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SHG invites all community members, business owners, and fishing sector stakeholders to participate in the public consultation on The Future of the Fishing Industry: Options for Policy, running from 21 September to 23 October 2026. No decisions have been made, and your views are essential to help shape future direction.
Upcoming Public Engagement Opportunities
- Thursday Pop-Up Stall: Stop by the stall outside the Canister every Thursday from 12:00 to 14:00 for four weeks, beginning Thursday, 24 September 2026. Speak directly with team members, ask questions, and pick up information.
- Public Meetings: Attend any of the three evening meetings held at The Museum at 19:00 on:
- Thursday, 24 September 2026
- Thursday, 1 October 2026
- Thursday, 8 October 2026
How to Review the Documents
- Online: Download the document from the SHG Public Information Page.
- Hard Copies: Available at the Jamestown Public Library and the Post Office.
- Background Reading: Review the plain-English summary via the Situational Analysis Summary or access the full report on the SHG Website.
Additional Ways to Submit Feedback
- Email: Send your comments to fisheries.consultation@sainthelena.gov.sh.
- Direct Contact: Reach Ann Muir at the Thursday pop-up stalls, at The Castle by calling 22470, emailing Ann.Muir@sainthelena.gov.sh, or visiting in person to arrange an individual meeting.
All consultation responses will remain confidential and will be cited anonymously in subsequent reporting.
The St Helena Government (SHG) wishes to inform the public that effective from 1 October 2026, a small 2% adjustment will be introduced for Health and Social Care service fees and charges. This modest adjustment will be applied gradually over the next three years to help support and protect our essential health services for everyone on the island. In addition to this there will also be an increase on commercial fees for this period.
Resident fees have remained fixed since April 2021. In the five years since, the cost of providing care has increased significantly, driven by global rises in medical supplies prices, rising freight charges, and the growing need for specialised overseas medical referrals. At present, patient fee contributions cover just 3.1% of the overall Health and Social Care running costs, with the remainder funded through Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) aid and local taxation.
To keep care affordable for our community, the modest 2% adjustment has been set purposefully low. It remains:
- Below St Helena’s local inflation forecast
- Below the cost increases faced by the NHS in the UK
- Well below the global average 10% annual rise in medical expenses
What the Changes Mean for Charges (Effective 1 October 2026)
- Prescription Fees: Moving from £2.60 to £2.65 per item (rising to £2.70 in 2027/28 and £2.75 in 2028/29) – a 5p increase year on year
- Hospital General Ward: Moving from £13.85 to £14.15 per day – a 30p per day increase
- CT Scan: Moving from £20.55 to £20.95 – a 40p increase
- Dental Examination: Moving from £10.30 to £10.50 – a 20p increase
- Social Care Services: A 2% adjustment, supported by ongoing hardship reviews to protect those who need assistance
Minister for Health and Social Care, Martin Henry, commented:
“Although this is a very modest adjustment and the first change since 2021, this decision was not taken lightly. We fully understand that households across St Helena are feeling the weight of rising living costs, and we know that no one wishes to see fees increase, especially when household budgets are tight.
However, with medical costs both locally and overseas growing far faster than our revenue, and with our community growing older and needing more complex care, taking no action would put the services we all depend on at risk. A 2% increase is the minimum necessary to help sustain our health service, and it remains far below the actual cost of delivering medicines and care to our residents.
Most importantly, I want to reassure everyone that no one will ever be turned away from receiving care because they cannot afford it. Strong, compassionate hardship provisions are in place to support anyone who needs them.”
Protecting Our Community and Supporting Those in Need
The Health and Social Care Portfolio recognises that any change, however small, can be stressful, particularly for residents, our elderly community, and families already working hard to manage daily expenses. We are fully committed to ensuring that no resident is left behind or without support:
- Anyone experiencing financial hardship can apply for a fee reduction or waiver through the Admissions Panel and Adult Support Team contactable at 25949.
- If prescription costs create genuine difficulty, cases can be referred for exceptional consideration to ensure necessary treatments remain available to you.
- Access to health and social care services will always be guided by clinical need, never by an individual’s financial situation.
- All existing safeguards remain fully in place, including free care for children under 16 years, and for young people aged 17–18 years in full-time education, and eligibility rules for resident rates.
#StHelena #HealthandSocialCare #Increaseincharges
St Helena Government (SHG) and Sure South Atlantic Limited (Sure) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), marking an important step towards a major upgrade of St Helena’s broadband and mobile networks.
SHG and Sure have been discussing the island’s longer-term future for communications for some time. Through 2025, detailed technical, commercial and legal talks took place with negotiations on a longer-term licence reaching an advanced stage in June 2025. Whilst agreement was not reached, work has continued looking at options for improving the domestic communications network.
The key development now is that SHG has secured funding to move forward with one of the more ambitious options identified during that process.
Funding is being brought together through the BIOT MoU and the United Kingdom Government-funded Economic Development Investment Programme (EDIP) for St Helena. As part of accessing EDIP funding, the infrastructure project will be developed in accordance with EDIP standards, governance, assurance and approval processes.
The MoU is an important milestone, but significant work remains before network upgrades can begin, including completion of the required EDIP assurance and approval processes, detailed technical and commercial work, contractual arrangements, licensing and planning approvals. The MoU sets the framework, but the contractual details for the network upgrade and a new communications licence still need to be agreed.
The option now being progressed includes a new Fixed Wireless Access broadband service together with a significant upgrade of the island’s mobile network.
A key principle of the proposed arrangements is that new network assets purchased through the publicly funded project would remain SHG-owned assets, recognising the importance of telecommunications infrastructure as part of St Helena’s critical national infrastructure. It is intended that the new network assets will be operated and maintained by Sure and will then be transferred to SHG at the end of the licence term, ensuring the investment remains for the long-term benefit of St Helena.
If successfully taken through the remaining approval, contractual and implementation stages, the proposed network upgrade is expected to deliver a substantial improvement over the existing network, with the potential to increase network capability from around 20 Mbps today to upwards of 300 Mbps.
This will provide significant benefits for households, businesses and public services, including improved opportunities for remote working, better access to cloud-based services and online markets, and increased capacity for areas such as education and healthcare.
Minister for Environment, Natural Resources and Planning and Economic Development, Karl Thrower, said:
“For several years I have said that our priority must be to maximise St Helena’s investment in the Equiano cable in the public interest. This has never just been about faster internet, or about who provides it; it is about ensuring that the people and businesses of St Helena receive the reliable, affordable and modern telecommunications services they need.
“The signing of this MoU is an important step forward and, importantly, it demonstrates our intention to move forward positively and constructively in partnership with Sure. But we also need to be clear about what today’s announcement represents. This is a significant milestone; it is not the end of the process.
“There is still a considerable amount of work ahead of us. The infrastructure project must now progress through the appropriate EDIP assurance and approval processes, detailed commercial and contractual work still has to be completed, and the future telecommunications licence remains a separate piece of work.
“We have learnt lessons from the journey that has brought us to this point, including the previous fibre network project. That makes it even more important that we proceed carefully, maintain proper governance and are open with the public about both the opportunities ahead and the work that remains to be done.
“The option we are now seeking to progress allows us to finally unlock much more of the potential of the fibre-optic cable. Better connectivity can support our businesses, education and healthcare, improve the resilience and efficiency of public services and open up entirely new economic opportunities for St Helena.
“Ultimately, however, the measure of success will not be the equipment we install or a headline broadband speed. It will be whether people across St Helena see better services, greater affordability and real improvements in their everyday lives. That is what SHG and Sure must now work together to deliver.”
Sure Chief Executive Alistair Beak said:
“We are incredibly proud to be continuing our long-standing partnership with the St Helena Government and to be entrusted with delivering this significant upgrade to the island’s telecommunications infrastructure. We have worked closely with SHG to develop the plans and secure the funding for this ambitious programme, which represents a major investment in St Helena’s digital future.
“This marks the beginning of a new era of connectivity for the island. The Equiano cable has brought enormous international capacity to St Helena; our focus now is on ensuring the community can fully realise its potential by building the high-quality, resilient network needed to connect homes, businesses and Government to it.
“Working with our local team on St Helena, we will deliver a new generation of broadband services offering speeds of hundreds of megabits, alongside a significantly enhanced mobile network and upgraded services for businesses and Government. Faster speeds, greater coverage and improved reliability will provide a significantly better experience for our customers and bring St Helena firmly into the modern digital age.
“Importantly, this is about much more than faster broadband. Better connectivity can create new opportunities for local businesses, support economic development and help enable the continued development of essential services such as education and healthcare. It will provide a digital platform from which St Helena can continue to develop for many years to come.
“We want to move quickly. A transformation of this scale will take time to deliver across the island, but our ambition is to begin deployment in early 2027 and for the first customers to start benefiting from the new network by the middle of the year. We look forward to working closely with SHG, our local team and the wider community to make that happen.”
The signing of the MoU enables SHG and Sure to progress the next stage of work on the proposed infrastructure project.
The current programme envisages implementation beginning 2027, with services being introduced progressively thereafter. These timings remain indicative and will be refined as the project progresses through the remaining approval and contracting stages.
The infrastructure project and the future telecommunications licensing arrangements are related but separate workstreams.
The MoU does not itself grant Sure a new communications licence. Future licensing arrangements will continue to be progressed separately under the Communications Ordinance 2025 and through the appropriate SHG legal, policy and regulatory processes.
SHG, Sure and the EDIP team will continue to work together on the infrastructure project, and further information will be provided as key approvals and milestones are reached.
#StHelena #Sure #Telecommunications
Please be advised that the Public Library will be closed on Wednesday, 16 September 2026.
The closure is to facilitate staff training.
Normal operations will resume on Thursday, 17 September 2026.
The MV Karoline is scheduled to arrive at James Bay on Thursday, 17 September at 06:00. Weather permitting, the vessel will berth alongside Rupert’s Jetty and cargo operations will commence as soon as practicable.
During this time, Rupert’s Cargo Management Facility, the beach, jetty, and Rupert’s Bay will be under Security Access Level 3, meaning these areas will be restricted to authorised personnel only.
Access will remain restricted until all cargo operations are completed and the vessel has departed.
Once the vessel leaves, security will reduce to Access Level 2, at which point only the Cargo Management Facility will remain restricted during normal working hours (08:00 – 16:00).
The beach, jetty, and Rupert’s Bay will reopen to the public and can be accessed via the public walkway beginning at Liberation House or via the Ferry Service (charges apply).
After working hours, the Security Access Level reduces to Level 1, whereby vehicular access is allowed through the facility.
St Helena Port Control thanks the public for their cooperation and understanding.
The St Helena Government (SHG) wishes to inform the public of the formal conclusion of the historic arrangement with Samaritans to provide emotional support services to the residents of St Helena.
This arrangement was originally established in 2015 following an inquiry into local services, enabling free calls from St Helena to be directed to Samaritans in the UK and Ireland.
Following recent public enquiries regarding the availability of this service, Samaritans has formally advised SHG that due to operational policy changes implemented over recent years, they are no longer able to maintain international support agreements.
Samaritans operates under a policy that limits its listening services exclusively to individuals located within the UK and Ireland. This policy is grounded in legal safeguarding requirements and the vital operational need for volunteers to be able to coordinate directly with local emergency services to safeguard callers in critical situations.
Calls from St Helena will no longer be answered by Samaritans branches. Anyone attempting to call the free helpline from St Helena will hear an automated message directing them to seek support services within their own jurisdiction.
SHG extends its gratitude to Samaritans for their historic partnership and support over the years.
The St Helena Government remains fully committed to supporting the emotional health and well-being of our community. We are actively exploring alternative support options for the island and want to reassure residents that dedicated local emotional support, social care, and health resources remain readily available to anyone in need through the Health and Social Care Portfolio.
The Mental Health Support Team can be contacted by telephone at:
- 22593 (during office hours)
- 22500 (for out-of-hours or urgent on-call support)
#StHelena #Samaritans #Support
The public are advised that a period of strong winds is forecast to affect St Helena from 21:00 UTC on Wednesday 16 September 2026 through to 18:00 UTC on Thursday 17 September 2026.
Upper winds are expected to be 22-27 KT through Wednesday, before quickly increasing overnight to 27-32 KT. The strongest winds are currently expected during Thursday morning.
A period of strong winds is expected, with occasional surface gusts of 30-35 KT and choppy sea conditions at times. There remains a low likelihood of peak gusts reaching around 40 KT, particularly in exposed locations.
Care should be taken when walking or hiking, particularly in exposed areas. Residents are advised to secure any loose items that could be blown away, such as wheelie bins and outdoor equipment.
Boat owners should ensure that vessels are securely tied to their moorings. Motorists are advised to exercise caution when driving, particularly on exposed roads and routes prone to strong crosswinds. Motorists should also remain alert for loose debris on roads.
The Emergency Planning Department and Met Office will continue to monitor the situation. Further updates will be issued as necessary should the forecast change.
The Highways Authority has approved a temporary road closure along the section from Bates Branch to the Junction at Stitches Ridge, St Pauls.
This closure is required to allow the Roads Section to carry out essential surface maintenance. During this period, the Forestry Section will also take the opportunity to fell trees along the route to ensure public safety and minimise future disruptions.
Closure Details
Dates: Monday, 21 September 2026 – Monday, 5 October 2026
Hours: 09:00 to 15:00 daily
Days: Monday through Friday (No weekend closures)
Traffic and Diversion Information
Traffic travelling to and from Sandy Bay should use the standard diversion route via Stitches Ridge Road to Lemon Tree Gut. Full access will be granted to emergency vehicles at all times, with safety protocols in place to allow the work crews sufficient time to clear the roadway upon approach.
Appropriate traffic management signs will be in place to assist motorists.
The Roads Section thanks the public in advance for their cooperation, patience, and understanding while these critical infrastructure and maintenance works are completed.
The St Helena Government (SHG) will publish a discussion document, The Future of the Fishing Industry: Options for Policy, on 18 September 2026 to support consideration of the future direction of the island’s fishing industry.
The document sets out a range of policy options for consideration by the Minister and the public. It is important to note that no decisions have yet been made regarding which options, if any, will be recommended by the Minister. The paper is intended to inform discussion and consultation and does not make recommendations.
The publication marks the beginning of a public consultation period, which will run from 21 September 2026 to 23 October 2026. Copies of the document can also be found in the library and the post office.
SHG is encouraging all interested parties, including members of the fishing industry, businesses, community groups and the wider public, to review the document and provide their views on the options presented.
The document can be accessed online at: https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/app/uploads/2026/09/Future-Of-The-Fishing-Industry-Options-For-Policy.pdf
You can participate in the consultation through any of the following options:
- Send your feedback and responses to fisheries.consultation@sainthelena.gov.sh.
- Attend one of three public meetings at The Museum at 19:00 on Thursdays: 24 September, 1 October, or 8 October 2026.
- Visit the stall outside The Canister every Thursday from 12:00 to 14:00 for four weeks, starting 24 September 2026.
- Reach Ann Muir at The Castle by calling 22470, emailing Ann.Muir@sainthelena.gov.sh, or visiting in person to arrange a meeting.
All responses received during the consultation period and referred to in the revised options for policy document will be confidential and referred to anonymously.
There is also a plain English public summary of the Situational Analysis of St Helena Fishing Industry which informed the options for policy at https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/app/uploads/2026/08/FRSA-Public-Summary-260813.pdf and the full Situational Analysis document is available at https://www.sainthelena.gov.sh/documents/Situational-Analysis-of-the-St-Helena-Fishing-Industry.pdf.
SHG welcomes public participation in this important consultation and looks forward to hearing your views on the future of the fishing industry.
#StHelena #FishingIndustry #PublicConsultation
Her Excellency the Governor, Belinda Lewis was sworn in this afternoon in front of the Court House in Jamestown. The Chief Secretary and Head of Public Service, Mr Ian Todd OBE, read the Royal Commission, before the Sheriff of St Helena, Mrs Ethel Yon OBE, administered the Oaths of Office and gave the Address of Welcome. The Chief Minister, Dr Rebecca Cairns-Wicks MBE, read a welcome address and spoke about welcoming Governor Belinda Lewis and her family to St Helena, celebrating the island’s community resilience, acknowledging key developmental opportunities alongside ongoing socioeconomic challenges, and emphasising the importance of a constructive partnership between St Helena and the UK. The Rt Rev, The Lord Bishop of St Helena, Dale Bowers MBE gave a prayer and blessing.
In her Inauguration Address, Her Excellency commented:
“It is a great honour to serve the people of St Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha on behalf of our Sovereign, His Majesty King Charles the Third. I can assure you that I will strive to discharge the responsibilities incumbent on me as Governor to the best of my ability (…) and serve you with diligence, integrity and respect.”
“I am looking forward to working closely and constructively with the Chief Minister and the elected Government in a strong spirit of partnership. St Helena has a long, proud history and a promising future: I want to celebrate this and am ready to play my part to advance the interests of the communities we are all here to serve.”
Governor’s Inauguration Speech
Photos
From left to right: Mrs Debbie Yon, HE the Governor Ms Belinda Lewis, and Major Anthony Galvin, USMC (Retd.).
The Chief Secretary and Head of Public Service, Ian Todd OBE, reading the Royal Commission
HE the Governor Belinda Lewis signing the Oaths of Office, administered by the Sheriff of St Helena, Mrs Ethel Yon OBE.
The Chief Minister, Dr Rebecca Cairns-Wicks MBE, welcoming HE the Governor Belinda Lewis and her family to St Helena.
Invited guests attending the inauguration ceremony.
HE the Governor Belinda Lewis being introduced to Guides from the St Helena Girl Guide Association
1st Jamestown Scouts marching
#StHelena #Governor #InaugurationCeremony