Active citizenship

Active kids

Active citizenship starts young and last Saturday’s Children’s Parade, kicking off the May Brighton Festival, was a fantastic example of this. The wonderful creations that schools, parents and children had made on the theme of 'taking flight' was a real inspiration.  The Festival director, Ali Smith, shared with me her wonder and delight at the spectacle  and the wide engagement that was on display on New Road. How wonderful to see children claiming the streets and Brighton & Hove revealing itself as a child and family friendly place to live, work and visit.  

Hove Museum

The theme of active citizenship continued into election day. After further preparations, training and anticipation, election morning brought me to Hove Museum to cast my vote and to meet the polling staff wearing my Returning Officer hat. 

Me at Hove Museum 

As an added bonus I met Sylvia and her dad. Sylvia was also casting her vote and I was delighted that she and her dad agreed to be photographed with her home-made ballot paper in front of one of the wonderful, magical machines currently on display in Hove Museum. 

Sylvia casting her vote

Hove Museum as a polling station must be one of the best polling stations in the UK. In order to cast your vote you had to pass by these wonderful Rowland Emett creations. Emett was the creator famously of the fabulous flying car in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and at the moment you can see other fantastic inventions. Sylvia was delighted to pose infront of her chosen one. It seems to me it can only be a good thing to start to introduce children to the notion of democracy and active citizenship and that’s what Sylvia’s dad was doing. I visited a number of other polling stations through the day and was struck by the enthusiasm of our polling staff and the seriousness with which they had taken up my challenge. It was that we must be the most voter friendly place encouraging everybody to be able to participate fairly and freely in both the national and local elections.

One of Rowland Emett's creations

About Rowland Emett

Another of Rowland Emett's creations

Promoting the Festival at Hove Museum

Parliamentary elections count

After a rehearsal at the Brighton Centre on Thursday afternoon my trustee count supervisory team went off to get a little rest in preparation for a very long night into morning.

Our count supervisory team

Abraham, Paula and me dressed for the evening

At the start of the evening

We assembled at the count mid evening and then began, for me, a whirl of press discussion and oversight of the complicated arrangements that achieve the delivery of a safe, credible election result. This year our Elections and Communications teams prepared a really helpful leaflet on the election process and we held to our value of openness in making sure that everybody at the count was aware of the stages of the process that we were engaged in.  

Busy counting

On stage at the Brighton Centre

Announcing Brighton Kemptown results

Announcing Hove results

Announcing Brighton Pavilion results

Just some of the media pack at the Brighton Centre

In the end, the exercise that involves checking and verifying postal votes and the overall voting numbers was not complete until past 3am.  Some counting of votes had begun by 2am, but the first result I was able to announce was Brighton Kemptown result at 6.50am this morning. This was followed fairly closely by first the Hove constituency and then Brighton Pavilion. As you will know we now have a Conservative, a Labour and a Green MP representing our three constituencies. The average turn out for the election was over 70%. There were no requested recounts and all candidates declared themselves confident in the results and complimented all of our count staff and elections team on the committed and effective work they had done. 

I would like to lend my profound thanks to everybody who worked so tirelessly to bring the Parliamentary Election to a safe conclusion. In particular, I would like a mention for my Executive Leadership Team and colleagues from the Corporate Management Team who became count supervisors and added so much to the effective running of the night and morning. I must also acknowledge the fantastic work of our Communications team who again worked all through the night and ensured that the huge press pack who were with us were properly informed and supported throughout the event.  

Local elections count

It all starts again tomorrow morning with the count for the Local Government elections and I’ll update you when that is done. Clearly I am the most politically restricted person in the city. My first and only focus is on ensuring a free and fair election and the certainty that everyone is able to exercise their right to vote, which was so hard fought for. So back to active citizenship starting young; I hope that Sylvia will be inspired to take an interest in local and national democracy and to properly cast her ballot when the time comes. Until then I know that George, her stuffed rabbit, will have been delighted to have been her chosen vote!  

The end of the Ofsted inspection

Finally for all of those not involved in the elections, thank you for keeping our services going and to all of those in Children’s Services both in the council, and in our partner agencies thank you for keeping going through the gruelling four weeks that Ofsted have been inspecting us.  Today marks the end of that inspection and I very much hope that we’ve done ourselves justice and revealed ourselves to be committed to further learning and improving ensuring a good life for all our children and young people.

Thank you and all the best
Penny

Tuesday 12 May update:

After a long day counting on Saturday we have now announced the results of the local election. Thank you to all the staff who helped again at the Saturday count, may of whom had also worked on Thursday night. I am proud to say that we delivered a safe election for the city.

I will now meet the three group leaders on Wednesday to discuss the new administration. 

Care and collaboration

Last Sunday was a wonderfully warm day and I interrupted a walk with my elderly father to meet Kevin Watts, jet washer and graffiti remover who was cleaning one of our beach shelters. I was caring for my Dad and Kevin was caring for our wonderful city and keeping it bright and clean.

Kevin Watts

The theme of caring was very present when I visited the Child Development and Disability Service on Monday morning and met a range of health, education and social care staff and two of the parents whose children they work with. Reza Ataie and Debbie Collins both powerfully told their stories of coming to terms with children with profound disabilities and needing to turn to specialist services to support and help them provide a quality of life for their children and their families. 

Reza could not speak too highly of the care that his family is now receiving from their social work resource officer, Matthew Howson, from Downs View School and the services based at Seaside View, our Child Development and Disability Service. He spoke of ‘good services, friendly advice’ and gave this recommendation to others who need to turn for help: ask politely, know what you want, don’t take no for an answer. Turning to Matthew he told me: “this young chap has been instrumental in our family turning the corner”. What a fantastic testimony.  

Reza Ataie and Matthew Howson

Equally Debbie spoke so positively of Seaside View and the support which she received. In particular she mentioned the voluntary organisation Extra Time, who she described as brilliant. She said: “what made the difference was the overnight break away from home, where my daughter received amazing care. This has transformed our lives” Debbie told me.  

Debbie Collins

At the end of our morning we all heard about the disability review which is being launched to look at both improving services to families and also making value for money savings. The review is ambitious in its scope and everyone in the room was enthusiastic about making further improvements, engaging young people and families. The review gets underway in June and is expected to report in December of this year.  

From hearing and being inspired by this caring and collaboration I went straight over to Sussex County Cricket Club to participate in the signing of an agreement to work together between Brighton University and the cricket club. 

Sussex Sharks mascot and Pete the Panter, Brighton University's mascot

Mascots with vice chancellor of Brighton Univeristy, Julian Crampton
and SCCC chief executive, Zac Toumazi

Tuesday saw the inaugural meeting of the Greater Brighton Economic Board which has been formed to deliver the aspirations of our City Deal and economic development projects across the Greater Brighton area. The meeting was held against the backdrop of Brighton & Hove Albion football stadium.  Once again Brighton University was round the table, with leaders from Adur, Worthing, Lewes, Mid Sussex District and of course Brighton & Hove City Council.  Our leader, Jason Kitcat, chaired the meeting.  This ambitious board is going to oversee the delivery of millions of pounds of projects across the Greater Brighton area. It has a forward plan which will look at the visitor economy, the economic outlook, travel to work and travel to learn, training our people, learning from key cities, inward investment and other topics.

That night I returned to caring responsibilities and met my sons in London.  I thought you would enjoy the glorious views of South Bank from the Golden Jubilee bridge.

In case you weren’t aware this week is Carers Week and I was privileged to go and meet some carers and professionals at the carers event at Brighthelm centre on Wednesday. The new Mayor was also there. I heard from carers about their appreciation for the Carers Centre and carers services which support them to maintain loved ones at home, even when in very difficult circumstances.  For this event all sorts of professionals were taking an hour or two out of their busy working days to just go and listen to the stories of carers. Those I spoke to found it a moving and valuable learning experience to be the listeners. The carers I spoke to very much appreciated being listened to, being valued and having somewhere to turn to. 

New mayor Brian Fitch with a resident

On Wednesday evening Sajid Javid MP, Minister for Culture Media and Sports, came to visit Brighton Festival and the Pavilion and I was asked to come and be part of the walk around.

Andrew Comben, Sajid Javid with our guides

The Minister took a real interest in the Royal Pavilion and benefited from a very informative tour from one of the resident guides.  The journalist Polly Toynbee, who is chair of the Brighton Festival & Dome, Andrew Comben, its chief executive, and I were able to tell the Minister about our vision for a reunited Royal Pavilion, Dome and gardens providing the beating heart at the centre of our fabulous city. Once again the themes of collaboration and caring shone through this visit.  

As this is also European elections week, I am writing this while the ballot boxes are being returned to Hove Town Hall for safe storage. We will verify the number of votes cast on Friday morning before counting the votes on Sunday afternoon. This evening I visited some of our polling stations and was universally greeted by enthusiastic polling staff who reported that they had been kept quite busy through the day. The team at Hove Library were happy to be photographed and you see here Sue Coleman, presiding officer and Claire Penfold, polling clerk.  

Claire Penfold and Sue Coleman

Clare Wardle, electoral services manager

At St Philip’s church hall I met a mother with her young daughter. The mother was telling her daughter about the suffragettes  and how women had won the vote and the importance of using the opportunity to vote. I couldn’t agree more.

Finally then, just a word of thanks to those of you who responded to my call for suggestions on improving recycling. I can assure you that the service is already discussing your ideas and I am particularly grateful to one of our street cleaners who sent me a long and very constructive email which I really appreciated and have followed up on. 

All the best
Penny