The Mayor’s speech given at Mayor Making on 25 May 2024

Welcome to The Deputy Lord left tenant of Essex, Mrs Lorna Rolfe, The High Sheriff of Essex, Mr David Hurst, Invited guests and dignitaries, Fellow councillors, ladies and gentlemen.

It is an absolute honour and privilege to take up the role of mayor and I will do my utmost to serve the council and the community to the best of my ability and to uphold the high standards the office deserves.

I’m incredibly proud of our achievements, as a council, over the past few years.

We have an iconic, well maintained Town Hall which serves not only as council chambers but hosts events such as weddings, amature dramatics, comedy shows and even wrestling matches – was a bit noisy as we had a committee meeting below! But it does bring much need revenues for the council.

Also bringing in revenues is the newly completed project next door.  Through prudent financial management we were able to purchase the old Nat West bank building, and have transformed it into 3 self contained flats on the top floors, office space for council officers on the 1^st and prime retail space on the ground floor. I think this venture is a first for a council such as ours.

Our open spaces are sympathetically maintained balancing wild flower and natural habitats for wild life and space for the community to enjoy.

We have tourists coming to SW specifically to visit Bridge End gardens.

We  laid new paths across the common to improve the access to the town for people with mobility issues and families with buggies.

Our play areas have won awards for their high standards and we have recently updated the play equipment on the common  and the anglo playing fields. And we will continue to host free events on the open spaces and in the town square over school holidays and during the summer periods.

Using grant funding council is embarking on a programme to improve the Golden Acre community centre by  installing better thermal glazing and solar panels making it more sustainable. Golden Acre is already very well used by the community and these improvements should make it even more popular.

Last year we took over Jubilee Hub and in parternership wilh UKAN and EE we can offer a full week of activities from tea and coffee mornings through singing for fun, to a place for young people to chill and chat, providing wellbeing sessions to arts and crafts – something for everyone.

I am also very proud of our award winning council – our market has won multiple awards as has our market management team over recent years and we strive to continue to do so, not least by hosting popup markets such as for young traders.

The TIC hasn’t been left out either and not long ago was a finalist in the ‘Customer Excellence’ award, Last year the council itself won the Quality Gold Award  From National Association of Local Councils for being at the forefront of best practice and achieves excellence in governance, community leadership and council development.

Not forgetting our own Town Clerk who this year reached  the final shortlist of 5 for the clerk of the Year Award from National Association of Local Councils

But we face difficult challenges in the near future. The aftermath of covid, the national economy and the increasing financial burdens placed on all of us. These are the issues exercising us all at present. But a successful council is a prosperous one and we are using our financial stability to good effect, by renovating our community hubs and partnering with providers such UCAN and Enterprise East we are reaching out to those in need of support and help.

So in the forthcoming year we will continue to be innovative in maximising non-council tax income to deliver more projects for the community of SW. I want our Officers and councillors to come together as an integrated council with common goals and objectives to achieve even more.

But, of course, a lot of our achievements are not down to me but to the watchful eyes of past Mayors and I would like to thank Heather Asker for all her hard work over the past year not least of which was guiding and schooling me as Deputy Mayor. You may know this was her 3^rd term of office, and I think I’m right in saying that’s a new record !

Heater has also raised a huge £14k for her charities   —  It gives me great pleasure in presenting you with these flowers

On the subject of charities, I have chosen 2 which for me reach the widest spectrum of the community.

As we are all acutely aware, we face difficult challenges in the near future. The aftermath of covid, the strain on the national economy and the increasing financial burdens are the issues exercising us all at present.

With this in mind my first chosen charity is Citizens Advice, and I invite Kate Robson, CEO of Citizens Advice here in SW to briefly outline the challenges she is seeing.

Thanks

My second charity is MIND based here in the High Street and invite Craig Mcall to give a brief overview of the work they are doing.

Thankyou both and I look forward to everyone’s support in raising as much as we can to help those needing the organisations expertise

Thank you all and I would now like to invite you to make your way to St Mary’s Church.