Mayor of Worcester

It has been a quieter week, but I have been enjoying some of the feedback that I have received via letters and email.

The Hive Summer Reading Challenge was greatly appreciated by so many young people.

Thank you to all the brilliant parents who contacted me to let them know that their child had a brilliant time reading over the summer and receiving their award.

This is a fantastic challenge for young people in our city and I think it goes a long way to foster a life-long love of learning and reading.

I have had many emails from parents whose children I met revisiting Pitmaston Primary School.

It is really wonderful to be able to share my knowledge of local government and politics with young people.

I always try to do so in a way that is balanced and student led, answering their questions, rather than just talking at them.

I am so pleased to see all the parents who say their children, especially their daughters, have been inspired by my visit.

I very much appreciate parents taking the time to send that feedback to me. With all the brilliant young people I have met recently, I know that Worcester has an exceptional future ahead of it.

It was a great honour this week to be invited to speak to the Brownies, Rainbows, Girl Guides and Rangers at St Martins Church.

They asked some really interesting questions about my journey to becoming mayor, what it is like in local politics and the history of Worcester.

I also learnt a lot about their journey through guides and how it prepares them for life as well as things they would like to see in the city. Thank you to Caroline Hallam for organising the visit and allowing me to speak to such inspirational young people.

There are a few things coming up that I am looking forward to. This weekend will be Worcester City Pride, a fantastic celebration event for the work of LGBT+ people in our community.

This event is unusually in October this year, and to tie in with that they have set the theme as “spooky”.

I think there will be some brilliant outfits and costumes on display.

I often think about how lucky I am to be alive at this time, where events like this can happen in our city.

How lucky we are to have such a diverse range of people in our city who can go about their lives without fear and without oppression.

How lucky we are that Worcester is, in general, a safe space for everyone. I am looking forward to the celebration of history, art, performance, literature, politics and so much more.

It has been another busy week, with events ranging from graduations and films to reading, dancing and healthcare.

I had the pleasure of joining Heart of Worcestershire College for their graduation ceremony.

We met at the Guildhall before processing through the city to Worcester Cathedral in our academic and civic robes.

Graduations are always such joyful events. It is wonderful to see people celebrating all the hard work that has gone into earning their qualifications, surrounded by proud friends, family and tutors.

One of the fantastic things about Heart of Worcestershire is that their graduates span a broad range of ages.

They have a huge passion for upskilling and reskilling students at any point in life. The whole ceremony made me want to take on another qualification. Congratulations to everyone who graduated!

I also did something I never thought I would do, a flashmob. I am not a great dancer but it was for a great cause.

The event brought people together to celebrate National Fitness Day and raise money for Alzheimer’s Research UK, with the important message that “age is just a number”.

Alaric (my consort) and I did our best to keep up with the group and spent most of the event laughing.

It was brilliant to see different generations getting involved, having fun and getting moving together, even if we weren’t all perfectly in time. Thank you to Tania Skerit and her team at Berkley Care Group for organising the event.

Tuesday evening was the opening night of Worcester Film Festival. I love seeing events which bring visitors into Worcester and give us the opportunity to show off our city.

We started at the ODEON for the opening film before heading to Tonic for the reception.

It was so surreal watching the heart-warming and funny film, which featured Michael Sheen, and then being able to interview some of the lead actors at the end.

I really hope next year I am able to come and enjoy the whole five-day festival.

Finally, I visited The Hive for their Summer Reading Challenge medal ceremonies. More than 600 children completed the challenge this year, reading six books over their summer holidays.

As a former teacher, I love seeing children excited about reading and learning, and it was a privilege to help celebrate their achievement.

I also enjoyed talking to the children about all the characters they had met through books they had read.

Congratulations to every young reader who completed the challenge. I hope you discovered at least one book this summer that you will remember for years to come!

The BBC Hereford and Worcester Make a Difference Awards celebrate members of our community each year.

It was great to be invited along to the ceremony, to recognise so many people and meet so many new people receiving credit for the work they do. It would be difficult to calculate how many lives have been changed and hours have been volunteered by the people in the room that night. They are an inspiration to all.

I spent the weekend meeting some more wonderful people. Starting on Friday, Heritage Tours took place throughout the city, opening up many historic buildings to the public.

It was wonderful to show people around the Guildhall and tell so many stories about the place I grew up.

This brought many people from other cities and they were fascinated by our rich history.

Another event that brought many people to our city this weekend was Worcester Music Festival.

I have played the festival for the last nine years. It is brilliant every time.

Each year musicians, sound engineers and organisers give up their time to raise money for a charity. This year they have the same charity as me, Onside.

It was a great honour to open the festival, talk about all the fantastic work that Onside do and to play the first set of the weekend with my best friend, Keiran.

Thank you to everyone who works hard throughout the year for this weekend. I hope all the organisers are having a well-deserved break before starting again for the next one.

The heritage tours and the festival continued on Saturday, then the Worcester City Run was on Sunday.

Thank you to all of the organisers of the run for inviting me. So much time and effort goes this huge event, from setting up stalls, organising runners to getting many streets throughout the city closed.

It is greatly appreciated by the thousands of people who take part each year. My favourite part of the day was handing out prizes to the children. For many of them, this was their first formal race.

I am enjoying all of the events this year involving our local schools.

Before this year, I worked as a teacher so it is great to put these skills to use. I got to do so when Nunnery Wood students visited the Guildhall.

We showed them the building, let them compete in a quiz and then I allowed them to ask any questions they had.

Some of my favourite questions included “when can we get a pump track in Warndon”, “how much do you earn” and “where did you get your shoes from”.

I did my best to answer as many as possible.