Agenda item

The Executive Mayor will outline his priorities for the year ahead.

The Leader of the Opposition Group will be invited to respond.

The Borough’s first elected Executive Mayor, Jason Perry, congratulated the elected Civic Mayor on her election and said that he was looking forward to working with her over the coming year.

He said he wanted to start by thanking the Returning Officer and all the Council staff who had worked tirelessly to deliver the elections three weeks ago.  He said that, while the count had clearly taken longer than anyone had anticipated, the election was a historic moment for Croydon, and although close, all sides had agreed that the integrity and accuracy of the result was without doubt.

Executive Mayor Perry said that, to be sure lessons that were learned from the Borough’s first Mayoral election, he had asked the Chief Executive to commission an independent review of the election arrangements and count and was very pleased to have heard that this was already underway and he would ensure this was reported back to Full Council when it was complete.

Executive Mayor Perry said that next month’s by-election would be the first test and while the vacancy was a normal part of the Borough’s democratic process, he had asked for his mayoral salary to be reduced this year to cover the costs of running the by-election.

Executive Mayor Perry then went on to say that, like the referendum last year, the result of May’s election had sent a clear message that residents wanted change, with the election of the Borough’s first Green Party Councillors, the return of a Liberal Democrat Councillor after a period of absence and his election as Croydon’s first Executive Mayor, a Conservative Executive Mayor. Change was, he said, what the Borough’s residents wanted, and change was what its residents would see in the coming years.

He said that the Executive Mayoralty was a new start for Croydon, a much-needed chance to hit the reset button and to move on from the years of negative headlines and scandals that had blighted the borough.  This evening, he said, he wanted to set out the initial priorities for his administration to begin that change.

Executive Mayor Perry also spoke about the change he hoped Members could collectively make to the often fraught and divisive political culture seen over recent years.  He said that when he first became a councillor, and for many years following, the Council had a consensus.  He acknowledged there had been political theatre in the Chamber, but outside of the Chamber was where the constructive and collaborative work between parties to improve Croydon’s communities took place.  He said that that was not a culture more recently elected Councillors would have experienced but it was important for Croydon that it returned to a place of mutual respect for one another as it was what the residents wanted to see and had often been called for on the campaign trail.

He added that residents wanted to see the parties cooperating for the benefit of Croydon and had already met with each of the parties – Labour, Green and Liberal Democrat – and, as Executive Mayor that was a dialogue he would continue to have over his four years in Office.  Executive Mayor Perry said that he would maintain an open-door for all Councillors and after the summer, he would begin arranging a rolling programme of meetings with groups of Councillors to discuss the major issues in their wards and what the Council could do to improve their wards and the Borough.

Executive Mayor Perry said he would reintroduce estate walkabouts, led by the Deputy Executive Mayor and Cabinet Member for Homes, Councillor Hale, to give Councillors an opportunity to raise areas of improvement and to help prevent the kind of neglect which had led to the conditions in Regina Road going unchallenged for so long. 

Tonight, he said, he hoped the Council would collectively deliver another of his manifesto pledges and finally appoint a Chair of the Scrutiny Committee from an opposition party and he wished Councillor Rowena Davis well in her new role.

Executive Mayor Perry said that strong scrutiny made the decisions the Council made better, and he welcomed that critical challenge from members across the chamber. Indeed, he said, he hoped to discuss options for a greater role for pre-decision scrutiny once the new Chair was formally elected.

Executive Mayor Perry said he also wanted to build a bigger role for residents in the Council’s decision-making, learning from best practice to develop wider pre-decision engagement with local people, a Community Cabinet or something similar, to provide feedback on proposals before final decisions were made.

It was, he said, these changes to how business was done in this Council that would slowly rebuild trust in Croydon’s politics by opening up decision-making, working cross party and having independent Scrutiny and challenge.

Obviously, a key part of rebuilding trust is delivering on the Administration’s promises.

Executive Mayor Perry said that his priorities were clear and at June and July’s Cabinet meetings, the Administration would be taking the first steps to deliver the lasting change Croydon needed to see in order to rebuild residents’ pride in the Borough.

Executive Mayor Perry announced that the Council would reform its planning policies to prioritise design and stop forcing inappropriate and unwanted developments upon our communities. He said he had already begun the process of revoking the Planning Design Guide, SPD2, which was effectively a developers’ blueprint and allowed unsightly and unsuitable developments across the Borough. He added that a review of the Local Plan would also follow.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would get the regeneration of Croydon’s town centre back on track by working with partners like Westfield and Hammerson to re-energise the town centre and not by way of long policies and empty strategies but real action to improve Croydon, supporting local businesses and driving inward investment.  He said he had already met with Westfield and Hammerson to begin this work and hoped to have positive news to announce in the very near future.  It was, he said, this new investment that would create a destination for shopping, leisure, employment, education and culture, including putting Fairfield Halls back at the centre of Croydon’s local offer.  He confirmed that the Council would work with its district centres to ensure they had the tools to flourish and grow.

Executive Mayor Perry announced that the Council would reopen Purley Pool.He said that Purley would get its pool and leisure centre back. He acknowledged that this may take a little time but said it would breathe life back into the heart of Purley and it would allow schools to teach children to swim again, disability groups to thrive and charities to fund raise once again.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would clean up the Borough, which would deliver on his manifesto pledge to reinstate a graffiti removal service, increase grass-cutting and tidy up Croydon’s streets to once again make Croydon a place where people felt proud to live.  He said he had asked officers to focus grass cutting activity around known Jubilee events next week so that the Borough looked its best in order that residents could celebrate in style. He acknowledged that the Council must start to mend the many broken windows in the Borough since a borough that looked like no one cared, would continue to decline and the Council could not allow that to happen. 

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would tackle knife and violent crime and recognised that the tragic loss of five young lives last year was a tragedy. He said the Council would work with the police to make the Borough’s streets safe again and Public Space Protection Orders would be reintroduced in Croydon town Centre and New Addington and would work with the Borough’s schools and communities to tackle youth violence in the Borough.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would also promote, recognise and celebrate the positive contribution of so many of the Borough’s young people to its society.  He said that, only today, the Council had launched the George Floyd Race Matters Pledge and the Borough’s young performers and contributors were outstanding.  He said that Croydon had talent.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would end the scandal of Croydon being a slum landlord and recognised that the atrocious conditions laid bare at Regina Road had brought shame to the Borough. Sadly, he said, over a year later, residents were still living in sub-standard homes.  He said the Council would increase the pace of work to ensure standards across all its properties were improved and would work with residents to develop a plan for the long-term future of Regina Road. It would, he said, take time to reverse, but his administration would give the Borough’s housing tenants back their dignity.  He said that the culture of ignoring the Borough’s tenants must change and the Council would enshrine its commitment to a new culture in a new Tenants’ Charter, valuing its Council tenants, its customers, and giving them the responsive service, they needed and the respect they deserved.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would protect the most vulnerable in the Borough’s communities and would continue to invest the majority of its funding in services for vulnerable Adults and Children and ensuring those who often had the least were protected from the impact of savings and service changes wherever possible.

Executive Mayor Perry recognised that none of this would be possible unless the Council got a grip on its finances.He said that fixing the bankruptcy of the previous Administration would mean taking tough decisions to make the Council financially sustainable for the future.  He went on to say that, whilst the Budget agreed by the previous Administration only two months ago was balanced, holes were already emerging, which would need significant work and the Council still had very clear challenges ahead around Brick-by-Brick, Croydon Affordable Homes and parking income to name but a few.

Executive Mayor Perry said that, with the Council still being reliant on Government support to stay afloat, significant savings were still needed in coming years.  Financial discipline, he said, had to be a top priority not just for Cabinet but for every Member of this Council.  He said that the Council must achieve this through the transformation of its services working with its communities.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the Council would once again be one which listened to Croydon.  He said he would instil a new culture in the Council where its residents would no longer be treated as a nuisance but respected and that the Council would listen to their needs.

As Executive Mayor, he said he would be out and about across the whole Borough, Cabinet roadshows would return, and he would be holding face-to-face advice surgeries for the Borough’s residents.  The Council must, he said, be accessible and accountable to its residents since he and Councillors had been elected to serve them.

Executive Mayor Perry said that the agenda he had set out today was a response to the needs of the Borough’s residents and was the practical and positive change Croydon’s community needed to see.

In conclusion, Executive Mayor Perry said that this was a time of change for Croydon and a new start for the Council at the beginning of the journey to restore the fortunes of its great borough and make everyone proud of the place they called home.  He said that the election campaign had highlighted the strengths and diversity of the Borough’s communities.  As Executive Mayor, he said he wanted to end the years of division and to harness all the talents and voices of the Borough. Together, he said, everyone was stronger and together the change everyone knew Croydon needed, could be delivered.

Executive Mayor Perry said he looked forward to working with everyone to achieve that change.

Madam Civic Mayor Flemming invited the Leader of the Opposition Group, Councillor Stuart King, to respond.

Councillor King began by congratulating Madam Civic Mayor Flemming and Madam Deputy Mayor Bennett on their election to Office this evening.

Councillor King then extended his congratulations to Executive Mayor Jason Perry on his election as the Borough’s first directly elected Mayor and said that, as a lifelong Croydonian, no-one would doubt his commitment.

Councillor King said it was right that everybody, regardless of political party, acknowledged that and the significance of his election and the promise of better times, which half of the Members agreed could herald better times for its residents but that the proof would be in the pudding.

Councillor King said that returning Members in the Chamber might recall that he had spoken in the debate on the outcome of the referendum, which had led to the creation of the Executive Mayor’s post and in his speech he had said that the Council should be trying to ensure that the mayoral system flourished and succeeded, not just because Croydon voted for it but because its success, the Executive Mayor’s success, would be the Town’s success.  He said that he still stood by this today.  He said he thought it was an ambition that all Members and guests here today could all unite around and that whilst he might regret that his party’s candidate was unable to secure a victory, he was, nonetheless, both hopeful and determined that the mayoral system would deliver for Croydon, its businesses, and its residents.

Councillor King said he thought it was fair to say that there were some concerns that residents and others had about how mayoral systems could operate and, in particular, the potential for a concentration of power in one pair of hands at the expense of all the other elected Councillors, regardless of political party.

With regard to the Executive Mayor’s priorities, Councillor King said that much of this would be welcomed by Councillors and residents, including the independent review of the election count; his generous offer to forego some of his salary to meet the cost of the upcoming by-election; estate walkabouts and proposals to work with Members to enhance the role of scrutiny were all important steps which he thought all Members could agree on as ways forward for this Council. 

Councillor King also welcomed the Executive mayor’s announcement to review SPD2 Design Guide.  He said that the Labour Group Councillors would play an active role and support amendments to this policy to make it more acceptable to Croydon’s residents.

Councillor King said the Opposition Group welcomed the opportunity to act responsibly and constructively with the Executive Mayor as he sought to continue the efforts of the Council to tackle the scourge of knife crime and he looked forward to hearing how the Opposition group could play an active role in supporting him in that endeavour. 

Councillor King said he did not think that some of the concerns he had expressed would necessarily be restricted to his own party and he welcomed the new representatives from the Green and Liberal Democrat parties, as well as any other Members in the Chamber who had similar concerns.  He said that all Members had a mandate that brought them to serve on Croydon Council.  The Executive Mayor, he said, had a slightly larger mandate than most but recognised it was a very important one and he hoped that the Executive Mayor and his party colleagues would recognise that the election result was very close and ensure that, as an authority, the four parties represented on the Council could work constructively and effectively together.

Councillor King said that he welcomed Executive Mayor Perry’s indication that he wished to lead an authority where the political culture would change from the one many Members had found to be insidious over the past eight years and he very much looked forward to trying to play his part as the leader of the opposition to support that change.

In conclusion, Councillor King said that he wished Executive mayor Perry all the best as he took on his role on behalf of all of the Opposition Group.