Keep up to date with what the Executive Mayor of Mansfield, Andy Abrahams, is focusing on.
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Delivering on our election pledges
Our election pledges were to ‘Protect and Care for our Communities’ and regenerate our district while being financially responsible. The challenge is how do we show our residents through our actions that we are delivering on these pledges so that they see improvements in their lives?
The starting point for achieving our promises is having a sound financial plan because you need money to invest to make improvements. This is never a simple task, and local government finances remain in a fragile state after 14 years of neglect. We have all seen the headlines - one in five councils across the country are warning they may face bankruptcy in the next two years. But here in Mansfield, we have taken proactive steps to reduce our exposure to long-term risk. When we began setting last year’s budget, the projected deficit over three years stood at £5.4m. At the height of the cost-of-living crisis, we froze Council Tax when residents needed urgent relief because it was the right thing to do at that time, but that is not a sustainable position.
Through strong financial oversight and a focus on reducing our long-term deficit, we have halved that gap by:
- Carefully managing vacancies and staffing costs to avoid unnecessary redundancies.
- Finding efficiencies that protect core services without impacting frontline support.
- Making smart, sustainable choices that reduce our exposure to financial shocks in future years. We still have work to do, but this budget demonstrates progress and responsibility—not short-term fixes.
Across the country, we have a broken housing market; there are thousands of homeless people. This problem has occurred because for decades there has been under investment in affordable council homes, with a bias from the government towards private rented accommodation. This has led to rents being unaffordable for many and led to an unprecedented number of people becoming homeless.
In Mansfield, we currently have 4,600 on the housing waiting list, with 173 being in Band 1, the highest priority. To try to improve this situation, the council is taking part in an innovative scheme to reduce homelessness. Mansfield has been awarded a £188,000 Homelessness and Prevention grant to help alleviate some of the pressures. The scheme will support people registered with the council as homeless and living in temporary accommodation by funding rental deposits and the first advanced rent payment to private landlords. The Private Rented Access Scheme will enable us to work with landlords and create successful, long-term tenancies and reduce the cost of putting people in temporary accommodation such as hotels and bedsits.
This administration will always look to take whatever funding that we can get from central government to help the small businesses that are finding their way and the most vulnerable in our society. That is why I am so happy that we have been able to share over £131,000 to 15 community champions in our charitable sector with awards up to £15,000 to ensure they can continue to deliver vital support to our residents. The charities cover the broad spectrum across our district, including Ladybrook Enterprises, Community Transport, Family Action, Friends of Bellamy, Children’s Bereavement and Maun Refuge, to name a few. Our support for local businesses has led to Mansfield being named as the best place in England for supporting hospitality and the night time economy and the 8th best place to start up a business. We feel justifiably proud that we continue to ‘punch above our weight’ and deliver our pledges for our residents.
12 February 2025
Challenges and opportunities in 2025
The pace of change in local government seems relentless, and new challenges are continuously arising. This year’s draft financial settlement from central government and the National Insurance increases have left the council worse off by around £300,000; making balancing our budget deficit over the short and medium-term ever more challenging. We are up to the task and will succeed, but maintaining services with less money is extremely difficult.
The government is also embarking on a fast programme of local government reorganisation. The English Devolution White Paper, published just before Christmas, significantly impacts all the district councils in two-tier authorities like Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. The white paper advocates the creation of unitary authorities with populations of around 500,000, replacing existing district and county councils. This is with the aim to improve efficiency and accountability by reducing the number of politicians and focusing on delivering better services for residents. Although this is a laudable ambition, the concern is that local democracy will be greatly reduced. This is why it is so important that Mansfield has a strong voice, and we are vehemently opposed to the creation of a super-sized authority covering the whole of the county with a population of over 1.2 million people.
I have already and will continue to meet with the leaders of adjoining districts to formulate proposals focusing on place and identity, maintaining local democracy, and the funding and financial viability of any new authority. The government's proposals, which aim at establish mayoral authorities with enhanced powers over housing, planning, and transport, are even more complicated for Mansfield, as we are already part of the East Midlands County Combined Authority (EMCCA), which already has many of these powers. This was set up under the previous government with a regional mayor, Claire Ward, elected in May 2024.
We are hopeful that the substantial financial investment of £38 million annually into the East Midlands region over the next 30 years through EMCCA will be the catalyst for economic growth, job creation, and infrastructure development, benefitting the residents of Mansfield. Additionally, the £1.5 billion that was promised for transport investment should improve connectivity, reduce congestion, and enhance the efficiency of public transportation systems. I attend regular audit, and governance and standards meetings at EMCCA to scrutinise their strategic policy-making decisions to promote and influence from a Mansfield viewpoint.
In the meantime, I will continue our brilliant partnership working with the Mansfield Place Board, the Mansfield and Ashfield Business Network (MABN), the Mansfield Business Investment District (BID) and our team at the council to deliver our many regeneration and housing projects. The £18.6m Centenary Road project now has building contractor Mercer on site, aiming to deliver 77 high-quality, eco-friendly, and affordable council homes. The same contractor will be able to complete the next phase of the 22 council properties being built at Bellamy Road as soon as the fit-out of the new shops is completed. The £8.8m Future Tech and Skills Exchange development at West Notts College’s Chesterfield Road campus is progressing well. It is scheduled for completion in the summer, providing state of the art teaching facilities for 300 students delivering level three and above qualifications on STEM, construction, engineering and digital subjects.
Opportunity knocks everywhere with Mansfield’s new homegrown Chief Executive taking up his position at the beginning of February and Mansfield BID’s resounding victory vote bringing in a new five-year term, I am confident Mansfield, despite the ever-changing political times, is on the way up.
16 January 2025