Valerie Mainstone: a campaigner who remains a true colossus

(This item first appeared in the Brighton Argus on 1st May 2024)

It takes some courage, in one’s mid-40s, to go to university. It takes some attitude to then get involved in student politics. And it takes someone of extraordinary ability and personality to become the oldest person to be elected as President of the Students’ Union. But then Valerie Mainstone was, and still is, a one-off.

Valerie Mainstone (front) at the unveiling of a blue plaque in Montpelier Crescent for Elizabeth Robins and Octavia Wilberforce

Forty years later, Valerie continues to make her mark and be noticed. In our society, women, especially those who are retired, can become invisible. But not Valerie. At just under five feet tall, she stands out from the crowd, including at women’s events and public occasions such as the recent unveiling of the plaque in St Michael’s Place, Brighton, to commemorate the life of Mary Hare (the pioneering teacher of deaf children and campaigner for women’s right to vote). Valerie, as is her custom on such occasions, wore a suffragette outfit. 

Now in her mid-80s, she does not stop, campaigning for the NHS, in the peace movement through the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, and as a founder member of the Brighton Women’s History Group. So who is this remarkable woman?

Born in Edinburgh in 1941, she and her family moved to Southwick when her father was posted overseas during the war. An early memory was of standing on the one part of the beach at Southwick that hadn’t been closed and fortified to hinder a German invasion. Looking out across the Channel, she said to herself that one day she would go to France.  The war itself was to have a lasting impact on her. Even today she can’t stand the sound of police or ambulance sirens. “It chills me to the bone”, she told me. 

Valerie, her youngest sister and her Mainstone cousins have inherited a mutation of the BRCA1 gene, a condition which affects more women than men in her family. The BRCA1 gene protects one from getting certain cancers, but some mutations prevents them from working properly. If you inherit one of these mutations, you are more likely to get breast, ovarian, and other cancers. She speaks of her huge relief that she did not pass on the mutations to her son and daughter, and so her four granddaughters and two great-grandsons are free from this particular risk.

Valerie did well at school but had her mind set on getting married, which she did at 19 much to her mother’s disgust. She worked as a shorthand typist for the Federation of British Industries where her fluency in French and German saw her working with the Oversees Director of the Federation. It was at the Federation that she met people who had been members of the French Resistance during the war, thus deepening her Francophile tendencies that started on that beach in Southwick.

She worked at a local dairy where, she says, sexual harassment was endemic. It reenforced her belief in union membership.  A Workers’ Education Association course was the start of her academic aspirations. 

When she divorced her husband in the early 1980s, she enrolled as a mature student at the University of Sussex studying European History with French. Her year abroad was in Marseilles where she researched and wrote her dissertation ‘Professional Equality of Women in the Sugar Refinery In Marseilles’ for which she won the prestigious Peggotty Freeman Memorial Prize for the Best Year Abroad Dissertation. And it was at Sussex University that she was elected as President of the Students’ Union which is where I first met her, even though I was not a student.

After graduation she worked for Women Against Sexual Harassment where she continued her advocacy work and gave talks at schools, universities and workplaces. She spoke at a conference in Paris on the fight against sexual harassment, surprising the organisers by delivering her speech in fluent French.

Today she remains as active as ever. Her diary is much busier than mine, as I discovered when we tried to find time to meet. After our meeting, she had to dash off to a demonstration outside Hove Town Hall. In the previous fortnight I had seen her at an event where she was dressed as a suffragette, and at the International Women’s Day event at the Corn Exchange where she spent time staffing three stalls, for Sussex Save the NHS, the Brighton Women’s History Group, and the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal.

Many people do their bit to make this world a better place. By comparison, Valerie’s activism is that of a colossus.  

“Doing good in Brighton”: honouring the educationalist and suffragette Mary Hare

(This item first appeared in the Brighton Argus on 27th March 2024)

When I was a councillor in the 1980s, I used to love door-knocking, both during election campaigns and throughout the year. But there was one exception, a street I never enjoyed visiting: St Michael’s Place in central Brighton. It was inevitably windy and raining. I was back in St Michael’s Place last Saturday. Not only was there a bitterly cold west wind, and not only did it rain, there was a most dramatic hailstorm the likes of which I have seldom experienced in England.

But Saturday was different. It was an uplifting and joyful celebration of the life of Mary Hare, a suffragette, the founder of an independent women’s police force in Brighton and, most importantly, a pioneering teacher of deaf children. The Mayor, Cllr. Jackie O’Quinn was there, the Brighton and Hove Bus that bears the name ‘Mary Hare’ was incongruously parked in this side street, and at least half those present were communicating through sign language. They were all there to witness the unveiling of a blue plaque to commemorate the life and work of Mary Hare.

17 St Michael’s Place was Mary’s home from 1895 to 1901, and was one of the sites of the school she had founded. According to the programme prepared for the unveiling, “Mary was ahead of her time in championing the rights and wellbeing of deaf children and women” and was “a revolutionary campaigner for the inclusion in society and education of deaf children who, at that time, were often abandoned in asylums, or considered by some as unworthy of education.”

Mary was a committed suffragette and a contemporary of Mary Clarke, the sister of Emmeline Pankhurst, Brighton resident and organiser, and the first suffragette to die for women’s right to vote. There is currently a campaign to have a statue of Mary Clarke erected in the gardens of the Royal Pavilion to commemorate her life and work. 

The Brighton Gazette of 1908 reports that Mary Hare chaired a Women’s Social and Political Union meeting on Queen’s Road where she said that suffragettes “were going to rouse Brighton”. In 1913 she became secretary of the Brighton Women’s Freedom League, which was prepared to break the law, but rejected violence.

In 1915 Mary Hare set up a volunteer uniformed women’s police force, much against the wishes of the local constabulary, to assist Brighton and Hove’s women and children. An article in the Brighton, Hove and South Sussex Graphic entitled  ‘Bobby – the Woman Policeman’ records her work and describes Mary as looking “particularly smart in her uniform and bowler hat”. Times have moved on and one of the speakers at the unveiling of the blue plaque in St Michael’s Place was Superintendent Petra Lazar from Sussex Police.

Her true passion, however, was as an educationalist for deaf children. She said that her efforts on behalf of these children “have been my greatest joy in life.” She established, originally in London, the Private Oral School for Deaf Children in 1895, taking mixed pupils of all ages from across the country. In 1916 the school moved to larger premises in Sussex, and then to Berkshire, where the Mary Hare Grammar School for the Deaf still operates.

A past student of the Mary Hare Grammar School is Brighton-born Margaret Stewart who lives with her husband John in Patcham. Margaret single-handedly set about fundraising for the blue plaque to recognise the pioneering work of the remarkable Mary Hare. ‘Remarkable’ can also be said of the formidable Margaret Stewart who herself should be seen as an inspiration to us all. She might be small in stature but she has displayed a steely determination to honour Mary Hare.

While Margaret was the driving force behind securing the blue plaque for Mary Hare, others have supported her including the influential Brighton Women’s History Group. Present, too, at the unveiling was the current Head of the Mary Hare School for the Deaf in Berkshire, Robin Askew, and the force of nature that is Victoria Garcia from Brighton and Hove Buses who does so much to ensure that the names of more of the daughters of the city are celebrated on our buses. 

About the independent police force, Mary Hare said that “we are out to do good work in Brighton, and we have had unsolicited testimonials to the effect that we have done good.” This could be said about all of her life’s work. It can also be said of Margaret Stewart, and those words should be a challenge to the rest of us “to do good in Brighton.”

Who from Brighton’s past should we be remembering? The film ‘Vindication Swim’ recalls the achievements of the amazing Mercedes Gleitze

(This item first appeared in the Brighton Argus on 13th March 2024)

Brighton has a poor record of preserving the memory of those who have gone before. How many Brightonians, not least those who are recent arrivals, know who Herbert Carden, Dorothy Stringer or Lewis Cohen were? And why should they? The City Council does little to commemorate these and other individuals who helped make the city what it is. The Argus remembers them, and Brighton and Hove Buses names significant people from Brighton’s past on its buses and on a special website. It should be commended for this.

From time to time I write about people I have known who have died, people like Selma Montford, Dennis Hobden, Ruth Larkin, Bernie Jordan and Bob Cristofili. Mary Clarke is the ‘forgotten suffragette’ in spite of being Emmeline Pankhurst’s sister. Mary ran the Brighton office of the Women’s Social and Political Union. She died on Christmas Day 1910 from a brain haemorrhage probably caused by rough treatment at the hands of the police and prison authorities immediately before her passing. There is no memorial for Mary other than her name appearing on the front of a Brighton bus. There is now a campaign to have a statue of Mary Clarke erected in the gardens of the Royal Pavilion estate. 

Another long-forgotten Brightonian is Mercedes Gleitze. She was born in Brighton who, in 1927, became the first British woman to swim the English Channel. Her swimming achievements were not ‘limited’ to that. She is believed to be the first person to swim the Straights of Gibraltar and was the first person to swim to Robben Island and back to Cape Town, a sea I know well as I was brought up there and can testify to the currents and coldness of those waters.

After nearly 100 years during which time she had become largely forgotten, her legacy is now secure through a film that went on general release last Friday, deliberately coinciding with International Women’s Day. The film, Vindication Swim, features the amazing Kirsten Callaghan and the equally impressive John Locke. Remarkably, it was written and directed by a 23-year-old Brightonian, Elliott Hasler. If you warch just one film this year, make sure it’s Vindication Swim.

With Kirsten Callaghan and John Locke (I’m the one who didn’t dress up for the occasion!)

After a special screening of the film on International Women’s Day at Brighton’s Duke of York cinema, a cinema that Mercedes herself had visited, Kirsten Callaghan, John Locke and Elliott Hasler answered questions from the audience. Kirsten described some of the discomforts and challenges faced by Mercedes which she, too, had experienced. For example, she wore a heavy 100-year-old one-piece bathing suit. The leather in the goggles she used bled, resulting in a disgusting taste seeping into her mouth. On one occasion she was in the water for four hours, with the salt affecting her mouth and sense of taste. Elliott, too, spent lengthy periods filming in the water, but he had the protection of a wetsuit! John, on the other hand, stayed in a small support boat as had his character, Harold Best, who had coached Mercedes.

All the scenes in the sea were filmed off the south coast. No use was made of stage tanks nor ‘green screen’ technology where subjects can be superimposed onto virtual backgrounds. 

Back to Mercedes herself. Her first endurance swimming record was for 26 hours. Over several years she extended this record to 45 and, subsequently, 46 hours. She had become a popular and famous personality, and when she undertook these endurance swims in public swimming baths, crowds would attend and encourage her by singing together.

Most of Mercedes epic swims, including her world records for endurance swimming, were sponsored.  She used her sponsorship and winnings to open accommodation for homeless people, particularly homeless women, with the first Mercedes Gleitze Home opening in Leicester in 1933. The charity bearing her name continues to operate providing accommodation for homeless people but, sadly, not in Brighton. She helped unemployed people to move from the north to Leicester where there were jobs. She is also said to have supported the extension of the franchise to women below the age of 30 in 1928.

Towards the end of her life, Mercedes became increasingly reclusive. She denied her past achievements and would not discuss them with her family.  She died in1981 in London aged 80. There is now a blue plaque commemorating this daughter of Brighton at the house in Freshfield Road where she was born in 1900.

I hope that in future more Brighton women, perhaps not as exceptional as Mercedes Gleitze, can be remembered for their own extraordinary achievements.

Mary Clarke: The Forgotten Suffragette

(This item first appeared in the Brighton Argus on 22nd March 2023)

Women’s History Month is celebrated in March each year. Over recent times there have been moves to recognise the achievements Brighton and Hove women, from the earliest suffragettes, early women physicians like Louisa Martindale (after whom the new wing at the Royal Sussex County Hospital has been named), women involved in sport such as Clare Connor, Sally Gunnell, and the magnificent women at Lewes FC.

Maquette of Mary Clarke by Denise Dutton (photo credit: Andrew Hasson)

There is one woman in particular who should be recognised and lauded by the City. She is Mary Clarke, the Brighton organiser of the Women’s Political and Social Union. She was a quiet, modest woman who never sought the limelight, but who was fearless in the face of male aggression.

She was assaulted and arrested on Black Friday in 1910 when police officers physically and sexually assaulted suffragettes outside Parliament. She was imprisoned in Holloway, went on hunger strike and was force-fed. She was released from prison two days before Christmas 1910 and died at the home of her brother on Christmas Day from a brain haemorrhage, probably caused by her treatment at the hands of the authorities.

There is a local campaign to have the life of Mary Clarke recognised by a statue, ideally in the grounds of the Royal Pavilion Estate where she and her fellow suffragettes held their meetings. Brighton and Hove has two statues of named women. Both of them are Queen Victoria. Now must be the time for a statue for Mary.

The Chair of the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal, Jean Calder, explains why recognising the ‘forgotten suffragette’ is so important: “Mary was the first suffragette to die for women’s right to vote, yet there is no public memorial for her anywhere in the country. 

“Despite her sacrifice – and the fact she was Emmeline Pankhurst’s sister and close companion – she is not even one of the fifty-nine suffrage campaigners commemorated on the plinth of the 2018 statue of Millicent Fawcett in Parliament Square. The names of her sister and her three Pankhurst nieces, Christabel, Sylvia and Adela, are there. There are even three named men. But Mary’s name is absent.

“Though Mary was known for her gentleness and was not physically strong, she was extraordinarily brave. At a time when domestic violence was condoned and divorce a matter of shame, she had escaped an abusive marriage during which she experienced  destitution and homelessness. Thereafter she dedicated her life to the struggle for women’s suffrage.”

Fast-forward to 2023 and another group of pioneering women have made a comeback. In the late 1970s and early 1980s it was rare to find all-women music groups. This was the era of punk, New Wave, and Two Tone music. In Brighton a group of lesbians called, at different times, the Devil’s Dykes, Bright Girls and, latterly, Siren, rehearsed at the old Resource Centre, performed at The Richmond, The Marlborough, and at venues in London and Amsterdam.

Their presence proved to be a threat to many men, and they were frequently the target of male violence, sometimes after gigs while packing their equipment into their van. Some men, it seems, had a problem with all-women groups and, particularly, an all-lesbian one.

After many years, Siren have reformed and now perform regularly. The story of Siren, as pioneering women, musicians and lesbians, has been told in a documentary that can be seen on Latest TV. Siren have just released a new album, Under the Bridge, which is being formally launched on Friday 31st March at The Brunswick in Hove. 

Their music is unashamedly political: pro-women, pro-lesbian, anti-pornography, pro-environment, anti-war, and anti-capitalism.

One track on the album is The Ballad of Mary Clarke, commemorating the life of Mary. 12.5% of the proceeds from the sale of the album is being donated to the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal.

At this point I should declare multiple interests: I am a trustee of the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal, and am married to the Chair of the Appeal. My sister, Jude, is the keyboard player in Siren and her wife, Debs, is the drummer. As for the magnificent women at Lewes FC, I am a proud co-owner of the Club (along with 2,300 others in 40 countries).

As for the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal, we are making slow but steady progress. We have raised about a third of what we need. We have commissioned the sculptor, Denise Dutton, to produce a maquette which can be seen until the end of the month in the foyer of the Jubilee Library.

The eventual site for the statue is still a matter for discussion but one day Mary will be honoured and will no longer be the forgotten suffragette. For more information please see our website: https://maryclarkestatue.com

Jean Calder will be giving a talk about Mary Clarke tomorrow (Thursday) at 1.00pm in The Dome.

Volunteering in Brighton and Hove: 4.5 million volunteer hours per year with a value of £37 million

(This article was first published in my ‘Brighton and Beyond’ column in the Brighton Argus on 25th May 2022)

One of the best aspects of Brighton and Hove is the number of people who give their time freely for the benefit of others and their communities. They are an army of people who enrich our lives and whose extraordinary efforts often go unnoticed and unrecognised.

In the year before the pandemic, Community Works (which brings together over 600 charities, community groups and not-for-profit, organisations across the city and beyond in Adur and Worthing) calculated that 51% of adults in the city volunteer their time each year.  This equates to an estimated 4.5 million volunteer hours per year with a value of £37 million.

Next week (1st to 7th June) is National Volunteers Week, a week dedicated to recognising their invaluable contribution and thanking them all for their time, energy, commitment, and skills. It will be one of the themes of the Platinum Jubilee celebrations.  I hope it won’t be lost in all the other razzmatazz of this unique occasion.

Last year there were over 600 Volunteers’ Week events across the country, from award ceremonies to tea parties and barbecues. Charities across Sussex will be holding events to thank their volunteers and celebrate the power of volunteering. This year’s festivities include The Big Jubilee Lunch.

Volunteers play such an important role in a host of areas, from cleaning up parks and the beach, being school governors, to working in charity shops, as well as running amenity groups, community organisations, political parties, and sports clubs.

The city council often portrays itself as running the city. Of course it does so much, delivering many great and some not-so-fantastic services. But without volunteers, the city would very quickly grind to a halt and Brighton and Hove would not be, as it is said, “a great place to live, work and play”.

Park Run, for example, arranges free, weekly, community events for thousands of people including Saturday morning 5km runs in several Brighton parks and open spaces. On Sunday mornings there are 2k junior park runs for children aged four to 14. All this is possible only because of an army of volunteers who make sure that these events are well-organised and safe.

The wonderful Brighton Table Tennis Club has 70 volunteers ensuring that players of all ages and abilities can participate in this sport while at the same time the club brings about social change, challenging exclusion, disability discrimination and poverty. 

Volunteers are people of all ages. For example, the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal has Child Ambassadors who promote our work, like 9-year-old River Isaac who, with three school friends, spoke to 500 fellow school children about the campaign for a statue for the suffragette, Mary Clarke.

At BHT Sussex, the organisation and, more importantly, our clients and tenants, benefit from the contribution of well over 100  volunteers each year including former clients of our Addiction Services, now abstinent and in sustained recovery, who return to the service to support and inspire new residents. 

Volunteers from the Brighton Choir With No Name

We have a wonderful team of volunteers who support the work of the Brighton Choir With No Name which we run in partnership with the national charity of that name. They cook, support and sing alongside Choir members.

Volunteers add huge value to the work of many organisation, but might not be noticed, valued or appreciated by those who award contracts. Often, when organisations from out of the area win contracts for services, community assets can be lost, including long-standing volunteers, their contribution not appreciated by those whose focus can be on price.

Amongst the most hard-working volunteers in any charity are the Trustees. At BHT Sussex, in common with almost all charities and community groups, our Board of Trustees are all volunteers. For the Chair of Trustees, this can come with onerous responsibilities and must feel a bit like a full-time, unpaid job.  At BHT Sussex, our Chair, Kelvin MacDonald, now has the added responsibility of leading the process of choosing my successor.

The chief executive of Community Works, Jess Sumner, has said: “Volunteers’ Week 2022 is a time to say thanks. Volunteers have played a vital role in the pandemic response and have been the lifeblood of our communities during an exceptionally difficult couple of years. 

“The coronavirus pandemic has rightly raised the profile of volunteering and more people than ever are aware of the immense contribution being made by volunteers throughout the UK.

“Volunteers’ Week is a time to recognise the invaluable impact volunteering has on the community. 

“People from all walks of life have stepped up and spent thousands of hours helping our community continue during these difficult times, from the small scale, mutual-aid groups offering much-needed local support, to the thousands of existing voluntary and community groups, and the national organisations and programmes.”

Old Brighton: we will miss it when it is gone

(This article was published in the Brighton Argus on 20th April 2022)

I’m not a Looker. I can be Slummocky. I am certainly Outlandish. These are all old Sussex words meaning, in order, a shepherd, messy or untidy, and foreign as in ‘out of the local neighbourhood’.

Brighton has become such a cosmopolitan city that it can be hard to find anyone born and brought up here. Locals are increasingly being priced out of the city by affluent people moving down from London.

Other than some of our architecture, little of old Brighton remains. The railway works are long gone, so too white-helmeted police officers. The Hollingbury Industrial Estate now boasts an Asda superstore.

As a city I think we are lousy at celebrating our past. It got me thinking about the things I have known and loved over the forty plus years I have lived here. Some remain, many have gone.

Gone are Hanningtons in North Street and the old Co-op Department Store on London Road. We have lost Bamfield in Little Western Street, and the cafe on St James’s Street that served the most delicious liver and bacon. The Bardsley / Brown family has move on from their iconic fish and chip restaurant in Baker Street after 92 years, although the same high standard of frying continues. 

We still retain some extraordinary Brighton ‘classics’ such as Connie’s in Baker Street, the Pavilion Gardens cafe with its to-die-for rock cakes, and the Yellow Shop in Oxford Street. What would we do if Ransoms in Ann Street was to close, or North Road Timber, or Dockerills in Church Street?

There are some more modern manifestations of what is good: the independent shops and cafes in the North Laine, now spreading towards Seven Dials, up London Road towards Preston Park, and along Lewes Road.  

My favourite shop is Pen to Paper in Sydney Street.  I avoid the place in case I spend vast amounts of money on even more beautiful stationery to add to what I already have. 

I realise that in naming these central Brighton institutions I show how little I know of other parts of the city. I am sure that the outgoing Mayor, Alan Robins, a proud son of Portslade, could educate me on the rich heritage of the area that the Boundary Commission, knowing even less than me, referred to as ‘West Brighton’!

I am always amazed how few people know of the Preston Park Velodrome, the oldest velodrome in the country. The Duke of York at Preston Circus is, itself, the oldest cinema still operating in England. 

There used to be several cinemas that are long gone, including the Continental in Kemptown that in the 70’s and 80’s attracted the ‘dirty mac brigade’. Its closure and demolition, to be replaced by housing, is perhaps not the greatest loss! It was the site of a tragic loss of life during the war when, before it became a known for ‘adult films’, a matinee screening was bombed resulting in the deaths of four children and two adults along with a further 48 people killed in the surrounding area. (See footnote added 31/12/2022)

An attempt to relocate the County Cricket Ground to mid-Sussex failed, thankfully, and the quaint, higgle-piggly Eaton Road ground remains, although its redevelopment has changed its character almost beyond recognition.  

The West Pier has succumbed to fire and fallen into the sea.  It will never be rebuilt.  The future of the Madeira Arches is balanced on a knife edge, and any hope for their future is due to the tireless work of people like Jax Atkins. Over the years organisations like the Brighton Society and the Regency Society, along with people like Selma Montford, have done their best to safeguard our architectural heritage.

Last month a plaque was unveiled marking the Lewes Road Hospital in Roundhill Crescent which was opened by Dr Helen Boyle in 1905, the first hospital in England to care for poor women suffering from nervous breakdowns.

I am an active supporter of the campaign for a statue for Mary Clarke, the sister of Emmeline Pankhurst, who ran the suffragette’s office at the Clock Tower and who was the first suffragette to die for the cause.

It is one thing celebrating the past through blue plaques, but we are in danger of losing what still remains of times gone by. And we will miss them when they are gone.

(Note added 31/12/2022: several readers have pointed out an error in this item. It was not the Continental cinema that was bombed but the Odeon that was around the corner. I apologise for this error, The frontage of the old Continental remains but the site is now, as I said, housing.)

So, how did my forecasts for 2020 turn out …?

Last year I was asked by the Brighton Argus to share my hopes for 2020, some of which were published on 3rd January, just as the first reports of a new virus emerged from China’s Wuhan province. They included:

A reduction in and an end to rough sleeping: one of the very positive by-products of Covid-19, in response to the government’s ‘Everyone In’ call, has been the extraordinary steps taken by local councils to accommodate rough sleepers. In Brighton and Hove there has been accommodation for every rough sleeper, although some have not taken up this offer.  But the accommodation isn’t sustainable housing and many currently accommodated are likely to return to the streets at some point. (I still see too many people begging with signs saying they need £20 for a room.  They don’t as the temporary accommodation is paid for).

Reduced drug-related harm and increased abstinence: it is difficult to evaluate this but my anecdotal view is that there has been a reduction in the use of illegal drugs but increases in alcohol misuse.  I might be wrong and would welcome the views of those who are better informed on the current situation than I am.

Less violence in the home: sadly the rates of violence in the home across the nation have increased as a result of the lockdown.

Joan Mortimer (left), the Chair of BHT, and Graham Maunders, the Chair of Sussex Oakleaf, sign the merger agreement

A successful merger between Brighton Housing Trust and Sussex Oakleaf: This happened in April and it has been a great success even though covid put an end to merger celebrations.

An increase in the number of homes we (BHT Sussex) provide: we have several developments in the pipeline.  These are ‘slow burners’ but we should be able to make some announcements in the next few months.

From government I hope for action that will see more homes that people can afford to rent, particularly council housing, less poverty and greater economic justice: 2020 has been a year of great disappointment and frustration as government continues to invest in failed home ownership policies that, if anything, makes housing more expensive.

My brother, Simon, my dad, Tom, and me on my dad’s 95th birthday in 2019

For my family and friends, I wish them health and happiness, particularly one close to me whose health continues to be a challenge: I think that those with whom I am close have been fortunate to have avoided being struck down by covid, although I had several symptoms in early March, including an unusual cough that I have never fully shaken off.  Two people close to me have had surgery during the year, including the one referred to above. That operation was traumatic but ultimately it was a success. My very aged dad passed away on Easter Sunday, covid-free. I hope that when I go it will be in the same way as he did, in his sleep.

A close-up of the Mary Clarke bronze. Sculpture by Denise Dutton

Finally, a statue for Brighton’s Mary Clarke, the first suffragette to die for the cause: there is good news.  The maquette (the small bronze of the full-size statue has been completed and delivered to the trustees of the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal (I am a trustee).  Our sculptor, Denise Dutton, has produced such a beautiful bronze.

What I hadn’t foreseen was that life as we knew it was about to change, possibly forever.  I cannot see a return to what we knew as normal until earlier this year.  As a friend said to me, we have a few years of seismic changes ahead.

However you experienced 2020, I hope that 2021 will be better for you, and that you will be healthy, happy and safe.