Today’s guest blog is from Karen Ruisi – Cerebral Palsy Plus Fundraiser. We were honoured to recently welcome Mayor Marvin Rees to our Friendship Club on Tuesday 26th of March, during Cerebral Palsy Awareness Month.  The Friendship Club is a weekly social club for adults with Cerebral Palsy, which is still going strong after 50 years! Around 25 people attend this Club regularly, and it is a vital source of support which combats social exclusion and loneliness, something that many people with complex disabilities like Cerebral Palsy face in their everyday lives. One of our members Graham h ..read more

Today’s guest blog is from the Women’s Work Lab team. Back in February 2020, standing in City Hall, Mayor Marvin Rees helped officially launch the Women’s Work Lab, a Bristol based social enterprise that supports mums on benefits back into work via a nine month training, work placement and coaching programme. Back then, there was one cohort of 15 women; all of them united by their desire to get back into work despite facing multiple barriers. And it worked, despite the challenges of the pandemic and lockdowns, two-thirds of those mums landed new roles. Jobs that fitted around family life. With ..read more

Our administration cares deeply about Bristol’s parks and green spaces. Over eight years, we have worked hard to protect and invest in them, despite national austerity, and just last week we launched our strategy to improve their accessibility for all residents.  We also care about Bristolians’ right to bury and subsequently visit their loved ones, in the city they lived, close to the people they cared about.   Making tough decisions is part of leading a complicated and diverse city like Bristol. Working with the cards you are dealt, finite land and resources, and then choosing ..read more

Professor David Olusoga OBE spoke powerfully at our event on Wednesday at Bristol Beacon, which saw my final major speech as Mayor of Bristol. Watch his introduction from the start of this video, and read below. After the city poet’s new poem and my speech, David and I were then in conversation at Bristol Beacon. 2016-2024 Good evening and welcome to Bristol Beacon. My name is David Olusoga, and I’m here to introduce the evening’s events and to offer some of my own thoughts. One of the depressing things about being an historian is that you discover that almost all of the best historical quot ..read more

Today’s guest blog is from Councillor Don Alexander, Cabinet Member for Transport and Labour Councillor for Avonmouth and Lawrence Weston Ward. Bristol is a city which was planned, developed and built with cars as a priority. But this approach, as well as our city’s rapidly growing population, combined with the lack of alternative options, often results in congestion and poor air quality. This administration has worked to tackle this by providing residents with improved transport alternatives. At a strategic level we’ve improved bus prioritisation, secured Clean Air Zone support and even open ..read more

This afternoon I joined Councillor Asher Craig, Deputy Mayor of Bristol, at M Shed, ahead of tomorrow’s launch of the Bristol Legacy Foundation: a new chapter in our city’s journey in grappling with the legacies of slavery. An extended ‘history of protest’ display, including the Colston statue, opens tomorrow at the same Bristol museum. In that exhibition, I offer these reflections on events before, during, and after its toppling: “I have lots of thoughts and feelings about the Colston statue, what happened to it and what happened around it. Its place of honour in the middle of Bristol was ob ..read more

*Check against delivery* Welcome to Bristol Beacon. This is an appropriate venue for my last speech.  This building captures many of the complexities and contradictions that is Bristol. I’m a black, mixed race mayor descended from enslaved Africans – the great, great, great grandson of Samuel Richardson, who was hung by the British for participating in the Morant Bay Rebellion. I am of working class stock: Irish migrants who settled in South Wales, my Welsh grandfather and the Bryer family in Bristol. And I stand here as mayor of a city with a history of entrenched inequalities and one w ..read more

Today’s guest blog is from Councillor Asher Craig, Deputy Mayor for Children’s Services, Education, and Equalities, and Labour Councillor for St George West ward. It’s March and we are getting ready to open our doors again to welcome eligible children and young people, new and old, to Your Holiday Hub (YHH) during the school holidays. The programme, funded through the government’s Holiday Activities and Food (HAF) programme, is specifically for pupils who receive benefits-related free school meals (FSM), offering fun and fully funded activities to take part in which include a healthy meal and ..read more

Today’s guest blog is from Councillor Don Alexander, Cabinet Member for transport and Labour Councillor for Avonmouth and Lawrence Weston Ward. In November 2022 we ran a consultation on our plans to apply to the national government for moving traffic enforcement powers to enforce traffic regulations on six roads in Bristol. Up until now, the police have been responsible for traffic law enforcement on local roads, but we are keen to take on the civil enforcement of moving traffic offences on selected roads so we can focus on areas of concern. There was a positive response to the consultation, w ..read more

Today’s guest blog is from Councillor Asher Craig, Deputy Mayor for Children’s Services, Education, and Equalities, and Labour Councillor for St George West ward. In June 2023, I was happy to attend the launch of Bristol’s three new Family Hubs. Family Hubs are a ‘one stop shop’ offering support and information for all families – up to age 19, or 25 for young people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities. We want to make sure that early help is easily accessible for all families in our city. The purpose of a Family Hub is to help people navigate the challenges they might face with con ..read more