(i) Mayor (or person presiding)

(ii) Members of the Cabinet

(iii) Chief Executive

Mayor

The Mayor started off his announcements to Council today by first of all making a personal statement as follows:-

It seems a recent comment I made in conversation with someone while using my own personal Facebook account has offended some members of the opposition as it has been copy and pasted by them across various pages on social media along with calls for me to resign. For the sake of clarity, my comment concerned the perceived rivalry between my role as Mayor of Bridgend County Borough, and the role of the local Bridgend town mayor. More specifically, I said that I was looking forward to ‘winding him up’ at a forthcoming event we were both attending, referred to him in jest as a ‘minor mayor’, and joked that his chain was ‘probably bigger than mine’.

It was never meant to be a public post as I was under the impression this was a private conversation I was having, but as soon as I realised it was open to the public, I immediately deleted the post in order not to upset or offend anyone. No harm or insult was ever intended by any of this, and I am sorry if it caused offence to any individual or organisation as that was never my intention.

Since our last Council meeting there has not been a great deal of Mayoral visits, but I was pleased to be invited by Steve Brace of Bridgend Athletics to re-launch their re-furbished athletic track and facilities at Newbridge Fields. There were a number of sporting stars there, including previous Cllr. Eric Hughes who is still running on a regular basis after major heart surgery and now being in his 80’s. Bridgend Athletics have produced a number of regional, national, world and Olympic stars over the years and long may this continue as they embark upon the next chapter in their development as a club.

I have been visiting recipients of the Mayors Citizenship awards from when Councillor Stuart Baldwin was Mayor, that could not be presented due to the pandemic. Last week it was a pleasure to visit Isabella Evans who at 15 years old has done some amazing work in learning sign language known as Makaton to help with her siblings and their development. She is clearly a star of the future.

Then it was Pencoed Comprehensive School and their Young Carers Group. It was great to learn of the support they are getting from the school and hearing some of their stories as to how they help and support their parents and siblings prior to school and after school made me realise how remarkable these young adults are who will surely grow into even more remarkable adults in the future.

Lastly it was on to Kenfig Hill RFC to present the award to Chris Leyshon who is doing some amazing work in raising vital funds and awareness of Prostate Cancer. It’s the most common form of cancer in men in the UK, with 1 in 8 being affected and this increases to 1 in 3 if there is a family history of prostate cancer. There is no automatic screening of men in this country and therefore I would recommend that all men over 50 or anybody with a concern or family history, to log onto the Prostate Cymru website, where there is a simple checklist to complete and it will advise you whether to go and visit your doctor to request a PSA blood test.

The next round of Mayors Annual Citizenship Awards will soon be launched and nominations will be invited from Monday 8 November, next. The awards are open to people who live in the county borough, as well as groups and businesses based locally. More information is on the BCBC website where a nomination form can be downloaded and members will also receive an email with all the relevant information.  The deadline for receipt of nominations is Friday 7 January 2022 and the winners will be announced in March 2022.

The Mayor would be hosting a Mayors Pre - Christmas Charity event on Saturday 27 November at the Heronston Hotel & Spa with a comedy stage hypnotist and music by Lee Jukes of Bridge FM. Tickets are £22.50 and include a buffet meal. Tickets are selling fast, so he urged those interested not to leave it too late to get one. The event is open to all and it would be great to see as many Councillors as possible along with your partners, family or friends.

In addition to this, he was in the process of arranging a Christmas Raffle and tickets will soon be on sale at £2 each with a first prize of £200 cash. He was looking to draw the winning tickets on Wednesday 15 December just after the Council meeting for that month. The Mayor had received great support with raffle prizes from a number of Bridgend Town traders and also Sony, Pencoed and Asda, Bridgend.

Your support for the above would be greatly appreciated he added, as there is no longer a charity committee or officer assistance in arranging any Mayoral fundraising activities for Lads & Dads and Bridgend Carers Centre, and therefore he hoped these events would be successful as his wife and he had put in a lot of work to date in arranging them, and would continue to do so for the remainder of their term as Mayor and Mayoress of the County Borough of Bridgend.