johnfletcher

In my last few days as Mayor many of the themes which we have seen during the year have recurred - schools, regeneration, volunteers and helping people.

We had an early start to open the brand-new Wilkinson store in the re-development of Thornaby Town Centre.  55 staff had been recruited or transferred in and they and their management had an upbeat look for the first day.  We met a member of the original family who still own this nationwide chain of stores.  They were making a donation to the RAFA in recognition of Thornaby Aerodrome (which was there from 1930 to 1958) - we met a group of RAF veterans.  During a conducted tour of the store I spotted that they sold peg bags for washing lines.  Ours is falling to bits and it's not usually easy to find one.  We therefore spent the princely sum of 99p!  There were plenty of other early-morning shoppers, who, no doubt, spent more.

Later in the morning I had a meeting in my Parlour with the Deputy Mayor, the Director of Law & Democracy and some of his officers for a final run-through of tomorrow's agenda.

In the early afternoon we went to ARC for an event to celebrate a joint project of the Council's Drugs Action Team (DAT) and Arts Development Service.  They had been providing arts activity for DAT service users who had recovered or were recovering from substance misuse.  There had been a 10-week course of creative writing and visual arts, led by professional artists.  We looked at an exhibition of what had been produced and I then opened a performance of some of the poems written.  Two of the participants read their own poems.

We were particularly struck by the depth of feeling which poetry and visual art had brought out into the open from people's inner recesses; also the love/hate relationship which they had with the substances and lifestyles from which they were working to escape.

A poignant last event for my mayoral year.