As a VSO librarian in Gambia, my eyes were opened to the world inequalities, and I went on to campaign with War on Want, Palestine Solidarity and Cuba Solidarity Campaigns, and ran a network to support librarians in developing countries for many years. Now I’m a champion of libraries and librarians in primary schools and until I retired in September 2023, ran Tower Hamlets Schools Library Service.

I spent lockdown working to provide books for children at home without internet access – of which there were many. Often, schools told us of families of three or four children with one phone between them and no broadband in their flat or house, so having to pay for more mobile data to access online lessons. Several councils have found ways to provide free basic broadband in their areas to address just such issues and I am sure we can do the same here to try and close this digital divide.

We have 2000 families on HBC’s housing waiting list, and so we should be building social and council housing but progress on this is very slow. We do need to build, but where housing is built, we need to ensure that the right infrastructure is in place in terms of roads and local services.

In my “in-box” there has been a lot about the Langstone sea wall and I thank residents for giving me a greater understanding of the issues. I have been contacted about planning applications, speeding traffic, blocked drains, dead trees and the light pollution from the new Amazon site in New Lane. I’ve attended stakeholder meetings for Havant Thicket Reservoir and the New Lane Community Liaison Panel, helped Havant Borough Tree Wardens with a hedge planting and I help organise litter picks in the St Faiths area with Havant Community Litter pickers.

I work closely with Phil Munday on all issues, and we are both participating in the new Havant Town Centre Partnership Board which aims to revitalise Havant Town Centre. I serve on the audit and finance committee, licensing committee and Langstone Harbour Board and happy to talk to anyone who is interested about what this has involved!