Mansfield mayor vows to ‘improve and prosperity’ of residents after revealing plans to stand again

Andy Abrahams has been re-selected as Labour’s candidate for the mayoral role in May’s elections – having won the post by just two votes ahead of the previous incumbent, Mansfield Independent Forum’s Kate Allsop, in 2019.

Announcing he was “honoured” by his re-selection, Mr Abrahams said: “For the last four years, I have used my life experience to help all of our communities through the most challenging of times.

“We protected our citizens during Covid, setting up vaccination centres, administered thousands of grants to support businesses, redesigned all our services to work remotely to protect our staff and the public and established the community champion’s network that delivered groceries, medicines and looked after the most vulnerable in our district.

“I believe in working as a team collectively with others to achieve results. The partnerships I have formed with Mansfield Business Improvement District, Mansfield & Ashfield 2020, West Nottinghamshire College and Nottingham Trent University has enabled Mansfield to ‘bounce back’, being named the best place to set up a new business in England and the most entrepreneurial town in the UK.

“I have invested in Mansfield to develop key abandoned sites, attract £150 million of outside investment, revitalised the economic stimulus fund to help start up businesses and brought a fantastic events programme back to help our local economy recover.

“We want a green and healthy environment for our children to grow up in that is why we have built energy efficient houses that emit 80 per cent less carbon, invested in glass recycling, planted thousands of trees, started an urban greening flood alleviation programme and expanded our community orchard and allotment offer.

“This is just the start. We have laid the foundations and have the plans and ideas to raise aspirations and improve the health and prosperity for all our residents. I am up and running and raring to carry on.”

Other candidates confirmed for the election on Thursday, May 4, include Coun Andre Camilleri, for the Conservatives, and Mansfield Independents’ Coun Mick Barton.

Mr Abrahams is married to Lynne, a midwife at Sutton’s King’s Mill Hospital for 38 years, and has four grown-up children, who attended Mansfield’s King Edward, High Oakham and Brunts schools.

Brought up on the Ladybrook Estate, his father worked at Crown Farm pit and his mother was a cleaner.

He said: “I am proud I was the first in my family to go to university and gain first and postgraduate degrees. I’ve a broad experience, having worked in local government and private industry as a civil engineer for 25 years and in 10 years in education as a maths teacher. I was also a teacher/social worker with REAL Education, where I looked after the educational needs of pupils with extreme challenges in their lives.”

“As a principal chartered civil engineer, I have worked on multi-million-pound projects, led teams, managed programmes of work and budgets, assessed performance and delivered training. In education, as head of maths, targets and achievement were under constant scrutiny and as a pastoral learning leader in education, good communication, empathy and understanding for more delicate human and personality issues were the skills required.”