Stoke-on-Trent City Council is calling for volunteers to join a Citizens’ Assembly to help shape new approaches to deal with issues facing the city.
Council leader Jane Ashworth said the Citizens’ Assembly was an opportunity for residents “from any walk of life to step up and express their opinion”.
What is a Citizens Assembly?
A Citizens’ Assembly is a group of people brought together to learn about and discuss issues that impact their lives and communities. Governments in the UK and worldwide are increasingly turning to them as a way of solving problems by tapping into local knowledge and improving democratic engagement.
Citizens’ Assemblies will usually produce a set of recommendations that are presented to policymakers and the public. Assemblies in other parts of the UK have addressed topics including funding adult social care and how to respond to the climate crisis.
A new way to address Stoke’s challenges
Ashworth said an assembly could be a new approach to “a long-running issue; it may be to introduce a totally new idea that could transform lives, or it could just be a simple suggestion that may go a long way towards building community spirit.”
The creation of a Citizens’ Assembly is part of an initiative to find new ways for the council, residents and organisations to work in partnership set out in the Our City Our Wellbeing Strategy. Over the next four years, this will focus on key areas including finding ways to make Stoke-on-Trent a healthier place and improving the educational and economic prospects for local people.
Launching the strategy in May last year, Ashworth highlighted the work done to improve the quality of life for people living in the city since Labour regained control of the council in 2023. She added that despite the financial challenges the council faces, her administration is determined to retain the “health and wellbeing of our people” as its “primary aim”.
Stoke’s Citizens’ Assembly: for the people, by the people
The Citizens’ Assembly will bring together residents from communities across the city to discuss topics that most seriously impact their lives with a view to developing new approaches to deep-seated problems.
The first task for the newly created assembly will be to decide on how it is to be run and what areas and issues it wishes to focus on. Other key priorities will be how to make the assembly genuinely representative of the city’s diverse communities and ensure it is able to make a real impact on improving how services are delivered.
Ashworth said the council were “excited” about what a Citizens Assembly could achieve, adding that everybody has “a voice and deserves to have their say on shaping the future of their local community”.
Anyone wishing to contribute to or find out more about the Citizens Assembly can do so by emailing citizensassembly@stoke.gov.uk.
