A former Conservative council candidate is running against her old party in the local elections next month.
Jo Heard, 43, is standing as an Independent in Hangleton and Knoll on Thursday 5 May.
She decided to run when she missed out on the selection for the Conservatives after the party’s popular ward councillor David Smart died in December.
Ms Heard said: “I was with him the night before. He was such a lovely man.
“Sadly when the vacancy appeared and I went for it and I wasn’t accepted I was very upset.
“All I’ve ever wanted to do was to stand where I live in Hangleton and Knoll.”
“I could never join another party.”
Instead she opted to run as an Independent.
Her former party colleagues chose Michael Ireland, who works in the office of the Tory MP for Hove Mike Weatherley.
Heart
Ms Heard said: “I’ve got nothing against Michael Ireland at all. He’s a great guy and I think he’s got a huge future.
“This is not about being against anyone. This is about me. This is from the heart.”
She said that she still had many friends in the Conservative Party locally – including her mother – and in the other parties too.
“I’ve got a lot of Labour friends. I don’t call them that. They’re just my friends.”
Ms Heard said that she was talked into running in Brunswick and Adelaide four years ago “to show willing” but that she wanted to represent the area where she lived.
“When I first got into politics it was because of my mum.”
Ms Heard’s mother is Councillor Averil Older, who represented Central Hove for the Tories for eight years and is standing down at the election.
So if she is elected, Ms Heard won’t have to face her mother as a political opponent.
Ms Heard said that she was sorry not to be able to serve alongside her mother: “I really wanted for me and her to be on the council together.”
Her family have backed her and are showing their support by funding her campaign.
Support
Ms Heard said: “It’s probably the best decision I’ve ever made. I’ve got a huge amount of support.
“I went from thinking I had an outside chance to thinking I can do this.
“People say it’s a nice change to have a Christian in politics.
“I go to Bishop Hannington [in Holmes Avenue in Hangleton]. I’ve been going for years. I’m on the ‘welcome team’.”
The vicar there, the Rev Phil Moon, will marry Ms Heard in August when she weds her fiancé Kevin Jameson at St Andrew’s in Waterloo Street, Hove.
Ms Heard works for the Alzheimer’s Society as a fundraiser and in home support, providing breaks for carers near her home in Elm Drive.
“It gives them a three-hour break. It’s a chance to go shopping – or just have a sleep.
“Over 65, one in three of us will die with Alzheimer’s. It’s staggering!”
Trustee
She has also served as a parent governor at Blatchington Mill School in Hangleton and is a trustee of the Hangleton and Knoll Project.
Despite her Conservative background, she said that she would be pleased not to be bound by party.
As well as Michael Ireland, she is taking on two sitting Tory councillors, Dawn Barnett and Tony Janio.
And a veteran former Labour councillor, Brian Fitch, is in the fray. Dominic Ford and Alun Jones are also standing for Labour.
The Lib Dems are represented by Lawrence Collins and Dinah Staples while Martin Ashby, Adele Bates and Nic Compton are standing for the Greens.
Ms Heard will need more than good wishes to become a councillor against that sort of opposition. But if she succeeded and if she could achieve just one thing as a councillor?
She gives a hint of her Brightonian roots: “I would love to put the wishing well back in at Churchill Square. Everyone used to meet by the wishing well.”
And if it were still there, it’s not hard to guess what Ms Heard would be wishing for between now and election day.
Christian Tory. Ought to be a contradiction but reflects the human ability to hold radically contradictory ideas in the head at the same time. A bit like Christian Inquisition.
While I’m no Tory, I don’t have a problme with the idea of someone going into politics to try to improve the ward, town or country where they live, whatever their party. And doing that in a way which is guided by their religious beliefs. I’m sure Christian Socialists have their own ideological difficulties from time to time. I’m not really sure what the Lib Dems believe so that one’s a bit harder to call.
Jo Heard seems to be a decent sort and while it may be tough for her to win a seat in a ward where the wily Brian Fitch and the stalwart force of nature that is Dawn Barnett are slugging it out, I can only hope that people look beyond party and give her a chance. She may well instinctively vote with the Tories if she gets elected but the independent tag will give her the kind of licence she needs to speak up on matters of conscience and constituency that others won’t have. And I suspect her Christianity will give her the quiet strength she needs as and when those occasions arise.
Some people living in Hangleton today will remember Dr Edgar Colin-Jones who went from being a Conservative to an Independent and was probably the best councillor the ward has ever had.