Councillor named 'Rose of Northamptonshire' after helping town's BAME community during pandemic

Northampton's Labour leader Danielle Stone has been named a Rose of Northamptonshire after helping the town's BAME community throughout the Covid crisis.

The award, which was open to the public to send in their nominations, recognises and expresses thanks to groups or individuals who have worked tirelessly to keep their communities safe since the pandemic began back in March 2020.

At the beginning of the pandemic, Danielle helped the United African Association of Northampton with personal protective equipment. After this initial interaction she realised the community needed more help with other things such as food parcels, so she started delivering them to elderly residents along side her husband on a weekly basis from April last year.

Danielle said: "I am amazed because they kept it [the nomination] a secret, so I had no idea, it is very lovely to be acknowledge.

"Right at the beginning I helped get them a lot of their PPE. Then I went in to help them sort out their food parcels.

"Then they needed more drivers, so I started doing the deliveries, taking food parcels to people who are immobile in the African community across the whole of Northampton.

"It was a shock to see how vulnerable some of our elderly residents are. It is has just highlighted that a lot of elderly people carry a lot on without complaining; they just need support."

In the nomination, the United African Association said members feel that Danielle 'is the most approachable councillor in Northampton'.

In response to this compliment, Danielle said: "How lovely. I think there is lots of excellent councillors in Northampton but I do make it my mission to work at the grass roots level, to understand what people are doing and what they need."

The United African Association's nomination also said that Danielle had helped the community come together and try to build a better town.

The nomination reads: "She has enabled us to speak at council meetings, enabling borough councillors to be aware of our organisation and the work we are doing.

"She has also promoted the BAME communities and encouraged us to work together to build a better town.

"She is aware of the African community's need to have an African centre for training, meetings, a social hub information centre etc. We feel she is the most approachable councillor in Northampton and therefore fully deserving of the award."

Danielle said she is currently working on a campaign so that all the different African communities can work together to support each other, where they can offer different services and things to the town like music, food and art.