13 April 2024 – The Green Party has chosen former BBC journalist Jonathan Kent as its candidate for Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner.
Voters across Sussex, including Brighton & Hove, will go to the polls on Thursday 2 May to pick the new Police and Crime Commissioner, the same day as two Brighton & Hove City Council by-elections (in Queen’s Park and Kemptown) caused by the resignation of two former Labour councillors.
The Green Party has chosen former BBC journalist Jonathan Kent as its candidate for Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner
The Green Party candidate won 13.4% of the vote Sussex-wide when the post was last contested in 2021 – although it is likely that Green support in Brighton & Hove, where there is strong support for the Greens, was proportionally higher.
Jonathan said: “We know what the best policing looks like because so many officers deliver that day-in day-out. I want everyone who lives in Sussex to be able to expect that regardless of the colour of their skin, background, gender or [other] orientation.”
“I’ll focus on preventing crime and violence, women’s and girls’ safety and support better funding for youth services while working to ensure we have excellent officers who are welcomed to the heart of every community and every home.”
Siân Berry, Green MP candidate for Brighton Pavilion constituency, said: “Green members in Sussex have made a great choice. Jonathan is exactly the sort of person needed for a position like this.
“We are in strong agreement about the need to prevent crime in the first place, and that’s why funding for youth services is so crucial and will be such a big part of his campaign.
“Youth services have been undervalued and undercut under this Conservative government, but this is where the investment is needed.”
The Green Party believes that criminal justice cannot be divorced from its wider social context. The party has long argued for more focus on crime prevention and the use of restorative justice, an approach increasingly being adopted by police services across the country including in Sussex.
Restorative justice puts the emphasis on the offender making amends to the victim of their crime and aims to avoid pushing people into a life of reoffending.
Jonathan grew up and lives in Ticehurst in Sussex and went to local state schools before reading philosophy and theology at Oxford University.
As a former journalist and foreign correspondent, he campaigned on issues such as human rights, miscarriages of justice, the treatment of migrant workers and sex trafficking.
Jonathan said: “People are really struggling at the moment – the NHS, schools, transport and the other services we rely on have been run down; the cost of living is rising and incomes aren’t stretching as far as they used to.”
“Wildlife and nature are struggling too. Our beaches and rivers are polluted, habitats are being destroyed. At the same time countries that should be finding ways to work together to stop our climate spinning out of control are increasingly in conflict with one another instead.”
“It doesn’t have to be this way. Greens believe that the answer lies in working together across social divides and party lines to build a Britain and a future in which everyone matters.”
ends
For more info on voter registration for the Police & Crime Commissioner election and how to make your vote count, visit Brighton & Hove City Council’s election pages