A new mental health emergency department is set to open in Southampton after University Hospital Southampton was awarded a share of £156 million in government funding.
The new facility at Southampton General Hospital will aim to provide patients experiencing mental distress with faster access to specialist care in a calmer environment, reducing the need for people to wait in busy A&E departments.
Over 60 residents from the Inner Avenue area of Southampton joined Satvir Kaur MP for a meeting on Saturday, to address an escalating problem with drug related crime and anti-social behaviour on Southcliff Road and in the surrounding area. The meeting was organised in response to a petition handed to the MP by over 50 local residents calling for urgent action to tackle the issue.
The meeting brought residents together with a panel of decision makers and community leaders. Chaired by the MP, the panel included Councillor Toqeer Kataria, Bevois Ward Councillor and Cabinet member for Communities and Safety, senior service managers from Southampton City Council, the police, and the Director of Youth Services at the YMCA, along with the local resident who led the community petition. Councillor Jacqui Rayment and Councillor Paul Kenny, also Bevois Ward councillors, were in attendance too.
Freemantle residents joined Satvir Kaur MP in a fully booked coffee morning at Freemantle Baptist Church on Saturday – the first in a new series designed to “get Southampton talking”.
Under the banner ‘The Big Southampton Test Community Conversation’, local residents met with Satvir Kaur, ward councillors, volunteers and neighbours to discuss the issues affecting them, and to explore possible solutions.
Over 40 residents were in attendance, taking part in a discussion covering a range of topics, including concerns around housing, immigration, fly-tipping and street cleanliness.
More ‘Community Conversation’ events are to follow, with the next scheduled to take place in Portswood and Coxford, with invitations to be sent out to residents in due course.
Southampton MPs have today hailed a landmark moment for renters in the city as new rights for tenants come into force.
Satvir Kaur, MP for Southampton Test, and Darren Paffey, MP for Southampton Itchen, are encouraging the thousands of renters in the city to make sure that they are aware of their new rights as a result of the government’s Renters Rights Act.
Under the new laws that come into force today:
Councils are also being given new powers to crack down on rogue landlords. Landlords will still be able to get their properties back for clear and justifiable reasons – like selling up, moving in, or dealing with rent arrears and antisocial behaviour.
In the last couple of days, I’ve written to the Chief Executive of Southern Water on two occasions, about two separate issues in Southampton.
Firstly, I wrote regarding the ‘screening application’ published on Southampton City Council’s Planning Portal yesterday, concerning upgrades to Southern Water’s Portswood Wastewater Treatment Plant.
Local residents are rightly concerned about the impact the upgrade works might have on their community, and so I have requested a meeting with Southern Water to discuss how construction will affect people living close by – in St Denys, particularly on Kent Road – and to find out what they will do to mitigate any adverse impact.
It has been confirmed today that Joanna McNicholas has been appointed as the independent Chair for Redbridge & Millbrook West Pride in Place Neighbourhood Board.
Applications have also opened for local people to apply to be members of the Neighbourhood Board.
The Pride in Place programme is a ten-year initiative focused on supporting communities to shape priorities for investment and improvement in their neighbourhoods. With £20 million to spend over the ten-year period, the Neighbourhood Board in Redbridge will be established to provide resident‑led investment decisions based on a co‑produced Pride in Place Plan for each area.
Neighbourhood Boards will bring together residents, businesses, grassroots organisations, community and faith groups, alongside local public sector partners, to help shape a shared vision for their area and agree priorities for future investment. Board membership is voluntary.
Applications for Neighbourhood Board membership are open until 11.59pm on Sunday 3rd May. Further information about the role, eligibility criteria and how to apply is available here.
On Saturday 25th April, Saints will face Manchester City at in the FA Cup Semi-Final at Wembley. It’s a massive moment for our team and our city. There are over 33,000 tickets allocated to Saints supporters, who will be travelling predominantly from Southampton.
However, the rail route between Basingstoke and Woking is due to have a rail replacement bus on the day, to allow for engineering works.
If this goes ahead, it will significantly impact fans travelling from Southampton to Wembley, causing severe disruption and potentially even preventing some fans attending altogether.
Today, I’ve written to the Chief Executive of Network Rail – along with Phil Parsons, Chief Executive of Southampton Football Club, and Cllr Alex Winning, Leader of Southampton City Council – calling for the works to be postponed.
We cannot allow this disruption for fans on such an incredibly special day for our team and our city.
The Government has announced this morning that funding for schemes to replace the failing Northam Rail Bridge and to improve the A326 Marchwood Bypass corridor have been approved.
Both schemes have now been given the green light to progress as part of the Department for Transport’s third Road Investment Strategy and Major Road Network review, published today. Heidi Alexander, Secretary of state for Transport, gave a statement to the House of Commons this morning, announcing the strategy and setting out details.
The scheme at Northam Rail Bridge will see provision of a new, widened, replacement bridge on the A3024 corridor in Southampton, and the A326 scheme will see improvements made to the Marchwood Bypass corridor, connecting into the M27 at Junction 2 and serving the Waterside area of the New Forest.
The Government has today launched its new Waste Crime Action Plan – the toughest ever crackdown on illegal waste – backed by an additional £45 million for the Environment Agency to pursue fly-tippers and organised criminal gangs across England.
Waste crime costs the economy £1 billion every year, with nearly 1.3 million incidents of fly-tipping recorded last year alone.
In Southampton it is a huge problem, with the city recording over 12,000 separate incidents of fly-tipping in the year 2024-25, and areas such as Newtown and Portswood hit particularly hard.
Earlier in March, a group of Southampton small businesses met with Blair McDougall MP, Minister for Small Business and Economic Transformation, at a roundtable meeting hosted in parliament by two of Southampton’s MPs.
The meeting was arranged by Satvir Kaur MP, Member of Parliament for Southampton Test, and Darren Paffey MP, Member of Parliament for Southampton Itchen, in response to conversations had with Southampton small businesses – a number of whom had expressed an interest in speaking directly to ministers about key issues within their sector.
Make it Magic, Mettricks Southampton, and Alaplas Coffee were amongst the businesses attending the high-level meeting, and other attendees included Councillor Alex Winning, Leader of Southampton City Council, and Stephen Mannion, Chief Executive of Go! Southampton.