MARK STRONG ELECTED.
QUEEN’S PARK RESULT.

This page separates official election facts, attributed campaign statements and WATCH Sussex's own correspondence record. WATCH Sussex does not endorse or rank candidates.

The five candidates · pre-election profiles

What happened last time?

Queen's Park also held a by-election on 18 September 2025. This is context, not a prediction for 2026.

Turnout was 33.28%.

Official 2025 result · Brighton & Hove City Council ↗

Hustings

Before polling day

Candidate answers published · 17 September

Brighton & Hove News has published responses from all five candidates to the same set of questions covering local priorities, falling school rolls, temporary and emergency accommodation, roads and safeguarding. WATCH Sussex is preserving these as a pre-hustings evidence baseline.

Equal-treatment rule: publication of an answer records what a candidate said; it is not a WATCH Sussex endorsement or factual finding.

Pre-hustings fact-check · 17 September

Hustings evidence · 17 September 2026

Four of the five candidates attended the Queen's Park hustings at St Luke's Church Hall: Steve Gladwin (Labour), John Shepherd (Reform UK), Stefan Speckesser (Conservative) and Mark Strong (Green). Liberal Democrat candidate Rüdi Dikty-Daudiyan did not attend and supplied written responses for residents.

Three pre-submitted questions concerned the circumstances surrounding former councillor Milla Gauge's resignation, safeguarding, single-sex services and scrutiny following the NHS investigation into WellBN.

These are attributable pre-election positions. WATCH Sussex does not rank the answers or treat political assertions made during the hustings as independently established facts.

Hustings report · Brighton and Hove News · 18 September ↗

Additional contemporaneous notes · published 22 September

BHLocalDemocracy subsequently published rough “as live” notes from the hustings. They provide a broader contemporaneous record than the initial news report, but they are not a verbatim transcript. WATCH therefore treats them as a secondary source for attributable candidate statements and as a pointer to issues requiring primary-source checks where factual claims are made.

• Safeguarding, trans inclusion, the NHS WellBN investigation and calls for further or independent scrutiny.
• Family housing, falling school rolls and whether Queen’s Park is affordable and suitable for families with children.
• Short-term lets, events in green spaces and a possible visitor or tourism levy.
• Pavements, road maintenance, resurfacing quality and how local defects are reported and prioritised.
• Accessibility of campaign literature, including font size, colour contrast and alternative formats.
• Fly-tipping, communal skips, bulky-waste charges and local refuse arrangements.

The notes deepen the hustings evidence trail but do not supersede candidates’ own published material, the original news report or primary council/NHS records. WATCH will not treat shorthand note-taking as exact quotation unless the wording is independently confirmed.

BHLocalDemocracy “as live” hustings notes · Heyzine flipbook · published 22 September ↗

What the council record shows

Evidence status

WATCH Sussex questionnaire

WATCH Sussex sent a common set of 20 core questions and additional candidate-specific verification questions. The wording below reproduces the questionnaire record. Minor wording differences existed in some individual sends, including shorter wording of the ward-connection question; the substance of the core questions was the same.

Most questionnaires were sent through party, campaign or intermediary contact routes. We therefore distinguish between sending to an appropriate route and proof of personal candidate receipt. Late substantive responses can be added before polling day and will be clearly dated. Silence is not treated as a policy position.

The 20 core questions

1. Why are you standing for Queen’s Park, and what makes you qualified to represent the ward?

2. What is your current connection to Queen’s Park, and for approximately how long have you lived, worked or been actively involved in the ward?

3. If elected, will you commit to serving for the remainder of the council term unless exceptional circumstances make that impossible?

4. What are the three most important problems facing Queen’s Park specifically?

5. For each of those three problems, what practical action would you personally seek from Brighton & Hove City Council?

6. Please identify three specific, measurable commitments that you are prepared for WATCH Sussex to record and subsequently track if you are elected.

7. Where do you believe Brighton & Hove City Council currently provides poor value for money? Please give specific examples where possible.

8. If additional spending is required for your priorities, what should the council spend less on, raise more revenue from, or do differently to fund them?

9. What changes, if any, would you seek on housing, homelessness and the availability of genuinely affordable housing in Queen’s Park?

10. What should the council do differently about refuse, street cleanliness, pavements and the general public realm?

11. What action would you support to address anti-social behaviour and community safety, recognising the respective responsibilities of the council and Sussex Police?

12. What is your position on transport, parking, walking and cycling policy in the ward, and where would you change the council’s present approach?

13. What do you believe the council should be doing about the pressures caused by falling pupil numbers and the future of local schools?

14. The current by-election follows the resignation of Milla Gauge. Without asking you to comment on matters you cannot personally verify, what principles should govern the council’s handling of safeguarding concerns when they are raised by elected members, staff or residents?

15. If the position of your political party conflicted with what you believed to be the interests of Queen’s Park residents, which would take precedence?

16. How accessible would you be as a councillor? Please describe the casework, surgeries and other contact arrangements you would intend to provide.

17. What employment, business interests, paid positions or significant voluntary roles would you expect to continue if elected?

18. How much time each week would you realistically expect to devote to council and ward work?

19. Are there any financial interests, organisational memberships or other roles which you believe voters should reasonably know about when assessing your candidacy?

20. Is there anything in your previous public statements, professional history or political activity that you think requires clarification before we publish our candidate profile?

Candidate-specific questions

Rudi Dikty-Daudiyan

21. You also contested the Queen’s Park by-election in September 2025, receiving 98 votes. What have you done in or for Queen’s Park during the year since that election?

22. What have you learned from the 2025 result, and what is materially different about your candidacy this time?

23. You have highlighted issues including street cleanliness, pavements and anti-social behaviour. What specific council decisions or actions would you seek on those issues?

24. Public reporting describes you as a freelance translator and Queen’s Park resident. Is that description still accurate, and is there anything material about your professional background or local involvement that you would like us to add or correct?

Steve Gladwin

21. Public reporting describes you as a former NHS worker and journalist. Could you give us a brief account of your NHS and journalism work, including the approximate roles and periods involved, so that we can describe your professional background accurately?

22. You have said that communities around Queen’s Park experience some of the worst relative poverty in Brighton and Hove. What evidence or datasets underpin that assessment?

23. Which specific powers available to a city councillor or Brighton & Hove City Council would you use to tackle pensioner poverty, fuel poverty and the cost of living?

24. Queen’s Park has experienced three by-elections since the 2023 council election resulting from resignations by people originally elected as Labour councillors. What do you believe Labour needs to learn from that record, and what assurance can you give voters about your own commitment to the ward?

25. Labour currently controls Brighton & Hove City Council. Which decisions made by the Labour administration would you defend, and are there any on which you believe the administration has got things wrong?

John Shepherd

21. You contested Queen’s Park in September 2025 and received 237 votes. What have you done in or for Queen’s Park since that election?

22. In September 2025 you explained that you remained in the same home but that the 2023 boundary change had placed your home in Kemptown rather than Queen’s Park. Current 2026 reporting describes you as living in Queen’s Park. Could you clarify the current position so we report your ward connection accurately?

23. You have criticised council spending and rising council tax. Please identify the principal items of council expenditure you would reduce and, where possible, approximately how much you believe could be saved.

24. Which council spending associated with net-zero or environmental policy would you change or discontinue, and what evidence have you used to determine that those measures represent poor value?

25. In your 2025 campaign you identified anti-social behaviour, housing, council tax and council accessibility as important issues. What work have you undertaken on those issues since that election?

26. Where Reform UK's national policy does not relate directly to powers held by Brighton & Hove City Council, how would you prevent national political campaigning from displacing the local responsibilities for which a councillor is elected?

Stefan Sönke Speckesser

21. Public records identify you as an economist and Associate Dean at the University of Brighton. Is that description of your current professional position accurate?

22. Drawing on your economics background, where does Brighton & Hove City Council currently deliver poor value for money?

23. Which datasets or performance measures would you use to determine whether council services provide value for money?

24. You have spoken about improving conditions in Queen’s Park and ensuring Craven Vale receives regular care, repairs and clean streets. What specific changes would you seek and how would you measure success?

25. What does “affordable housing” mean in practical or numerical terms to you, and what interventions within the council's actual powers would you support?

26. Your professional work overlaps with areas of public policy. If elected, how would you identify, declare and manage situations where your university or professional interests intersect with council business?

27. Can you give an example where research or professional evidence has caused you to change your view of what governments or councils should do?

Mark Strong

21. You have served as a non-voting council scrutiny co-optee. What do you regard as your most significant contribution in that role?

22. Please identify any recommendations, interventions or scrutiny work in which you personally participated that subsequently produced a measurable change in council policy or service delivery.

23. Has your experience scrutinising the council revealed areas where you believe the Green Group itself has previously been wrong or should change its position?

24. You work professionally as an active-travel consultant. Please describe your current professional role and explain how you would identify and manage any actual or perceived conflict between that work and council transport decisions.

25. The Green Party says you have been a member of the council's Transport Partnership. Are you currently involved with that body or any other council-related body? Please list the relevant positions and dates.

26. You received 682 votes when you stood in Queen’s Park in the 2023 council election. What have you learned since then that makes you better equipped to serve as a councillor now?

27. Your party describes you as having extensive experience of community representation and holding the council to account. What evidence should voters examine to judge that claim for themselves?

28. If elected, how would your role change from scrutinising and influencing council decisions to being personally accountable for decisions and votes as an elected councillor?

Right of reply

Candidates were asked to respond by 5pm on Monday 14 September 2026 and invited to identify any factually incorrect premise and provide supporting evidence where possible. WATCH Sussex said verified errors would be corrected and that candidates who did not respond would not be treated adversely.

What happens next

WATCH Sussex has asked Brighton & Hove City Council's scrutiny team to confirm what happened following the HOSC Chair's 8 July undertaking, including whether further scrutiny was agreed, its proposed scope, whether the ICB will be invited and whether the issue will appear on HOSC's future work programme.

We will publish the council's response when received. The deeper question surrounding Milla Gauge's account of her attempts to raise concerns remains under investigation. WATCH has not reached a conclusion about those allegations.

After polling day, the successful candidate's substantive pre-election commitments and positions will remain on this page and will be tracked against subsequent council activity.

Last updated: 22 September 2026. Additional BHLocalDemocracy “as live” hustings notes added as a secondary contemporaneous source; 18 September hustings report, HOSC primary record and council scrutiny enquiry retained. Candidate statements and disputed accounts remain attributed.