Councillors agreed that Congleton Town Council should introduce a Civic Pride Awards Scheme, starting with some Covid Community Awards in the coming months for residents, who have "stepped up" and gone the "extra mile" during the pandemic.

Councillors discussed at Thursday's Congleton Town Council meeting of the Community and Environment Committee, the potential introduction of a Civic Pride Awards Scheme for Congleton.

Many town councils hold an annual Civic Pride Award event to recognise people in their communities that have gone above and beyond the call of duty to support and help their community.

Congleton Town Council does not currently hold annual awards apart from The Jeanne Whitehurst Award, which is given to an outstanding young person at the annual town council meeting.

Congleton residents are often successful in borough-wide awards such as the Silk FM Local Heroes Awards.

However, through councillors and social media, Congleton Town Council has been asked to consider hosting an award ceremony for local people.

Jackie MacArthur, deputy chief officer and communities and marketing manager, said in a report: "2020-21 has been an exceptional year where many local people have stepped up and gone above and beyond to help people in Congleton.

"But even before the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been aware of many, many fantastic volunteers, businesses, clubs and community groups serving our town."

As it is already mid-March and the annual town meeting is likely to be end of April or early May, Mrs MacArthur felt it was "sensible" to start with a Covid Community Involvement Civic Award for 2021 and to develop the full suite of awards for 2022.

Speaking about the 2021 awards, Mrs MacArthur said: "It will take a little bit of time to set up, but if we wanted to do something within this mayoral year, we believe there would be time to do awards for people that have gone over and beyond to support the community during COVID times."

The awards would recognise individuals, or community voluntary groups, who have made a positive contribution to the town during the Covid-19 pandemic and the town council would seek local nominations.

Cllr Kay Wesley, chair of the community and environment and committee, said it had been an "unprecedented year" where so many residents had "stepped up" and volunteered for their communities and gone the "extra mile".

Cllr Wesley said: "We had the volunteer database that we collected, and we had more people than we needed for almost every project and task because we had so many people.

"The idea of rewarding and celebrating that and making everybody aware of all the goodwill, volunteering and all the wonderful work that goes on, can only be a good thing. I think it's a fantastic idea."

Cllr Margaret Gartside queried how the awards format would work and how the categories would vary.

Mrs MacArthur said: "There is so many people that have done so much to help this last year, there could potentially be lots of certificates, so there might be postal recognition to lots of people.

"And we might just have to have a top tier of highly commended to come to an awards ceremony if that was part of Mayor Making.

"There is quite a bit of consideration that needs to go into that still. I imagine we would have a panel that could assess the various nominations that come forward."

Cllr Sally Ann Holland, Town Mayor for Congleton, thought the "superb idea" was "long overdue", but felt Covid-related awards should be "separate".

Cllr Holland said: "I think we need to do a general celebration of thanks for those people as well as this being an annual thing.

"I really do think we need to recognise all those people that came forward in our hour of need."

The Conservative councillor suggested that a 'special event of thanks' like an afternoon tea was organised to recognise the residents who stepped up during the pandemic, when the country hopefully opens back up from 21st June.

Cllr Suzie Akers Smith highlighted that when she attended a civic pride award event in Macclesfield as the Mayor of Congleton, there were 15 categories, with the winners being nominated by the mayor and a cross party group of people.

Cllr Akers Smith said: "The accolades and awards were absolutely worthy of pride, so they were not a tin pot medal.

"I do feel like there should be a group larger than what has been proposed to discuss how the civic pride awards should work.

"I think there should be more councillors involved in those discussions rather than just three."

When Mrs MacArthur put the report together for the awards, the recommendation at that point was to proceed with the organisation of the Covid-19 awards event "rapidly" and then a bigger scheme which Cllr Akers Smith referred to would be developed.

Cllr Wesley added: "So it's more of a quick fix now because where we are in the year and with COVID, so do something quick for this year and then do something more thorough for next year."

Following Cllr Holland's comments, Mrs MacArthur declared that if there was not an "urgency" for the awards to take place alongside the Mayor Making in May, then more people could be involved in the planning of a 'bigger scheme' with more time available.

Mrs MacArthur said: "Cllr Akers Smith is right, if we want to do something similar to what Macclesfield has previously done, that is going to take a big group of people and that would need to go back before committee, and we need to plan that all out.

"If we wanted to do something for when groups can hopefully get together after 21st June and arrange an afternoon tea, that may need to be a smaller group to organise that."

Cllr Suzy Firkin agreed that "getting something off the ground quickly" for Covid-19 awards would be "necessary", but she also wanted to see a considered response to the structure for a future awards ceremony.

The Liberal Democrat councillor felt that businesses themselves could be the recipients of awards and even during COVID, there may have been businesses that have gone "above and beyond".

Cllr Amanda Martin thought the awards was a "lovely idea", but she felt it was important that the awards were seen to the Congleton community as "non-political".

Cllr Martin said: "I'm not so keen on councillors doing the selection [picking winners]."

Councillors agreed that Congleton Town Council would introduce a Civic Pride Awards Scheme starting with some Covid Community Awards for 2021.

The development of the 2021 scheme, but not necessarily the voting on the awards would be delegated to David McGifford (Chief Officer), Jackie MacArthur (Deputy Chief Officer), Cllr Sally Ann Holland (Town Mayor), Cllr Denis Murphy (Deputy Town Mayor) and Cllr Kay Wesley (chair of community and environment committee) with a report on the development of a larger scheme for 2022 to come back to committee was also approved.