Mayoralty and Town twinning
Mayoralty
The Mayor is the elected Chair of the council and is the civic and ceremonial figure head for the council. The chain, badge and robes of office are an outward sign of this high office.
The Mayor is by statute the “First Citizen”, which is an honorary title and means that the Mayor takes precedence over everyone, apart from a member of the Royal Family and the Lord Lieutenant. The Mayor must be non-political and represent every section of the community. Apart from the civic and ceremonial duties and functions that the Mayor performs for the council, he or she also represents the District at all major events and historical ceremonies.
The Mayor has an important role to play in promoting the work of the council and supporting local community, voluntary and charitable organisations, and in celebrating and recognising achievements and milestones.
The Mayor and the Mayor’s Office welcomes your invitations, letters and feedback. Please be aware that the role of Mayor is ceremonial only and carries no decision-making powers. The role is entirely separate to that of elected councilor for their ward.
The Mayor 2024-25 Toggle accordion
The Right Worshipful the Mayor of St Albans City and District, Councillor Jamie Day
Cllr Day was confirmed as Mayor at the Council meeting on 22 May 2024.
Councillor Jamie Day has been elected the new Mayor of the City and District of St Albans and has chosen his charity for the year.
He was made Mayor for 2024/25 at the Annual Meeting of the Council on Wednesday 22 May with Councillor Jenni Murray becoming Deputy Mayor.
Mayor Day, who succeeds Cllr Anthony Rowlands, will raise money for St Albans Fund for the Future during his civic year.
The Fund, managed by Hertfordshire Community Foundation, distributes grants to smaller charities and community groups within the District.
Mayor Day has been a District Councillor since 2006 and represents Hill End ward. He is the City’s 480th Mayor with the first having been appointed in 1553.
He will chair Full Council meetings and represent the City at a variety of events, often involving voluntary and charity groups.
Mayor Day said: “I am honoured to have been elected to this historic position and look forward to an exciting year ahead.
“I will be seeking, like my predecessor, to raise money for the Fund for the Future which supports so many important causes across the District.
“I’ll also be seeking to promote sustainability in any way I can as it is a cause dear to me and one of the biggest issues facing us all.”
Mayor Jamie Day
Jamie has held numerous Council posts and was previously in charge of the planning portfolio. For the past two years, he was chair of the Planning (Development Management) Committee.
He was born in Portsmouth - where his great uncle was Lord Mayor in 1956 – and brought up in the Hampshire village of Hambledon.
Although his family were involved in construction, he took an interest in farming from an early age and gained a degree in agriculture from Reading University.
He met his wife Liz while working at a Cambridge farm and in 1984 they settled in St Albans where Jamie taught at the Hertfordshire College of Agriculture and Horticulture. It later merged with other institutions to become Oaklands College.
In 1990, he began work for the British Pig Association before taking a job at a larger agricultural trade body based in Whitehall, lobbying politicians in both Westminster and Brussels.
Moving into agricultural journalism in 2000, he edited a specialist magazine before setting up his own publishing company.
Outside of work, Jamie pursued an interest in local issues by first becoming a Colney Heath Parish Councillor before standing for the District Council.
Jamie is a member of the South Herts branch of CAMRA, the Campaign for Real Ale, and helped organize the first St Albans Beer Festival in 1996, working at every one since.
He and Liz, the new Mayoress, have two sons who went to Verulam School and now have families of their own.
The Deputy Mayor Toggle accordion
The Deputy Mayor of St Albans City and District, Councillor Jenni Murray
Cllr Murray was confirmed as Deputy Mayor at the Council meeting on 22 May 2024.
Jenni Murray has been a District Councillor for Batchwood Ward since 2022 and has served on the Planning Committee and the City Neighbourhoods Committee.
Born and brought up in St Albans, she was educated at Aboyne Lodge, Garden Fields and Townsend Schools as well as the former St Albans College of Further Education.
She works as a Student Support Officer in a local school having held various roles in Hertfordshire schools for over 20 years.
Married in St Albans in 1991, she has six children, who were all educated at local schools, and six grandchildren.
She is a member of St Albans Museum Black History Research Group and St Albans Faith and Cultural Enterprise (FACE).
Passionate about Caribbean genealogy, she traced her family tree with her late father Cyril Roper who died in 2020 after suffering from prostate cancer.
Jenni and her family fundraise in her father’s memory for prostate cancer charities and work to raise awareness of the disease.
She is currently a trustee for an Alms House in St Albans and enjoys supporting St Albans Community Pantry. She has been a member of the Royston Social Club for over 20 years and has served as a committee member.
Jenni is also an active member of St Albans New Testament Church of God where her mother is the minister.
Mayor’s Events Toggle accordion
We maintain a diary of public events and appointments that have been attended by the Mayor. If you would like to invite the Mayor to an event you are managing, please use our contact form to make your request. Please note that the diary below is no guarantee of the Mayor's availability in the future.
Invite the Mayor to an event Toggle accordion
If you would like to invite the Mayor to a function or event, please contact:
The Mayor’s Parlour
District Council Offices
St Peter’s Street
St Albans
Herts.
AL1 3JE
Email: mayoralty@stalbans.gov.uk
Tel: 01727 819544
Please download an invite form or use an eForm
Mayor's Charity 2023-24 Toggle accordion
The intergenerational Mayoral theme we have been developing is All Ages Together aimed at encouraging local organisations to identify ways of working which enable the generations to support each other to tackle isolation and loneliness. We have already connected with a large number of local organisations already active across the generations or planning to do so.
The charity for the year is St Albans Fund for the Future. The Fund was established by John Peters who served as Mayor in 2001-2002. John's aim in establishing the Fund was to provide an opportunity by which smaller local charities and community organisations could be awarded multi-year unrestricted grants thereby enabling them to plan ahead. Thanks to John's efforts, the fund has grown steadily ever since.
Awards have been made to organisations working with people who are excluded or disadvantaged by low income, rural or social isolation, age, health, disability, race, sexuality or gender. This was a far sighted and hugely practical approach and very much mirrors John's dedication to the long-term well-being of everyone living in our City and District.
There are obvious links between our Mayoral theme and the vision which underpins the St Albans Fund for the Future. Working with Hertfordshire Community Foundation, which administers and manages the Fund, we have now committed to raising money for the Fund.
Going forward it will be open to local organisations initiating intergenerational work to bid for one off grants with the hope that, later, they will plan further ahead and apply for multi-year grants.
Major fundraising events are planned for the late Autumn and Spring. We will also be appealing to local people across the City and District to commit to regular monthly/quarterly/annual giving by Standing Order pledges.
https://hertfordshirecommunityfoundation.enthuse.com/cf/st-albans-fund-for-the-future
We intend also to identify ways of continuing to build the Fund further over future years. Please support the Fund.
Mayor's Theme Toggle accordion
History of the Mayoralty
The area now known as the City and District of St Albans was originally home to the Celtic Catuvellauni tribe. Their capital was at what is now Wheathampstead, which eventually fell under their leader, Cassivellaunus, to Julius Caesar in 54 BC. Within a century, the Roman colonisers had settled in what would be Verulamium, the third largest Roman town in Britain. Verulamium, now St Albans, was located a day’s march or a half day’s coach ride from London, making it an essential hub for travel to the north along Watling Street, now on the A5.
You can find out more about the history of the City and District at St Albans Museum + Gallery and Verulamium Museum.
The Church
Saint Alban, a Roman-British official who had converted to Christianity, was most likely martyred c. 250 AD, becoming the first British Saint. The site of his burial, as with many saints, became a place of pilgrimage for common people and nobles alike.
(Above: A depiction of the murder of St Alban. From Ralph of Dunstable, William of St Albans, Matthew Paris (early 13th-century), p. 82. Courtesy of Trinity College Dublin, University of Dublin https://digitalcollections.tcd.ie/concern/works/8p58pm63q?locale=en)
A Benedictine monastery was founded and dedicated to St Alban in 793 AD. After the Norman Conquest in 1066 Paul de Caen became the Abbot and he oversaw the rebuilding of the Abbey church. The Abbey was consecrated in 1115 in a ceremony attended by King Henry I and Queen Matilda. Ironically, the only British Pope, Adrian IV, was denied acceptance into the Benedictine Order at the Abbey in 1154. The Abbey ceased its functions in 1539 during Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries. The Abbey church continued to be used as a parish church by local residents and in 1877 it became a Cathedral for the newly formed Diocese of St Albans.
Every June the city celebrates St Albans Day with a large pilgrimage including giant puppets and colourful costumes. The procession travels through the centre of the city and finishes at St Albans Cathedral.
The Battles of St Albans
St Albans saw decisive battles in the War of the Roses, a thirty-year power struggle between the houses of York and Lancaster. This feud ultimately ended with the foundation of the Tudor Dynasty by the Lancastrian Henry VII’s seizure of power at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, and subsequent marriage to Elizabeth of York.
The two Battles of St Albans took place in 1455 and 1461. The first enabled Henry VI’s kidnap, the second proving decisive in the coronation of Edward IV. Many road names around Bernard’s Heath reference these major historic events, including Archers Field, Battlefield Road, and Lancaster Road. As in Roman Britain, St Albans has consistently proved itself to be a strategically important stronghold as a site of battle, of trade, and of piety.
The City and the Mayor
St Albans received city status in 1877 by Royal Charter issued by Queen Victoria. “The Right Worshipful” was added to the title of “The Mayor” which henceforth made the Mayor of St Albans the senior Mayor in Hertfordshire.
St Albans has had a Mayor for over 450 years, the first being John Lockey who came to office after the town was granted a Royal Charter in 1553. During their tenure, the Mayor is the first citizen of St Albans. Some tenures have been cut short by the outbreak of war and death in office, whilst others have served for three consecutive years, as with William Balcombe Simpson, who served 1860-1862. Other famous St Albans Mayors include Samuel Ryder (1858-1936), known for giving his name to the Ryder Cup tournament.
(Above: Samuel Ryder in Mayoral garb, 1905. Courtesy of St Albans Museums’ Collections https://collections.stalbansmuseums.org.uk/objects/51465)
Originally, the Mayor chosen by burgesses and mayors originally held Executive and Judicial Roles, unlike today. Today’s mayoralty is ceremonial, with the central role being focused on representing the City and District Council locally, nationally, and internationally.
The official mayoral garments include a Chain of Office, red gown, and black tricorn hat. When wearing these the mayor is proceeded by a Mace Bearer carrying a silver-gilded mace, walking three steps ahead to protect the mayor. The last time the mace bearer needed to protect the mayor was during the Poll Tax protests in 1990.