Mayor Sam becomes the 'Boris of Milton Keynes' with official daily updates about coronavirus

But now, as charities, organisations and businesses are forced to cancel public events they have been planning for months, Sam finds his mayoral calendar strangely empty.

As the son of a bishop who steered Belfast through the peak of its troubles, it would be anathema to him to sit back and enjoy the unexpected spare time that a crisis has bought him.

Sam grew up in in Belfast during all the troubles in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and the panic, bewilderment and upheaval of today's coronavirus pandemic reminds of how the Ulster community was affected all those years ago.

"People's lives could change overnight. We didn't know what would happen next. We wouldn't know if school would be open the next day; workers wouldn't know if their workplace would even still be there the next day. It was a time of great fear and uncertainty," he said.

"But I remember the one certainty during those times was the 9pm broadcast from the BBC. Everybody would tune in and listen to what had happened during the day and what could happen tomorrow. That 9pm broadcast was so important to so many people."

Boris Johnson's daily late afternoon update is rapidly taking on the same importance. But that gives the national picture and is not too concerned with the comparatively parochial day to day life of the population of Milton Keynes.

Sam, a veteran Liberal Democrat councillor who has been faithfully non-political during his reign as mayor, could not be more different to Boris politically. But he has willingly taken it upon himself to become MK's equivalent of the PM or the erstwhile BBC of Belfast .

Sam now spends his days researching and writing a daily update, which he publishes every day, on the dot of 4pm, on his Facebook page, simply called the Mayor of MK.

In it, he gives details of who has said what in Milton Keynes, who needs help, what the council is doing and what events are on or off, as well as links to national policies and changes. He's hoping it will become a trusted information hub, where people and groups will message him with announcements they'd like to make.

He supports good causes such as the city's food bank, reminding people to how panic-buying is causing them to run low on the products they need to feed the needy of MK.

And he translates often jargon-filled briefings from official sources into clear, understandable and panic-free language.

"I feel there is a need for an authoritative source that is non-political and just contains factual statements, linked to sources as much as possible, to describe what is happening in Milton Keynes," he said.

You can access Sam's updates by typing Mayor of MK into Facebook or you can follow the link here

Anybody who would like anything to appear in the Mayor's daily update can email Sam on [email protected] or text him on 07803 036 656.

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