Looking back at 2024
A review of some of the big Northamptonshire stories from the past 12 months
Dear NN Journal readers,
Hoping you’ve had a great Christmas break. As it’s the last day of 2024, we thought we’d send out a review of the year’s big news in Northamptonshire. It’s been another interesting twelve months, with the departures of a number of public figures, the changing of the political guard with a new batch of Labour MPs and the repeated floods forcing a new focus on how the county is going to deal with the effects of climate change.
NN Journal has played its part in uncovering some of the news, with our own scoops and investigative reporting. We have investigations underway for 2025, but NN Journal’s reporting is only possible due to our loyal subscribers, to whom we are extremely grateful.
If you’re not already a paying subscriber, please consider joining today. You’ll receive everything we write, plus access to our full archive which now has over 1,000 articles.
Out in disgrace
The biggest story of 2024, was perhaps the fall of four heavyweight public figures. Former MP for Wellingborough and Rushden Peter Bone started the ball rolling after a Westminister standards investigation found that he had bulllied and been sexually inappropriate towards a male junior staffer. A subsequent by-election in February saw his partner Helen Harrison defeated by Labour’s Gen Kitchen and his 18 years as a Tory MP come to an end.
Bone’s disgrace was swiftly followed in March by his political colleague, police, fire and crime commissioner Stephen Mold. 2023 had been a tricky year for Mold, after he rashly appointed his rumoured girlfriend Nicci Marzec to the job of chief fire officer, despite having no fire experience. After protests and public condemnation, Marzec quickly stood down and was then replaced by senior police officer Nikki Watson, in a delayed appointment due to her being under investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct. (It was later found she had no case to answer).
Our exclusive story about how Mold had called Watson a ‘bitch’ in a meeting with male firefighters, led to the loss of his job, as he decided not to stand for re-election. It turned out to be a terrible year for Mold, as we again exclusively reported that his business had gone into insolvency.
Disgraced former police and crime commissioner’s business goes into liquidation
In April, leader of West Northamptonshire Council Jonathan Nunn quit following exclusive reporting by Private Eye and then testimony to the BBC from a number of former partners about domestic abuse allegations.
Nunn, who denies all the new claims, had been convicted of attacking his second wife in the street in the early 2000s, but had not been damaged politically and had managed to become leader of the new unitary council when it started in 2021.
He has always maintained the incident for which he was convicted had been a one off, but this year a number of women, including his first wife Maria, spoke out about the abuse they had suffered from him.
NN Journal had been working on the story for a while before the Private Eye exclusive, but after putting a number of claims to Nunn and receiving a legal threat through his London lawyers, we were advised not to proceed at that point.
(Note to any who threaten NN Journal legally in 2025, we now have gold plated legal cover and will face off any such threats).
July saw the sacking of the county’s chief constable Nick Adderley. Incredible detail emerged from the standards hearing, as those gathered heard the catalogue of lies that Adderley had conjured up over his career; from giving the impression he had been a Falklands hero, to lying on his CV about attending a prestigious naval college and making up a role as a hostage negotiator in Haiti.
The hearing, heard claims from the police force’s legal team that Adderley, who had led the Northants force since 2018, was a ‘dodgy police officer’ with a ‘flawed personality’ who had created a ‘false legend’ about himself.
He was sacked, banned from returning to policing, and is currently under investigation and may face criminal charges relating to CV fraud.
Nick Adderley accused of ‘bare faced lies’ in disciplinary hearing
Dark day for Northants Police as dishonest chief constable sacked
After his departure, we published an exclusive interview with Mick Stamper, a former chief superintendent, who had worked with Adderley closely.
Former senior Northants police officer reveals all about working with dishonest chief constable
Labour gain
After almost two decades of Conservative domination, the county followed the national lead and elected a new batch of Labour MPs. Gen Kitchen’s initial success in the Wellingborough and Rushden by election in February, was repeated in Northampton, Corby, East Northants and Kettering as Mike Reader (Northampton South), Lucy Rigby (Northampton North) Rosie Wrighting (Kettering) and Lee Barron (Corby and East Northants) all earned themselves election to Westminster. Only Daventry and South Northamptonshire remained blue, with newcomers Stuart Andrew and Sarah Bool winning.
Former cabinet members Chris Heaton-Harris, Andrea Leadsom, Michael Ellis all decided against standing again, and former minister Tom Pursglove and Andrew Lewer were beaten at the ballot box.
Campaigning success
Community campaigners had a number of successes this year. In January, Save Weekly Hall Wood campaigners won their planning enquiry with the inspector ruling that Buccleuch Properties plan for five mega warehouses at the beloved nature site would be too big and not create enough high quality jobs.
2024 also saw a win at the high court for the Wellingborough Walks Action Group after the judge hearing their judicial review found that North Northamptonshire Council had acted incorrectly when it allowed a developer to pull down protected trees.
And there was success for those who were against the DHL warehouse at Towcester after the West Northants council’s planning committee voted against the proposal this autumn.
North Northamptonshire Council was wrong, high court judge rules
Riots
The summer of riots sparked by disinformation about the murder of three young girls at a dance club in Southport, also affected the county.
A Northampton law firm had been named among a group that could be targetted by riotters, but the racists stayed home after a large number of community activists formed a guard in front of the building.
NN Journal was there with NN Live to document the event and like most, was delighted to find dancing and music, rather than missles and kettling on the streets.
Two Northamptonians, Lucy Connolly and Tyler Kay were among those jailed for publishing social media posts aimed at stirring up racial hatred.
Floods and more floods
There was misery for the residents of holiday park Billing Aquadrome in Northampton and thousands of others across Northants this year, as two major flooding incidents in September and late November, exposed the issues being caused by climate change and the growing inadequacy of the county’s flood defences.
Thanks Sarah for your investigative journalism. This is what is required for Local issues. Without NN Journal there us no transparency and you have inbread corruption. Let's hope 2025 will provide more reassurance for the public of Northamptonshire.
Great review of the year. Thanks NNJournal. ❤️ Keep up the fine tradition of investigative reporting. Best wishes for 2025.