COUNCILLORS have taken to the streets armed with a sofa to speak face-to-face with residents.

Four 'sofa sessions' were held in town centres to allow councillors and officials to hear what matters most within communities.

Ward councillors were joined by cabinet members, who are at the heart of decision making, to have open and honest conversations with residents of Bridport, Blandford, Wareham and Ferndown.

The sofa was brought to make people feel at ease and able to talk informally, and a comments board which was added to during the day. Scores of people took the opportunity to ask questions and raise issues important to them and their community.

In each location highways maintenance, waste and recycling, website navigation, road safety, planning, parking and public transport, were all hot topics. Customer services officers showed residents how several of the issues raised could be easily reported through the council’s website, such as raising highways maintenance issues or ordering new bins.

Other subject specific queries were passed on to services to answer in a more detailed way. These included issues such as adult social care support, website feedback, cost of living support for elderly residents, specialist blue badge queries, and escalation queries for missing waste collection .

Cllr Laura Beddow, Dorset Council’s Portfolio Holder for Culture, Communities and Customer Services, said: “We wanted to connect with residents in person. Now more than ever, it is important to have open conversations, to listen to our residents and to signpost people to council services that can meet their needs.

"We wanted to test public reaction, to see if these types of conversations were what people wanted. Following the positive response, we hope to have more sessions next year, hearing from even more people.

"In the meantime, we will be running a series of Facebook live sofa sessions this autumn where we will be bringing our sofa to yours”.

Dorset Council will be running a series of Facebook live sofa sessions this autumn, beginning today. If you would like to get involved, keep an eye on Dorset Council's Facebook page for more information.