The world’s first and only ‘monkey’ mayor will hand in his chains forever in a few days time when Hartlepool Borough Council returns to a non-elected mayoral system. Chris Webber talks to Hartlepool Mayor Stuart Drummond about the night he was elected

MONKEY is Mayor is some headline and the story on that May day in 2002 when a man in a monkey suit was elected mayor of an historic town went around the world. That monkey was, of course, Stuart Drummond, a 28-year-old lad working in a call centre and living with his mum – and Hartlepool United’s mascot H’Angus the Monkey on Saturdays.

Almost exactly 11 years on, after being reelected twice, Stuart, married man, father and highly-paid executive figure once voted as one of the best mayors in the world, reflects on the night that changed his life forever.

“It had all been a joke,” says Stuart, sitting in his office under a framed photograph of the 2009-10 Hartlepool United team, a soft toy of H’Angus the Monkey – a joke on Hartlepudlians’ supposed hanging of a monkey as a French spy in the Napoleonic wars – on his desk.

“It was just a laugh. I was looking for new things to do as mascot and the idea came up one night in the Gillen Arms pub.”

One of the lads in on the idea in the Gillen Arms that night was Stuart’s friend, The Northern Echo’s sports reporter Nick Loughlin.

After Stuart had secured his £500 deposit to stand from Hartlepool United, the story appeared as an exclusive on the newspaper’s front page, one month before election day.

It was a good, fun story but no one, absolutely no one, thought Stuart would come anywhere near to winning.

Odds on his victory were offered at 100-1, a price described as not-generous enough by then Hartlepool chairman Ken Hodcroft.

After all, Stuart had found himself in trouble more than once as mascot.

He had angered stewards for simulating sex on a female steward and on another occasion was once escorted off the pitch by police for playing with a blow-up doll.

Not exactly a conventional CV for a prestigious £53,000-a-year job.

“I only had one bloke having a go at me,” recalls Stuart.

“This guy had a right pop, said I was disgracing the town and the name of politics and all that.

“I just said, ‘I’m not the one in the middle of the street talking to a 7ft monkey,’ and that was the end of that.”

Stuart had to put his own name, not H’Angus’ on the ballot sheet. He appeared as himself in meetings and published his manifesto in the Hartlepool Mail.

There were the funny, jokey policies, including the famous pledge for free bananas for every child, which has led to Hartlepool primary schoolchildren being given fresh fruit every day.

But there were serious commitments too.

If elected, Stuart promised to fight for more police on the beat, increase some speed limits, and to deal with the vandalism-hit public toilets.

By now, the alarm was ringing for the other candidates. The joke candidate was no longer a joke.

Then came election night.

“There were one or two comments, ‘Here’s the football hooligans,’ that kind of thing,” he said.

“Then the Labour lot came in singing and chanting their candidate’s name. I thought, ‘Oh, aye, who’re the hooligans, then?’”

The votes started to pile up.

Stuart thought he might come third, even second. Then he was approached by Peter Mandelson, at that time the town’s MP and one of the most powerful men in the country.

“Mandelson was the first to work out I was going to win, he was ahead of everyone else.

And he went through me like a dose of salts, really quite abusive.

“It was really something.

“After the abuse, he asked some questions, about my degree, that I could speak foreign languages, and all that.

“A couple of minutes later he was telling the BBC how intelligent I was and I wasn’t a joke candidate.

“It was quite an education watching him switch like that.”

The Northern Echo also saw the writing on the wall and splashed on its famous Monkey is Mayor headline even before the official count was declared. In the end Stuart secured 345 more votes than the Labour candidate, Leo Gillen.

Stuart had to make his first big decision as one of the most powerful men in the North- East – to be monkey or not to be monkey.

He decided to ditch the mascot and, in his acceptance speech, Stuart declared himself a serious man, willing to forget the joke and get on with the job.

The following morning Hartlepool Borough Council dealt with hundreds of press calls from around the world. One reporter apparently even believed the people of Hartlepool had elected a real live monkey.

Stuart, after no sleep, had to attend a press conference packed with national newspaper journalists and camera crews.

“One or two seasoned journalists told me afterwards they’d never known anything like it, I really had it in the neck for being me, not H’Angus ,” says Stuart.

“But, of course, I knew it was a great story.”

Stuart even turned down the chance to appear on the Jay Leno show in the US because it would have meant donning the H’Angus outfit once again. But, mindful of his role as ambassador for the town he loves, Stuart turned Leno down. The daft lad having a laugh had grown up fast.

  • Tomorrow, Stuart Drummond talks about his time as mayor, including how being caught in a pub with “exotic dancers” rocked his first term in office.