As Leader of Crawley Borough Council, I’d like to wish all residents a happy Diwali, particularly members of the town’s Hindu, Sikh and Jain communities.

We are living in a time where there is greater uncertainty than the world has faced for decades, where it is all too easy to be brought down by the apparently endless cycle of bad events on the news and where ‘Fake News’ and ‘Alternative Facts’ seem to pose a threat to the very notion of truth.

Perhaps never before has a festival to remind us of the triumph of hope over despair, of good over evil, of knowledge over ignorance and of light over darkness been more needed.

I wish you all a happy and peaceful day.

Peter