THE LEEDS BRIEF ⏰ Wednesday, 11 November 2026

Morning, Leeds! The council has a new plan to make homelessness "rare, brief and non-recurring", and it goes to the executive board next week. Also today: Otley Run pubs asked to sign up to a safer nights out scheme, a new head of midwifery for the city's hospitals, last orders for brown bins, and a statue fund for Sergeant Wilko.

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🏠 A new Leeds plan to end homelessness

Leeds City Council has drawn up two new action plans on homelessness, one to prevent it and a longer-term partnership plan on rough sleeping, and they go to the executive board at the Civic Hall next Wednesday (18 November). They respond to the government's new national strategy, which wants homelessness to be "rare, brief and non-recurring" and asks councils to set annual targets and local delivery plans. The council says Leeds already does better than the national average at preventing homelessness, but demand here is very high, with more households seeking help than in comparable cities. The idea is a more joined-up response across public services: clearer roles, earlier action when someone's home is at risk, and moving on rough sleeping from reacting to it towards spotting people earlier and sticking with them. It sits alongside the national Rough Sleeping Programme, for which Leeds has £1.6m, and the first phase will add 39 accommodation spaces plus more outreach, specialist support for women, and drug and alcohol treatment. Health boss Councillor Emma Flint said homelessness "is not just a housing issue, it is also a significant health inequality". The full report, with its targets, is on the council's democracy website as agenda item 6.
👉 Read more: Leeds City Council · YEP / LDRS

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📰 NEWS

🍻 Otley Run pubs asked to sign up to a safer nights out pledge

Pubs and bars in the city centre and along the Otley Run will be asked to sign the new Leeds Standards – Safe and Sound scheme, committing to welcoming venues and challenging harmful behaviour. A council report says staff would be encouraged to spot people who are drunk, unwell, isolated or unsure and help them get home safely, and to manage queues in and out of busy venues. It's voluntary, and the council says it isn't a new layer of regulation or new licence conditions. The licensing committee discusses it next Tuesday (17 November), with a formal launch planned for January and a possible city-wide roll-out after a pilot year. Fancy-dress pub crawlers, consider yourselves warned (politely).
👉 Read the full story at the YEP

👶 New director of midwifery for Leeds hospitals

Sascha Wells-Munro OBE will join Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust as director of midwifery in the new year, moving from York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals, where she has held the same role since August 2023. Her arrival comes as Donna Ockenden's independent review into maternity and neonatal services in Leeds is under way, after the CQC rated the trust's maternity care "inadequate" in 2025. The trust says it is making a range of improvements, and she said she would work "openly and transparently with families".
👉 Read the full story at the YEP

🚌 Monday's double scare: the follow-ups

First Bus says it will carry out a "full investigation" into how one of its route 5 buses crashed into The Light on Albion Street on Monday afternoon, with six passengers suffering minor injuries; the road has since reopened. Meanwhile, West Yorkshire Police say the package that led to the evacuation of Asda House and a controlled explosion has been deemed "non-suspicious and non-viable", and the building was open as usual yesterday. Council leader James Lewis said both turned out to be "not perhaps as serious as they first looked".
👉 Read more: BBC News (bus) · BBC News (Asda House)

🍷 Sheepscar bar gets its licence despite objections

Unity Leeds Bar and Restaurant on Benson Street, Sheepscar, has been granted an alcohol licence by a council licensing sub-committee, despite five letters of objection about noise and litter, including from students in nearby flats. Police and environmental health withdrew their concerns after talks with the applicant, and conditions include CCTV, Challenge 25 and an incident register.
👉 Read the full story at the YEP / LDRS

🏘️ Horsforth Town Council objects to 42 retirement flats

Horsforth Town Council's planning committee has objected to Churchill Living's plans for 42 retirement apartments on the former Sunnydays Nursery and community clinic site on Church Lane. Its concerns include only 14 parking spaces, the building's scale next to the Horsforth Conservation Area, overlooking of neighbours and a nearby school, and highway safety at the Church Avenue junction. Leeds City Council will make the final decision.
👉 Read the full story at West Leeds Dispatch

🔥 Firework blamed for Cross Green flat fire

Two people were rescued from a ground-floor flat fire on Cross Green Avenue shortly before 1am on Tuesday and treated for smoke inhalation, with neighbouring homes evacuated as a precaution. West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service said that after police reviewed CCTV the fire was deemed accidental, caused by a ricocheting firework.
👉 Read the full story at BBC News

🏙️ AROUND THE CITY

🌿 Last call for brown bins

The final round of garden waste collections starts on Monday 16 November, and the last scheduled collection day is Saturday 28 November, before the service pauses for winter and returns in spring. You can check your own last date on the council's bin day checker or the Leeds Bins app. Over winter, garden waste can go free to any of the eight council recycling centres, open 8am to 4pm, seven days a week. Households in the Wetherby area on combined food and garden waste collections keep getting their brown bins emptied all winter.
👉 Read the full story at Leeds City Council

🍽️ New on the food map

Newly registered with the council and awaiting a first hygiene inspection: The Christmas House at 26 to 28 Albion Street; Acai And The Tribe at 88 Vicar Lane; Sushi Tachi at 7 to 9 Bond Street; Nove Studio in Central Arcade; Mico Coffee on Wade Lane; and Caprinos Pizza on South Queen Street, Morley. A registration can also mean a change of owner, so watch this space.
👉 Read more (FSA): The Christmas House · Acai And The Tribe · Sushi Tachi · Nove Studio · Mico Coffee · Caprinos Pizza

🎄 South Leeds gets ready to switch on

South Leeds Life has the dates: Hunslet goes first, with the West Hunslet Action Group switching on the lights on Church Street this Saturday (14 November) at 4pm. Hunslet Carr follows on Thursday 19 November, with carols from Hunslet Carr Primary pupils at 4.30pm and the switch-on at 5pm. Belle Isle Parade has a pop-up market and entertainment on Monday 23 November, Beeston's Town Street has the Salvation Army Band leading carols from 6pm on Thursday 26 November, and Middleton Park Circus switches on on Monday 30 November.
👉 Read the full story at South Leeds Life

🗑️ Harehills residents fed up with fly-tipping

People living around Seaforth Road, near Harehills Lane, have told Leeds Live that new rubbish turns up on their streets every day, and that fly-tippers fill their wheelie bins with building waste so the bins don't get emptied. The council says that in the last month it has seized two vehicles, issued two fixed penalty notices for fly-tipping and has seven prosecution cases progressing in the area.
👉 Read the full story at Leeds Live

🚗 Horsforth survey flags speeding worries

A new Horsforth Speed Awareness Group says 93.5 per cent of the roughly 100 people who answered its survey are concerned about speeding, naming Broadgate Lane, Low Lane and Broadway. The town council points out that its fixed speed sign on Low Lane shows 99.7 per cent of vehicles within the police enforcement limit, and has questioned the survey's methodology, but says it's happy to talk.
👉 Read the full story at West Leeds Dispatch

⚽ SPORT

Fans launch £120k fund for a Howard Wilkinson statue

The fan-led WILKO92 campaign wants to raise £120,000 for a permanent bronze statue of Howard Wilkinson at Elland Road in 2028. Wilkinson was manager from 1988 to 1996 and took Leeds from the Second Division to the 1991/92 First Division title. Leeds United Supporters Club and the Scandinavian supporters club have bought group memberships of the new WILKO92 Club, and the Leeds United Disabled Organisation has backed it publicly. Sergeant Wilko next to Billy and Don? We'd salute that.
👉 Read the full story at the YEP

Good news on Gudmundsson's hamstring

Gabriel Gudmundsson, who went off at half-time in Saturday's 1-0 win over Spurs with a hamstring problem, looks fine after a scan. Sweden boss Graham Potter says he should be available for their Nations League game against Bosnia and Herzegovina on Saturday. Leeds will hope he's managed carefully before the trip to Chelsea after the international break.
👉 Read the full story at the YEP

🎭 CULTURE

🥧 Jay Rayner talks pies in Farsley

Food critic Jay Rayner played to a full house at The Old Woollen at Sunny Bank Mills on Monday, as part of the fifth Farsley Lit Fest, run by Truman Books. He talked about his new book, Nights Out in the Kitchen, his soft spot for Leeds (he studied here), and namechecked the Empire Cafe and the Highland Laddie. Asked his favourite pie by West Leeds Dispatch, he went for steak and kidney, and pastry made with "proper fat, animal fat". Correct answer.
👉 Read the full story at West Leeds Dispatch

🎡 Christmas market dates are in

The BBC has the dates: the Leeds Christmas market runs from Thursday 19 November to Wednesday 23 December across City Square, Millennium Square and Victoria Gardens. City Square near the station has Thor's Winter Village with local and independent stalls, while Millennium Square and Victoria Gardens get more stalls and rides, including a carousel, a big wheel and an ice rink.
👉 Read the full story at BBC News

📅 THIS WEEK IN LEEDS

🎸 Tonight, 7.30pm: Gently Tender at the Brudenell, £14.
🎶 Thursday, 7.30pm: Widowspeak at the Brudenell, £15.
🎟️ Friday, 10am: Muse at Roundhay Park tickets on general sale.
🎤 Friday, 7.30pm: Liz Lawrence at the Brudenell, £17.50.
🎄 Saturday, 4pm: Hunslet's Christmas lights switch-on, Church Street.
🤠 Sunday, 7.30pm: The Sheepdogs at the Brudenell, £18.
🎙️ Tuesday 17 November, 7.30pm: Hayden Thorpe performing the songs of Wild Beasts at the Brudenell, £27.50.
🎡 Thursday 19 November: Leeds Christmas market opens.
Sources: Brudenell · Leeds City Council · South Leeds Life · BBC News

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🧸 AND FINALLY...

Chris Taylor, a 63-year-old lifelong Leeds fan from Wakefield who spent years designing Happy Meal toys for McDonald's, has launched Figuroos: you upload a photo and get back a personalised, fold-together paper figure of yourself in your team's colours, with your name and number on the back. The first ones he made were Leeds United and the Rhinos. They cost £11 each and Christmas orders close on Thursday 10 December. In his words, it's "a Secret Santa that actually looks like the person". Finally, a Leeds player who'll never get injured.
👉 Read the full story at the YEP

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