The Advertiser will be there once the others move on...

When the world’s media moves on to the next Great British Scandal - how does an area like Kimberworth Park heal?

This isn’t a new question for certain parts of Rotherham.

In the wake of 28-year-old Joshua Kerry being charged with the murder of 78-year-old former Conservative MP Ann Widdecombe in her Devon home, a new part of Rotherham became the encampment for the national press for a week or so.

Titles such as The Sun, The Daily Mail, The Express and The Daily Mirror all descended on S61 and made it their mission to get the latest line.

Indeed, the Express posted a well-engaged with article this week virtually mocking the town and its bid to be named Town of Culture.

Police outside the house of Ann Widdecombe in Haytor in Dartmoor (Matt Keeble/PA)

placeholder image — Police outside the house of Ann Widdecombe in Haytor in Dartmoor (Matt Keeble/PA)

National influencers came for a walk around our town centre, dismissed it as a sh**hole and then left again, their Facebook engagement dollars firmly in their virtual wallets.

You get the sense that some people enjoy sticking the boot in while the town is down. Maybe it’s good for the algorithms? Maybe it's cool to look up north from down south and sneer at the commoners…

Drones flew over Byrley Road, residents were stopped on their way to the shops and children watched on from push bikes. Every conversation in the street happened with a device in between a reporter and a member of the public for a number of days.

But with the news of a murder charge, the community is left to pick up the pieces and learn how to heal from the recent scrutiny it has been under.

Nobody in Kimberworth Park asked for that level of intense activity. Nobody, if being truthful and once the initial intrigue had worn off, will think it good for the town’s fragile reputation.

But now, it is those same people who must find a way to move the story of the area on. They must find a way to pick up the pieces and put them back together.

How do they discuss what has happened with their children? How do schools, families and community groups make sense of what has just happened? Will people be shell-shocked? I’d be surprised if they didn’t have a serious case of whiplash.

But as I alluded to earlier, this is nothing new for Rotherham as a whole. The town has had its fair share of kickings over recent decades and every time it threatens to rise from the ashes, another large boot comes and kicks it back to its knees.

How do we break the cycle, though? How do we, as a whole town, support one another and move the conversation forward? How do we change public perception about how the country sees us, and about how we see and talk about ourselves? How do we find ort confidence, our swagger?

Those, and similar questions, have to be front and centre for us to be able to heal fully.

CCTV footage appears to show a man leaving an address linked to the Rotherham suspect in the Ann Widdecombe murder investigation at around 7am on Wednesday, the day she is believed to have been attacked | Finn Smith for Iconic Media/3rd party

They are nothing new for many northern towns grappling with the same large-scale issues and loss of identity, but Rotherham seems to suffer more than most.

And it is Rotherham and the people within it that I, who - as a resident of the town for the vast majority of my life - care about more than anywhere else in the country.

For now, my thoughts are with the people of Kimberworth Park who have been dragged into the national spotlight without any say in it themselves.

The Advertiser will be there once the others move on to the next headline to help with the healing process in any way it can.