232 people signed a petition asking Spelthorne to mark the town's Ali G link before the new film lands on 23 October. Councillors consider it on 8 September.

A petition asking Spelthorne Borough Council to mark the town’s association with Ali G goes to the Corporate Policy and Resources Committee on Tuesday 8 September. It was signed by 232 people.

The e-petition ran on the council’s own website from 26 July to 24 August 2026 and has now closed. It is item 9 on the committee’s agenda, published on 28 August.

What it actually asks for

The petition is more cautious than “build a statue”. Its six asks, as the agenda reprints them, are:

  • Establish a time-limited partnership with Visit Staines BID, residents, businesses and community organisations.
  • Approach Sacha Baron Cohen, his representatives and the rights holders early, inviting him to help shape and potentially fund the initiative.
  • Explore a temporary licensed attraction, event or photo opportunity during the new film’s promotional period.
  • Assess public support and develop a permanent statue, sculpture or other landmark only if external funding is secured for its design, installation and maintenance.
  • Include a secure donation facility supporting affordable sport, arts, leisure and community activities for children and young people in Staines.
  • Make sure the whole thing meets the council’s legal, financial, planning, safety and ethical requirements, “while retaining suitable creative freedom for Ali G’s irreverent humour and satire”.

The petition text is explicit on the money. “The petition does not ask the Council to immediately purchase a statue using Council Tax,” it says. “It asks the Council to bring together the right partners, test a temporary attraction and consider a permanent landmark where it is feasible, properly licensed and externally funded.”

It was started by Alex Balkan.

The deadline is a film release

The timing is not arbitrary. Sacha Baron Cohen’s new Ali G film, “Ali G: Who Iz I?”, is released on 23 October 2026 through Amazon MGM Studios. Baron Cohen wrote, directed and stars in it, and it was filmed in secret. It is the first outing for the character on the big screen since Ali G Indahouse in 2002.

That gives the council a window of about seven weeks between the committee meeting and the release date, which is what the petition means by a “time-limited” partnership and a temporary attraction “during the new film’s promotional period”.

The petition also points at the plot of the original film, in which Ali G campaigns to save a community leisure centre. It says the initiative should support “the next generation of the Staines Massiv”.

Where 232 signatures gets you

Under Spelthorne’s petition scheme, the thresholds work like this:

  • Fewer than 30 signatures: treated as ordinary correspondence, answered by a member of staff.
  • 30 or more: the full petition scheme applies, and the council must acknowledge it within 10 working days and write to the organiser at each stage.
  • More than 4,500 (or 1,000 for a single-ward issue): automatically referred to full Council for a debate.

At 232, this petition clears the first bar comfortably and falls well short of the last one. So it is not an automatic Council debate. It arrives at a service committee, which decides what, if anything, to do with it.

The agenda gives no officer report and no recommendation for item 9. The committee is simply asked “to consider a petition”.

The rest of the agenda is heavier

The same meeting carries the council’s Q1 2026/27 performance report, its complaints annual report for 2025/26, the treasury management outturn for 2025/26, a governance assurance update on organisational and cyber resilience, and two property items: the acquisition of six residential properties for housing need, and the disposal of Elmbrook House and 17 Station Road in Sunbury.

There is one more piece of context worth putting alongside the petition. Two days later, on 10 September, a different committee is being asked to scrap the proposed multi-use games area in Memorial Gardens after 74% of consultation respondents opposed it. That scheme was intended to provide outdoor recreation for older children and young people in the town centre, and it foundered partly on a funding gap. The petition arriving two days earlier asks for a donation facility to fund exactly that kind of activity.

What it means for you

  • The meeting is Tuesday 8 September, 7pm, in the Council Chamber at Knowle Green, Staines-upon-Thames TW18 1XB. It is open to the public.
  • You can no longer sign. The e-petition closed on 24 August.
  • Nothing has been agreed, promised or costed. No approach to Sacha Baron Cohen has been reported, and the petition itself makes a permanent landmark conditional on outside money.
  • Anyone who lives, works or studies in Spelthorne can start a petition, on paper or through the council’s e-petitions page. Thirty signatures is the point at which the formal scheme kicks in.

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