Tony Dyer: Stellar names who make my Bristol City Council ‘dream team’

Cabinet of all the talents

If you are a football fan, you would have indulged in the traditional activity of picking your best “England” team (or Welsh team or World XI, or so on).  You would then present this team to your  mates and a vigorous debate would ensue about the merits of the players chosen.

Of course, if you are bit of a political anorak, the possibility of Bristol having a directly elected mayor offers a similar opportunity.  It appears the successful candidate could select a cabinet from the full council (although there could be an option to select  cabinet members from outside the council).

So here is my “cabinet of all the talents” – the “team” I would select. I decided to set myself three ground rules before I started:

• Rule One – if Bristol chooses to vote yes to an elected mayor, there will be a need for strong leadership of those councillors remaining in the full council to provide a high level of scrutiny of the executive.  Therefore I have decided that the party leaders (Cllrs Janke, Hammond, Abraham and Green) should be ruled out of consideration for my cabinet;
• Rule Two – the cabinet should include members from all four political parties with no party having a majority of councillors.  The somewhat gerrymandered division of cabinet positions as a result is 3 Lib Dems, 2 Labour, 2 Conservatives, and 1 Green;
• Rule Three is that the portfolios for each cabinet member should be clear, reflecting areas of responsibility that members of the public can readily understand; Education, Health and Social Care, Transport, Business, Housing, Energy and Climate Change, Communities and Local Governance, and Finance.

With those three rules in mind, here is my cabinet.

Transport: Mark Bradshaw (Labour)

Whilst the Liberal Democrats have regularly changed the executive member for transport, Labour have allowed Mark to remain focused on the transport problems facing the city.  As a result he has established a detailed understanding of what is needed in Bristol’s efforts to create a modern transport infrastructure. Coupled with a willingness to recognise the altered political and economic environment Bristol now finds itself in, this is why he would be my choice for transport.

Education: Geoff Gollop (Conservative)

Cllr Gollop is a proud Bristolian and a decent individual, and having spent a year as Lord Mayor in which he has visited schools across Bristol, I suspect that Cllr Gollop is even more conscious than ever before of the terrible waste of Bristolian talent when children are denied the best possible assistance in developing their knowledge and skills.  A poorly educated child is less able to make a positive contribution to society in their later years, and I am sure Geoff would work hard to ensure that ALL Bristol schools are able to bring out the best in the children of this city.

Energy and Climate Change:  Neil Harrison (Liberal Democrat)

Outside of the Green Party, I know of no other political individual who recognises the threats, and understands the complexities, of this portfolio as well as Cllr Harrison.  Whilst others do the talk,   Neil is already doing the walk and it would be a foolish individual who failed to allow him the opportunity to continue what he has already started.

Health and Social Care:  Helen Holland (Labour)

Health and social care is the poison chalice in Bristol’s political environment.  It is one in which there is massive disagreement about how to proceed, and there is considerable concern that what we are seeing is the breakup and privatisation of a system which currently delivers a high level of quality care that is free at the point of use.  It needs somebody in Bristol to defend it, not to acquiesce in its dismemberment and I would task Cllr Holland with that role.

Communities and Local Governance: Gus Hoyt (Green)

As powers are devolved from central government to local government, there is an opportunity to also devolve powers from city-wide level down to neighbourhood partnerships.  Cllr Hoyt has demonstrated that he is willing to challenge the status quo and I would give him two main tasks;  firstly to look at how to make neighbourhood partnerships as representative as possible of their communities without discouraging those individuals and groups who are already donating their time and energy,  secondly to look at every possible opportunity to pass decision making down to the lowest possible level capable of making the decision.

Business: Mark Weston (Conservative)

Cllr Weston is a powerful speaker with strong persuasive skills – talents needed to encourage the business community to invest in Bristol in economically straitened times.  In his role as the executive member with responsibility for business I would ask him to reprise the traditional role of the Conservative Party as the party of enterprise and small business.  98% of private sector businesses in Bristol are small and medium enterprises, and they are considerably more effective at creating employment than their larger brethren in relation to their turnover. They also tend to have a disproportionate economic impact on the local economy as their supply chains are usually more localised, with a greater proportion of expenditure recycled within the local economy.  Cllr Weston’s role would be to focus on these vitally important small businesses.

Housing: Mark Wright (Liberal Democrat)

As somebody brought up in a tower block in Hartcliffe, and now representing a ward that has seen more than its fair share of residential development but often of a type that only addresses a particular segment of the housing market,  Mark will be able to bring a different perspective to Bristol’s chronic housing problems.  His greatest challenge will be how to house Bristol’s expanding population whilst minimising the destruction of green spaces and providing homes that the average Bristolian can afford to live in.

Finance and Deputy Mayor: Gary Hopkins (Liberal Democrat)

Gary has the capability to take hold of a portfolio and develop a deep understanding of it in a very short time.  His role will be to monitor the other portfolios and ensure that they spend public money efficiently and effectively.  This will not be a case of implementing cuts based on simplistic accounting, but will involve Gary in encouraging investment that makes the best use of public money for the well-being of the city.  The money the cabinet spends is not ours, it is that of the residents of Bristol and needs to be treated accordingly.

This would be my team, if the people of Bristol were ever daft enough to hand me the reins of power.  If nothing else, it would ensure that cabinet meetings would be more interesting than the rather placid “show trials” they currently are.