‘Bristol’s mayoral model has failed to deliver on its promises’

Imagine a city where the leader rules with absolute power and checks and balances on the city government have been eroded away. Public money is spent snooping on people’s social media, big business has an overwhelming level of control on policy and public services are stripped away while millions are wasted on pet projects.

This is not a city in a post-Soviet oligarchy or a Latin American kleptocracy, but Bristol under a mayoral system.

When the people of Bristol voted for a mayoral system in 2012, they were told it would improve city leadership and allow politicians to deliver on their promises.

This has unfortunately not been the case. City leadership has been centralised in the hands of the mayor, and the business leaders that have been able to get close to him, while neighbourhood partnerships and community politics have been shelved.

There has been a failure to deliver the city centre arena, enough social housing, and the reduction in carbon emissions that are central to our fight against the climate emergency.

At the same time, objective scrutiny by councillors and the public has been curtailed by a failure to deliver the necessary papers, and a refusal to answer freedom of information requests in a timely manner.

Plans for an arena near Temple Meads were scrapped by mayor Marvin Rees in 2018 – photo by Ellie Pipe

We now also have a ‘second mayor’, the mayor for the West of England Combined Authority (WECA), which can take more power from Westminster than the Bristol mayor ever could, while giving us the public leadership and boosterism that proponents of the mayoral system desire.

Bristol’s faith in the role of elected mayor is not high. In the most recent Quality of Life survey, 65 per cent of people thought that the role of elected mayor was not improving the leadership of the city, while only 21 per cent of people thought they were able to influence decisions that affect their local area.

Under the current mayoral system, all the power is in Labour hands even though Labour and the Greens have the same number of councillors. Although opposition councillors have two-thirds of the council seats, they are limited to participating in licensing and planning meetings.

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Read more: Examining the success of Bristol’s mayoral system 

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The Bristol Lib Dems want to push power away from City Hall and put it back into communities. We feel that Bristol has been let down by the mayoral model, which has failed to deliver on its promises. Now that it has almost been ten years under the current system, we feel it is right to ask the people of Bristol what they think about the system, and whether it should be replaced.

Our preferred replacement is the committee system of governance, which is fairer, more proportional, and conducive to a long-term strategy for improving Bristol. By allowing councillors to work together on cross-party committees, we can improve our governance, while allowing for everyone to have a voice in a proportional and balanced way.

The committee system will mean that no one person will be able to singlehandedly make decisions that affect all Bristolians, and that the vote of all councillors will mean something, unlike the charade of the council vote on the city centre arena that the mayor chose to ignore.

The earmarked Temple Island site was the favoured location for the arena amongst councillors, who voted overwhelmingly in favour of building the arena there instead of moving it to the Brabazon hangar. The council decision was overridden by the will of one man.

A move to a committee system will ensure greater transparency and accountability around council decisions. It will also involve a wider cross-section of voices being heard and engaged in the whole decision-making process and be much more open to engagement and scrutiny by members of the public.

We feel that is important to go back to Bristolians and ask them their view on the governance of their city. That is why, at full council on Dec 7, we are tabling a motion calling for a referendum in the mayoral model, to put it to the people in a binding vote.

If people choose to escape from the mayoral system, the current mayor would be our last, and a new system would commence from May 2024. We would like to encourage all Bristolians to write to your local councillors to ask them to support the motion, and to write statements and questions to full council asking councillors to support the motion.

Only by working together to institute a new system of governance can we make Bristol a truly democratic and accountable city.

Alex Hartley is calling for a referendum on the mayoral model – photo by Ellie Pipe

Alex Hartley is Lib Dem councillor for Hotwells & Harbourside

Main photo by Bristol24/7

Read more: Motion to hold referendum on scrapping Bristol’s mayoral system defeated

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