‘Hotwells & Harbourside’s next councillor needs to focus on the job, not grandstanding’

My colleagues and I have spoken to thousands of residents around the harbourside, and their message is loud and clear. People want a councillor whose first focus is doing the job they’ve been elected to do.

Hotwells & Harbourside doesn’t want a councillor who’s just there to grandstand, desperate to revive their political career.

What residents have been missing for the last couple of years is a hard-working councillor who will get on with the job and prioritise residents’ needs before their own pet projects.

For many in the area, the stakes are simply too high. Hundreds of renters and leaseholders in the ward – including my own grandmother – are stuck in flats caught up in the cladding scandal.

More on Spike Island feel trapped on their streets because of badly placed bus gates and never-ending repair works. The cost of living crisis is pushing many residents and local businesses to the brink.

The Labour administration’s plan is to pretend our beloved Central Library is going to be shut down, only to miraculously save it a week before postal voting starts.

This is the third election in a row they’ve pulled a stunt like this. Residents of Hotwells & Harbourside won’t be fooled by Labour’s cynical attempt to bump up their vote share.

And we must not forget the residents living in the firing line of the mayor’s worrying Western Harbour plans.

Many people fear their community being carved up by yet more roads, and that their homes will be put at even more risk of flooding – if they’re not demolished first.

My position is clear: there is no way I will support building more homes on a flood plain without flood defences being seriously improved.

And if any major building projects are going to happen in the area, they must happen with the local community’s consent. Residents have already suffered through botched consultations for years, this can’t happen again.

Water spills over the top of the Cumberland Basin during a recent high tide – photo: Martin Booth

We know that the hunger for Green policies and representation is already here. At the last local election, there were just 26 votes between the Lib Dems and the Greens in first and second place.

Our community once again has a clear choice between these two options.

So who’s going to be able to affect change? There are only five Lib Dem councillors in Bristol. They’ve lost three since the last election, and none of them are in areas neighbouring the harbour. Does that sound like a team who can make change in our area?

Meanwhile, the Greens have surged to 24 councillors. There’s a reason why every neighbouring area to the harbourside has Green councillors; we graft, we’re tenacious, we work hard all year round, we get things done for residents. We don’t sit on our hands waiting for the next election to show that we care.

Hotwells & Harbourside’s ward eastern boundary is Pero’s Bridge – photo: Martin Booth

If you elect me, you won’t just benefit from my hard work as your local councillor – you’ll get 25 hard-working Green councillors. We work together as the biggest team in the city.

While others just spend their time collecting signatures, we’ve been picking up casework from Hotwells & Harbourside residents over the past two years.

I’ve been working with councillor Ani Stafford-Townsend in the city centre on pushing to get the Gaol Ferry bridge reopened as quickly and safely as possible.

I’ve been working with councillors Tony Dyer and Christine Townsend in Southville, scrutinising the Western Harbour plans and setting clear red lines.

I’ve worked with councillor Tom Hathway in Clifton Down on proposals to get rents capped. And I’m working with the whole Green group to scrutinise the mayor’s budget, to prevent unthinkable cuts to essential public services in our community.

This is how we are going to solve the big problems on the harbourside – by working together as a team.

If you live in Hotwells & Harbourside, I hope you will back me at the polls on February 2, because you deserve a councillor who’s going to get on with the job – and actually has the support to do it.

Patrick McAllister is the Green Party candidate in the Hotwells & Harbourside by-election on February 2. The other candidates are Eliana Barbosa of the Conservative Party, the Labour Party’s Eileen Means and the Liberal Democrats’ Stephen Williams. A hustings is taking place at Hotwells Primary School on January 17.

Main photo: Green Party – Patrick McAllister with Green Party co-leader and Clifton Down councillor Carla Denyer

Read next:

• Stephen Williams: ‘Hotwells & Harbourside needs a councillor with experience, dedication and respect’
• Eileen Means: ‘Your neighbourhood is my neighbourhood’
• Martin Booth: ‘I shall strive to make Bristol better, just from outside City Hall’

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