Interview with James Tibbitts, Labour candidate in Bradshaw, Bolton

Interview with James Tibbitts, Labour candidate in Bradshaw, Bolton

• Why a Labour candidate in Bradshaw?

I’ve lived in Bradshaw all my life, I went to school there, so I have a strong connection with it and I don’t believe the Conservative Party will get that. In an area like Bradshaw, and generally speaking in Bolton, people are struggling so it’s very different if you were going to speak with a candidate from down south. Bradshaw is one of the more social economically prosperous areas, but even an area like that needs money spent on the pavement, the roads; it needs a sense of community that it used to have when I was a child but definitely not now, it needs money being spent on the green spaces and also a bit of police presence (because some of the residents say there isn’t enough and there’s still crime so the neighbours are keeping an eye on one another in a way they shouldn’t have to). We have a Conservative council in Bolton, and a Conservative government, so Bradshaw needed someone to stand for them and the Labour Party is going to stand for them. If I’m completely honest, I do care about Bradshaw, that is just a seat in my town but I care of all the seats; so that’s why I’m the candidate for Bradshaw. I’m running to try to stop the Conservative cuts.

• What are the main issues you want to prioritise in this campaign?

The main one to me is the 70 million pounds that are going to be taken by the Conservative government from Bolton. That is the main issue because all the other issues will be affected by that. You studied Politics so I’m sure you know that as much as it would be great that money wasn’t the antithesis of everything that’s going on, without money, what can we do? Lots of these issues that we have need investment, and we want to create long-term socioeconomic benefits. The town of Bolton is socioeconomically struggling, and they’re going to take more money away from it, so that is by far the biggest issue. 

I’m very proud of being from Bolton, so I made lots of friends in the area by meeting with people my age, and they weren’t as much privileged as I was in terms of their socioeconomic background. The idea that their communities are also going to be affected by cuts the government wants to implement, that’s where I have a big issue.

Money being taken out of the council means less opportunities for the council to fix issues that are in the community, that’s the main thing I want to run on, but then you would have lots of another things that are more targetted towards the specific area I’m running in that would also be affected by money being taken away. 

• Why is Labour the best alternative to the Conservatives in Bolton?

I think Labour’s the best alternative to the Conservatives anywhere, not just in Bolton, and that is because we live in a country that has a FPTP system that only really allows a choice of two parties. Our ideology is based on caring and sharing opportunity with people. You have to look at what the two parties are offering, as much as it would be lovely for people to have the option of more parties (there is the Greens and the LibDems), you have to go with the Conservatives who operate on a conservationist right-wing approach, or you go to Labour that it was founded on a philosophy of caring for those around you. I as an individual care about those around me because that’s how I was raised, and generally speaking, what life shows is that the sharing of opportunity and resources for caring for one another benefits everyone in the long term. Those principles, those values directed towards the party that I think is most fitting to accomodate my philosophy and influence me as well. The Conservative Party doesn’t have an interest in doing that for me.That’s why Labour is the only alternative in Bolton and elsewhere. 

 

Interview with Tom Morton, Labour candidate for Hayes & Coney Hill, Bromley

 Interview with Tom Morton, Labour candidate for Hayes & Coney Hill, Bromley

• Why a Labour candidate in Hayes and Coney Hill?

I’ve been a member of the Labour Party for 8 years, I joined as soon as I could when I turned 16. My family has a rich history of being members of the Labour Party, my dad was a Labour councillor twice before I was born. I’ve always been Labour, it’s part of my life. I decided to run as a candidate mainly because of the age of the average councillor in the UK, only the 10% of councillors are under the age of 40, and that means that young adults and students aren’t represented in most councils and I think that needs to change. I think we as a party, specially in Bromley, we’re definitely trying to do that with a 10% of our candidates in this local election being under the age of 25, and several more being under the age of 30. The other reason is that, for all my life, the Bromley council has always been Conservative and my local representation has always been Tory as well. How can we have a healthy democracy without accountability? It’s always been like this, the Tories haven’t had any accountability in our local council and I think that should change. 

• What are the main issues you want to prioritise in your campaign?

In my opinion it’s quite plain and simple, everyone’s priority right now should be the climate emergency. My experience on this subject comes from my final degree project in my Physics undergraduate at the University of York, I’m currently researching whether fusion can help to solve the climate emergency, and that means that a lot of my research is based around the climate crisis and all of its components on a political and public policy level. It’s not looking good at all, so that’s my number one priority and it should be yours and everyone’s undoubtedly.

Other priority that I’m quite passionate about is social housing, I think that currently it’s a big problem in the UK and I don’t believe there’s any chance that any Conservative leadership will ever try to tackle this, Labour’s the only party that has good coherent policy on this issue.

• Why is Labour the best alternative to the other parties in Bromley?

I believe that Labour at a local and a national level is by far the best alternative in my borough of Bromley. The Conservatives are taking us as a joke, they don’t care and we need to start showing people and get them to understand that they don’t care about them. With COVID and the current cost of living crisis the Tories refuse to spend money on the people they represent. As Labour, we would invest in the people that we represent and try to help them in the current crisis that’s come out of Brexit and the pandemic.

Interview with Will Conway, Labour candidate for Bromley Town, Bromley

 Interview with Will Conway, Labour candidate for Bromley Town, Bromley

• Why a Labour candidate in Bromley Town?

Basically because they deserve better than what they’re getting at the moment, and I think we are the only ones who really have the resources (nationally apart from locally). When you are making promises to people in a national level you should be following that policy at the local level. The LibDems and Greens are never going to be the party of national power, they might grow, but when it comes to the cost of living crisis and so on, they are not going to have a reasonable approach to the reality. Single-issue parties like the SNP have it difficult to show unity, they’ve just got one policy. 

• What are the main issues you want to prioritise?

We’ve got various issues, the national stuff on corruption is also one but that’s more of a thing to get votes. On local issues, the council just refused to spend money on things, they’re letting things run away. We have an issue which is fly-tipping, it’s not only a local issue, it’s a central problem because nobody gets prosecuted for dumping rubbish. Potholes will take ages to do because there’s no one doing anything about them. Council houses are old, housing is another important issue.

Bromley is London’s greenest borough: more than 50% of Bromley is park land, but people don’t use that park land very much. They don’t use the spaces as much as they should. The council don’t spend any money on them. They don’t use the money to spend it on tackling poverty. 

The other thing is environment, Bromley has the worst death rate for air pollution in London, and the council calls it “standard air quality”! They do nothing for schools, with pollution around schools.

• Why is Labour the best alternative to the other parties in Bromley?

The minor parties don’t seem to be putting anything in, there’s a purely local issues party in Chislehurst which is about speeding, buildings and these things, but it’s not about the people. Labour cares about the people and looks after the poor in the borough, whilst the Conservatives seem to prioritise other wards. I have a plan for the people, I care about the people. 

Interview with Anthony Molloy, Labour candidate in Kilburn, Brent

 Interview with Anthony Molloy, Labour candidate in Kilburn, Brent

• Why a Labour candidate in Kilburn?

I’ve always been a member of the Labour Party, I’m a socialist through and through, and the reason I’m standing now is because I recently retired and I have the time to do the job of councillor properly.

• What are the main issues you want to prioritise in the campaign?

I have an expertise in a couple of areas, I work with an organisation called the Labour Land Campaign, which tackles land issues, mostly about land value taxation and wealth taxation. My experience with that organisation has given me some some expertise on land-related issues, and one of the main land-related issues in Britain and elsewhere consists in the construction of social housing and the funding of big regeneration and infrastructure projects: that relationship between developers and public authorities is completely asymmetrical, you have a skyscraper of lawyers and accountants on one side (for the developer); and basically local authorities aren’t using the powers they actually have to the full extent, notably in the use of public land. I can bring some expertise in that field and Kilburn is a site of major regeneration plans: there’s one project down in the south of the ward.

The other area of expertise that I have in this outsource times is that I know how to read contracts (a skill that most representatives lack), specially in an unprivileged ward like this one within an average borough, where we see the basic services like rubbish collection not being fulfilled. What you have to do is find out the contraventions, go to the contract, see if there’s a contravention and then if it is, pursue it so they have to pay. Outsourcers have to pay, and they don’t like to do that, and hopefully that will improve services. The point is that the services in my part of the borough are obviously being underprovided compared with other richer parts of the borough. Kilburn is definitely underprivileged compared with close wards like Queen’s Park.

• Why is Labour the best alternative to the other parties in the area?

Because, certainly in my ward, the rents are high; so a Labour councillor is the only one that’s going to construct social housing to solve the housing crisis.

Interview with Luke Hayes, Labour candidate in Shrub End, Colchester

 Interview with Luke Hayes, Labour candidate in Shrub End, Colchester

• Why a Labour candidate in Shrub End?

I’ve always been a Labour voter, I’ve always associated myself to liberal ideals on a national scale and looking at the local Labour Party I felt like I fit in it really well with the demographic, with the people that were already sitting in the party. I felt like Labour really fitted me, whereas the LibDems, I appreciate a lot of their values, and we’re all in this trying to make everyone’s lives better, but I felt like I fitted better with Labour; and of course, on top of that, I’ve been a Labour Party member since 2016.

• What are the main issues you want to prioritise in this campaign?

I’m running on 5 priorities: I want to work closely with the local police to tackle antisocial behaviour in the area, I want to work on the environmental credentials that Shrub End already has (We have a fantastic green space but I want to build upon that), I want to celebrate our heritage (Shrub End is named after a shrubbery that used to be in the area, and to some extent still is, I want to build upon that), I also want to work closely with charities in the area to look at ways to work on the Gosbecks area, because Gosbecks is astounding and unique to Colchester, there’s a Roman amphitheatre and currently all we have to show for it are a few talk lines on the ground, a notice board and the car park. I think that’s absolutely criminal. 

The other thing is obviously the roads and pathways, I intend to fully hold Essex County Council to account for it, because they’ve spent 1 million pounds last year on that, and more could’ve been done, specially for Shrub End. 

I’ve been talking a lot with residents in the area, the big thing that has come out recently is the fact that there’s very little underway for children to do, children from very young ages up to teenagers, we’ve got a skatepark which is fantastic but is very limited, we’ve got different playgrounds for younger children, but there’s no youth provision. I want to try to work on that as well to bring some of that back to Shrub End. There was a study in 2005-6 that said Shrub End was one of the most deprived areas in Colchester, and one of the big things to that was the lack of youth provision, that was exacerbated by the fact there’s just nothing for children to do. Those are really the things I’m running on. These are the things I’m trying to tackle, and I’ve got fantastic support from the Labour county councillor of the area. He supported me phenomenally over the past year to get these things moving.

• Why is Labour the best alternative to the Conservatives?

With the Conservatives you have privatisation, they’re very right-leaning. I don’t want to sound ungrateful of the work that the current councillors are doing, I think it’s brilliant that Shrub End is where it is. I think that a Labour councillor can bring more, we can put the investment into youth provision, we can look at extending the skatepark. There’s things that I believe we can do with a Labour councillor that aren’t being done at the moment. The thing is that I’m coming into this with an interest in local politics that I have for a very long time, and from what I can see, the things that I’ve been looking at and working on haven’t been done yet. I’m fully prepared to work to get these things done. On a local level it’s difficult to differentiate very much between the two main competing parties. I’m more interested about the community and the people in it. Shrub End has a fantastic community, so I want to emphasise that.