Mayor Election 2016 / News
Green leader’s ‘first of many’ Bristol visits
Green Party leader Natalie Bennett met with Bristol mayoral candidate Tony Dyer in what she promised would be the first of many visits to Bristol to drum up support in time for next May’s election.
In an early boost ahead of the launch of Dyer’s campaign next year, the leader also backed the local party to turn the city green in the council elections.
Bennett met local party representatives at Bristol Temple Meads before touring Bedminster where she met with developers over affordable housing targets – set to be a key subject in Dyer’s campaign, he said.
She told Bristol24/7 she is confident of a Green win at the mayoral elections and a further increase to the number of Green councillors. Dyer is 50/1 to win, according to Ladbrokes.
“I think we can win,” she said. “The people of Bristol have shown they are ready to vote for real change.”
Asked if the party would throw the same kind of resources behind Dyer as it did for Bristol West parliamentary candidate Darren Hall, she said: “Put it this way, you can expect to see me down here quite a lot more and other members of the leadership team too.”
The Bristol Green Party membership has grown from about 200 members at the time of the last mayoral elections in 2012 to about 2,500 now, according to Dyer, who added that he and the party are in the process of writing his mayoral manifesto.
The number of Green councillors has also grown from two in 2012 to 14 now. Ani Stafford-Townsend, the newly-elected leader of the group said she expects the number of councillors to continue to grow at next May’s election.
“We are expecting to take more seats and add to our numbers on the council,” she said. “I think we can take seats off all the parties. The expectation is the Lib Dems will continue to collapse, but we know we have a good chance of taking seats off Labour too.”
The Greens and Labour have been engaged in a battle for voters since Jeremy Corbyn’s attempts to move the party more to the left.
Stafford-Townsend said she was confident voters would choose Green for the party’s “genuine left-wing and social justice policies”.
After meeting at Temple Meads, Bennett, Dyer and Stafford-Townsend toured the Bedminster Green development area off East Street, Bedminster, and new sustainable homes on North Street.
Dyer said he planned to speak with developers about affordable housing targets, which are routinely missed in Bristol.
“We want to see more affordable housing,” he said. “It’s OK for politicians go on about the targets but we want to talk to developers and housing experts to get them on board to find a solution.”
Read about who has put their name forward so far to contest the 2016 Bristol mayor elections.
is needed now More than ever
Read Bristol24/7‘s report on Bristol’s failure to deliver affordable housing.
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