Many people are getting in touch wanting to be involved and there’s plenty of room for everyone because the task we have is a mammoth one. We want to push voting levels to 60/70/80% at least and we want the whole city to voice their aspirations for the place they call home.

We’ve begun bouncing around our words in our facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/amayorforbristol/

but feel free to comment here on how we can improve it:

A Manifesto for Bristol (working first draft only – make it better add comments and ideas below) Vision:
1 To inspire people to work together to create a shared vision for a better future for Bristol
Mission:
2) To encourage people to be bold and put forward ideas, suggestions and comment on how to build a better Bristol
3) To facilitate discussion and debate through online, postal and face-to-face means
4) To construct, develop and share the tools to enable this mission to take place
5) To promote engagement through existing city-wide community or council driven channels (e.g Neighbour Hood partnerships, school, universities, business associations, residents groups, representative bodies)
6) To reach out & collaboratively involve businesses and political groups of whatever colour or flavour across the city
7) To capture ideas, suggestions and comment on how to improve Bristol
To reflect and distil the aspirations of our communities in a Manifesto for Bristol
9) To carry out this exercise guided by a spirit of transparency and openness at all times
10) To remain independent of influence, bought or political, and to see to it that all candidates for Mayor are forced to measure up against a Manifesto for Bristol before the election campaign begins

He or she will have the same powers as the council leader, but will have been voted directly by the people of Bristol.

• currently, council leaders are chosen by councillors.
• A council leader will choose their cabinet from councillors of their own party.
• An elected mayor will have the freedom to have a cross-party cabinet, making it far more representative of the views of Bristol.

He or she will also be able to negotiate greater powers from Whitehall, in their move to devolve more power down to cities.

• Liverpool has already negotiated an extra £130 Million as part of their city deal in shifting to an elected mayor leadership model.
• Leicester’s mayor has negotiated greater transport and regeneration powers, which allows him to set bus fare prices and routes (imagine that for Bristol!)
• Bristol itself has been offered an extra £1Billion of funding if we go for an elected mayor model. It will also be able to have its own transport authority for the city and surrounding area.

2. What difference will an elected Mayor for Bristol make to my life? 

He or she will provide effective leadership

• Decisions are taken and carried through

  The mandate from the electorate, who vote for the mayor directly, means that the mayor can get on with what needs to be done without constantly having to check with other politicians. This means cities do better. The Olympic Games, the congestion charge would not have happened without the London mayoral mandate. In Bristol, the mandate from voters should mean the big projects – the arena, the transport system, football stadiums, affordable housing – get a huge boost and a chance of actually happening.

• Getting things done

  Reports from the Comprehensive Performance Assessment have shown that mayors demonstrate stronger and more effective leadership: for example, in his first year of office as mayor of Middlesborough, Ray Mallon gained a reputation for getting things done by “banging heads together” and cut crime by 18 per cent.

• Less partisanship

  An elected mayor is responsible to the public above all, not to their own political party. He or she exercises far greater freedom from partisan politics than the council leader. Instead of being a political figure, an elected mayor is a community leader.

• A different, more inclusive kind of leader

  Recent decades have seen a less domineering, more enabling kind of leadership of cities and urban areas, which because cities are so complex to lead, favours a more visible, outward-looking, open and team-minded style. Any successful elected mayor will be a co-ordinator and facilitator. He or she will be a leader who promotes positive interaction and a high level of communication – that is, makes a point of being fair and friendly and really listening to people – among officials and the public. They will give guidance in goal-setting and policy-making.

• More entrepreneurial leadership 

  This is crucial in helping to find new economic futures for cities, their businesses and residents. The job of the elected mayor is to help create employment as well as improve services.

   

He or she will enhance Bristol’s reputation

• A vote for a mayor will give Bristol the chance…

  …to choose a candidate with the best leadership qualities. Historically Bristol has been independent-minded and it still is today. A great mayor will be able to promote those qualities, and Bristol’s talents, expertise and creativity, to the wide world – in Bristol and beyond.

3. Isn’t there a danger of corruption? 

An elected mayor will improve accountability and reinvigorate democracy at the local level

• Turnout to council elections has dropped…

  …so we need to revive people’s interest if we want better democracy

• A mayor of Bristol will select a cabinet…

  …from the existing pool of councillors, meaning that more councillors will be elected to the council

   

Since a mayor will be directly elected by the people, he or she will be far more accountable to Bristolians

• The current leader of the council does not derive her mandate from the public…

  …as she is elected by her fellow councillors.

• Mayors can be voted out…

  …after four years. The government is also currently working on a power of recall for extreme circumstances, as a fail-safe.

• They can also be removed…

  …through a Council vote of no confidence.

• They have a direct relationship with the public who elected them

• By contrast, Bristol’s current Council leader…

  …effectively has no public mandate.

   

Despite enhanced powers, checks and balances will remain

• The relationship between the cabinet and backbench councillors will remain.

• The council can reject mayoral proposals if it has a two-thirds majority or more.

Most charges of corruption draw on examples from mayors in the USA 

• In the USA there are hundreds of mayors

  In the UK there are only 12, so the comparison is not very applicable to conditions in the UK.

   

• The mayoral system in the USA is different

  The “strong-mayor” system in many American cities assumes far greater powers for the mayor. In Denver, Colorado, for example, the mayor has in the past been able to award contracts worth half a million dollars without council approval, and appoint 50 heads of administrative departments as well as county judges. Even so, in recent years the strong-mayor form has moved to a more facilitative, accommodating style in response to these shortcomings.

   

Fears of corruption throw the baby out with the bathwater

• Corruption can happen anywhere. In the case of the mayor, it will be up to the councillors

  …to maintain checks and balances. Bristol’s councillors will be watching the mayor like hawks.

   

• The referendum for a directly elected mayor is unique to Britain

  It’s not a US import to ask cities and their people whether they want a mayor, nor to hold a referendum on the topic like the one in Bristol on 3 May. That is purely British fair play and democracy.

   

• One reason why so few authorities voted for the mayor and cabinet model might be…

  because councillors and politicians tend to think the mayor will disrupt existing power structures. This is what has happened in Bristol: the so-called “no campaign” is almost completely made up of councillors and politicians, while A Mayor for Bristol, the so-called “yes campaign”, is run by micro-business people, more women than men, and they are not politicians. The self-interest of many politicians would prefer to maintain the status quo.

   

The case of Stoke

• Critics often point to the case of Stoke-on-Trent

  …where the position of mayor was established in 2002 but was later removed in a 2008 referendum.

• What’s important is that Stoke tried a “mayor plus council manager executive” system…

  …as opposed to the “mayor and cabinet” system on offer to Bristol. Stoke’s system was a different system. It doesn’t apply to Bristol and won’t be tried out here.

• The option of “mayor plus council manager executive” system – the one Stoke voted out – was repealed in law in 2007

  …by the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act, because it caused so much confusion.

• Bristol will have a better system than Stoke had if we vote for a mayor on 3 May.

4. Won’t an elected Mayor be out of touch? How will they hear my views? 

The human face of local government

VOTE MAYOR FOR BRISTOL ON THURSDAY 3 MAY 2012

He said: “We’re giving people in Bristol the chance to change the way their city’s run. And I would say, if you end up with a mayor, you’ll actually save money, because mayors can bang heads together, get rid of bureaucracy, and right now, any mayor worth their salt will be trying to get bills down.

“That’s what Boris Johnson is doing in London, and I suspect that’s what a mayor will do in Bristol.”

He added: “In the modern age, Bristol isn’t just competing with other cities in the UK, it’s competing with Berlin, Bangalore, and you need to have someone who’s out there on the world stage, banging the drum for investment, for jobs, and talking up Bristol, which a mayor can do. This is not about party interests, this is about how do we run our country better, how do we make sure our big cities have got real clout.

“At the moment cities can opt to have a mayor if they want to, but in too many cases city leaderships have rather wanted to keep the status quo. This election is to give people the chance to say, ‘We want something better’, with really strong civic leadership. It’s your choice.”

University Road, Bristol BS8 1SR, in the Great Hall

FREE PUBLIC EVENT
Monday 23 April – 18:30 – Great Hall, Bristol Grammar School
Bristol’s May Mayoral Referendum

Bristolians will be asked to vote for or against the idea of a directly elected Mayor in May 2012, in a local referendum proposed in the Government’s Localism Bill. Every Bristol council taxpayer gets a vote – but do people really know what they’re voting for?

A vote for an elected mayor could be the biggest upheaval to local democracy since the dissolution of Avon County Council. So come along – and find out more.

The event, chaired by former BBC Radio journalist and Bristol Speakers’ Corner organiser Stephen Perry, opens with the presentation:

“A Brief History, and the Wider Context, of Directly Elected Mayors”
Dr Sweeting,
Centre for Urban and Public Policy Research,
University of Bristol

This will be followed by a talk from Ray Mallon, elected Mayor of Middlesbrough, who will have travelled from the North-East to be with us, about the reality of the post and what it means for his town.

A panel discussion will follow, with questions and answers from the audience. On the panel are:

Gus Baker – President of University of Bristol Students’ Union

Paul Smith – Labour Party Alderman of Bristol City Council

Peter Abraham – Leader of Bristol Conservative Party

George Ferguson – Architect & Entrepreneur

James Durie – Business West

PLEASE NOTE – THIS EVENT IS FREE

Please come along! The hall seats 400 people and everyone is welcome. This is YOUR chance to find out what this whole elected mayor referendum is all about, to QUIZ the experts, to ask the questions and to make up your mind.

BAGEHOT writes:

“LIKE many entrepreneurs, Rob Law—designer of the Trunki, a wheeled children’s suitcase that can be ridden by small, tired owners—is impatient with established ideas. A cross between a toy and luggage, his creation at first baffled buyers from big shops and was turned down by “Dragon’s Den”, a televised talent show for inventors. He has since sold more than 1.25m of them.

Mr Law’s design studio in the south-western city of Bristol is built to resemble a space-station, boasting dummy portholes offering galactic views and an escape slide to carry staff between floors. Next month he will bring a big chunk of production back from China to a factory in England—betting that shorter lead times, lower transport costs and a redesign eliminating two dozen parts will make British manufacture pay.

On May 3rd Bristol will be one of ten English cities to hold a referendum on whether to stick with rule by council committee or hand powers to a directly elected mayor. Mr Law is keen on change. The Bristol area is a good place for business—home to two universities, aerospace firms and the animation studios behind Wallace and Gromit. But it could be better, he says. Transport is a mess, and key bits of infrastructure are missing. Bristol is ‘treading water’, says Mr Law. It needs a champion to get things moving, just as London’s mayor champions the capital…read more”

Listen in to Charlotte Leslie, Member of Parliament for Bristol North West, discussing this question with Barbara Janke, Leader of Bristol City Council.

In the week before Bristol goes to the polls, and on the day when a major public event takes place at Bristol Grammar School (free and open to everyone, 18.30 in the Great Hall), the BBC asks: what are the powers that an elected mayor of the city will have, and should we know before voting in the referendum on whether or not Bristol wants an elected mayor? Is it even possible to know?