A local election hustings was held at the University of York on April 19th in preparation for the local elections taking place on May 4th.
The event was an opportunity for students and York residents to hear from, pose questions to and raise concerns with councillors representing all the political parties that will be putting up candidates. The discussion was chaired by Jonathan Cowap from BBC Radio York.
The hustings began with each councillor and party representative given five minutes to outline the problems facing the city and their proposals to tackle them.
Cllr Claire Douglas, representing the Labour Party, spoke about a commitment to 100% affordable housing being built on council land, the insulation of council homes, and free school meals for every primary school child. She also spoke about the need to bring more well-paid jobs to York and for greater investment in the city.
Cllr Paul Doughty, representing the Conservative Party, spoke about the need to improve the state of the roads in the city, to subsidise at-risk bus routes, and to invest in streets that have been neglected – such as Parliament Street. He opposed the idea of a ‘tourist tax’ and stated that pop-up events in the city centre should not, in the future, detract from existing shops. He also stated the need to implement Ofsted recommendations in schools.
Cllr David Carr, the Rt. Hon. Lord Mayor and leader of the York Independent Group, stated that he would not make hard and fast promises. He spoke about the need for something to be done to improve mental health services, citing the shocking statistic that the largest cause of death of men aged under 45 is suicide.
Cllr Paula Widdowson, representing the Liberal Democrats, defended their record leading the council with the challenges the pandemic brought. She spoke about the need to focus on greener, fairer and safer local communities. She committed to helping with the cost of living crisis, developing road repair, tackling anti-social behaviour, protecting library services, and introducing a ‘tourist tax’.
Cllr Andy D’Agorne, representing the Green Party, defended their role as the junior party in the present coalition, stating the council has helped residents with the cost of living crisis, kept library services running and worked with improving flood defences. He spoke about improving insulation in council homes, distributing the benefits of climate action equally, and making politics in York a more collaborative process.
Cowap then opened the discussion and took questions from the audience.
The first question was regarding the future of the Blue Badge ban that has made it difficult for disabled people and people with mobility issues to access the city centre. Widdowson and D’Agorne took the position that the situation was not ideal, but that they had acted on advice from security and counter-terrorist forces. Carr stated that the first responsibility of the government was the safety of its citizens. Doughty and Douglas stated that the current measures were disproportionate, and that a compromise needed to be found, respectively.
The second question was regarding the state of the roads in York. Widdowson said that the budget was only enough to oversee a managed decline of the roads, with Carr and Douglas agreeing that it was underfunded. The discussion then got a little heated with Doughty calling Carr “a joke”.
An audience member asked for more information on plans to improve mental health services. All councillors agreed that this was an important area with more work needing to be done; D’Agorne spoke about needing more preventative work, Douglas noted the need for improvement for assessment times and Widdowson spoke about pilot schemes that were in place. Carr said he was willing to work with whichever party took this up seriously, and Doughty stated that the council needed to look at past failures in this area and learn from those mistakes.
The last question was regarding a £308 million debt that the council had. The councillors noted that this debt was from the capital budget, with the sum in question actually being invested in the city in the form of homes being built and environmental development measures, among other things.
At this point, Cowap brought the hustings to a close, indicating that he would be questioning the candidates further on his radio programme, particularly around the impact of increased traffic flows in the city.
All in all it was a thorough discussion, touching upon many topics that will be at the front of people’s minds as they cast their votes in the local election on May 4th.