If you’re a Bristol resident, it cannot have escaped your notice – unless you’ve been on a drink and drugs bender for the last 6 months – that the city is due to go the polls in November to choose its first elected mayor, following an underwhelming referendum result in May 2012.
My home has been mercifully spared too much attention to date by party animals, canvassers and leaflet drops. In fact, I only recently received my first leaflet, as it happens from Labour mayoral candidate Marvin Rees.
As usual, the leaflet contains the conventional promises about how wonderful life would be if only the reader could be persuaded to vote for the candidate concerned, including the following about local employment:
We are living in tough times. I will work to get jobs and growth in Bristol.
That’s a very laudable and important aim to have for someone seeking election to a major public office in the city on a salary that will probably be in the region of £1,000 a week.
However, Marvin’s commitment to “work to get jobs” in Bristol is shot totally out of the water by the very end of his leaflet.
Yes, Marvin’s leaflet is printed in the far-flung Bristol suburb of Forest Farm, Cardiff, providing employment in CF14 in these “tough times”.
Is it really difficult to get printing done in Bristol? Not really: a quick Google using the words Bristol, UK and “leaflet printing” returns over 2,300 results in a fraction of a second.
However, Marvin is not alone in supporting employment anywhere but Bristol. The city council, of which Marvin will be in charge if elected, has form here too, as in spending £73,000 with a Manchester firm for logos.
Update 6/10/12: Yesterday I received a joint leaflet featuring Marvin for mayor and John Savage for the elected Police & Crime Commissioner. This one was printed in an outlying district of Bristol, i.e. Laindon in Essex.