Friday 24th April 2015

BCfm’s weekly politics show presented by Tony Gosling

At five – discussing the big stories in Bristol, Britain and around the world
After six – straight talking and investigative reports with Martin Summers

Listen live http://www.bcfmradio.com/player

First hour: Local election debate – BCfm Politics Show part 1 – Conservative on George Ferguson’s cabinet Geoff Gollop, Labour group leader Helen Holland, Liberal Democrats group leader Gary Hopkins, Green councillor Tim Malnick, and UKIP councillor Michael Frost.  What are the parties’ visions and priorities for Bristol? Transport, residents parking, education, academies, libraries, austerity/cuts, local communities, scrutiny of policy making, transport, jobs, homes, cost of living crisis, living wage city. Has bringing in a Mayor been a success? And is having all councillors’ elections at the same time a good idea? Residents parking scheme, Bristol Arena, lack of democracy, selling off freehold of Avonmouth docks.  Clip of Dawn Parry, from Independents for Bristol, explaining some of her ideas for Bristol: MP job share, Bristol Peoples Bus, housing. Quiz question for councillors – how many police officers have Avon & Somerset Police lost since 2010? Answer 600 which is about 20% of the force: UKIP councillor guessed closest at 500 response times have got worse, austerity, less PCSOs too.
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BCfm audio file
Radio4all audio file

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BILj4RFyBnY]

Second hour now available 🙂

Second hour: Local election debate – BCfm Politics Show part 2 – Is The West of England Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) @WofEnglandLEP as open and accountable as it should be? Its board is selected by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), Institute of Directors (IoD), Federation of Small Businesses (FSB), and Business West – business has the loudest voice spending tens(?) of millions of public money but meetings are held in secret – they should be accountable; sell off of Weston-Super-Mare Winter Gardens for a £1 to Weston college with help from a grant from the LEP but this what arguably should have been multi million pound asset transfer takes the Winter Gardens out of local authority control; article in the Bristol Post which fails to mention the criticism from Weston’s Civic Society nor the facts that the sell-off was carried out with no consultation and £15m granted by the secretive LEP to one of the LEP’s partners, Weston college. Should be more representatives from community and social and voluntary sector. Has immigration squeezed or supported local resources? Ed Miliband’s comments today about David Cameron’s Libya failings being partly responsible for tens of thousands of desperate migrants coming across the Mediterranean; similarity to forced migration in late 1800s from Ireland and Scotland to the United States. Tony Blair’s 2003 Iraq war and dodgy dossier also helped create chaos in the region; Is Bristol a City of Sanctuary for asylum seekers? Is migrant labour undercutting wages? Living wage vs the minimum wage; long term foreign policy – complexity dealing with different countries; diplomats; more social housing. Food security – clip of Derek Mead, North Somerset Farmer, explaining how Britain should be more food self-sufficient, and price cutting in super markets: fishing; local suppliers; people have visited food banks a million times this year. Bristol City Council spends around £370m of our money a year: some towards Metrobus £200m and Arena £110m; Michael Frost complains that the eviction of tree protesters at Stapleton Allotments should have happened much earlier and this would have saved the council money in the long term. He was informed of this by a UKIP colleague here in Bristol who he declines to name but has professional expertise in evictions. Jobs; Colston Hall; parking; scrutiny of funding.
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Where BCfm audio file should have been
Radio4all audio file