‘It’s about trust’ Mayor picks 5th cabinet member
BRISTOL mayor Marvin Rees has all but ruled out appointing a “rainbow cabinet” as he named the fifth member of his ruling group.
Labour councillor Nicola Beech will take charge of climate, ecology, waste and energy in what the mayor described as a portfolio of “critical importance”.
Cllr Beech is the fifth Labour member to be re-appointed to the cabinet since the party lost their majority on the council at the elections.
The Greens won 24 seats in City Hall, the same number as Labour, in a surge in popularity at the polls.
But their success at the elections may not translate into the “significant” power-sharing role they seek.
Mr Rees, who has ruled Bristol City Council for the best part of the last five years with a Labour-only cabinet, suggested at a press briefing on Wednesday he would not be appointing any members from the opposition benches to the ruling group any time soon.
He said that would require a certain level of trust which was missing and could take “months and years” to build.
“Being in cabinet is not just a functional relationship,” Mr Rees said. “It’s a group that... works very, very closely with me.
“It’s all part of a collection of relationships of trust. I’ve met with all the party group leaders... and what we talked about was the need to build some trust.
“Over the last five years, there’s been some very adversarial relationships, not necessarily creating an environment of trust that would facilitate that closeness of relationship.
“That’s the conversation we’ve started to have and that’s the journey we expect to be going on over the coming months and years.”
When asked about the likelihood of any Green councillors getting positions on the cabinet, Mr Rees said “you can draw your conclusions from that”.
“Being in the cabinet is about trust,” he continued. “You’re right on the inside of the decisions we make. There are many other ways to engage in leadership in the local authority... But being in cabinet is about human relationships, and it takes time to build those.
“We haven’t had the basis of those in the past, and I hope we can build those over the coming months and years.
“But until we do get to that level of trust, then those cabinet positions aren’t necessarily ones that
Being in cabinet is not just a functional relationship ... It’s all part of a collection of relationships of trust. I’ve met with all the party group leaders... and what we talked about was the need to build some trust
Mayor Marvin Rees
we would be throwing the doors open to.”
Mr Rees had a rainbow cabinet of cross-party councillors but disbanded it during his second year in office.
His first cabinet in May 2016 contained six Labour members and one from each of the main parties. That came to an end in November 2017 after Mr Rees said the crossparty arrangement was no longer
working for him.
Cllr Beech joins Craig Cheney, Asher Craig, Helen Godwin and Helen Holland on the mayor’s new cabinet.
She takes on a new portfolio, having previously been the cabinet member for strategic planning and city design.
Cllrs Cheney, Craig, Godwin and Holland have kept their previous areas of responsibility.