Principles seem cheap

✒ THE Bristol Green Party ran on a platform, in the election just passed, supporting the mayoral system.

This was likely because they were convinced they could win that position. Now they have failed to do this they have undergone a sudden “road to Damascus” moment, and changed that stance completely.

I have been led to believe that representatives of the Bristol Green Party are in secret discussions about supporting a cross-party effort to scrap the mayoral position. I assume that once the party comes out publicly with this policy, they will likely offer no explanation for their sudden turnaround.

This would be astoundingly dishonest to voters who backed them during the election, many of them assuming that their mayor campaign was based on policy and not

sheer opportunism.

This would also be immensely disrespectful to those who worked hard to raise awareness during the previous election about the lack of accountability in the mayoral role.

The Green Party claim to stand for a new way of doing politics, however this sounds an awfully lot like politics as usual.

If they really want to set a new precedent, then perhaps they could say “We were wrong and we apologise”.

As it is though I have no doubt that as soon as the next mayoral election approaches, they will change their stance again if they believe they have a good shot at winning. Principles, it would seem, are cheap.

Watt Tyler Bristol