Western Daily Press (Saturday)
From engineering and atheism to local politics and Christianity
Local Democracy Reporter Carmelo Garcia meets a politician whose experience was forged in the workshop, monastery and classroom rather than mundane council committee rooms
GLOUCESTERSHIRE’S new economy and education chief became an “accidental politician” after a varied life which saw him become an aeronautical engineer, a monk and a maths teacher.
Cllr Philip Robinson was elected to represent the Mitcheldean division at Gloucestershire County Council in May – and he is now the new cabinet member for economy, education and skills.
Originally from Manchester, Mr Robinson says he never expected to become a politician, not least a Conservative Party councillor.
He grew up in a small semidetached house as a very keen Manchester United fan who was told his first words were the name of Old Trafford legend Denis Law.
His father, a clerk at a big engineering firm, was the archetypal working-class Tory.
Shortly after leaving school in 1975, his higher education was paid for by British Aerospace who he went on to work for.
He became active in student politics and joined the Labour Party.
“My background in politics on the left was probably a reaction against my father’s Conservatism,” he said.
“I think he would be proud to see me now as a Conservative councillor. When I left school in 1975, there was full employment for anyone wanting to work in industry.
“I left school and did a sandwich course and my higher education was paid for by British Aerospace.
“I was never very active in becoming a politician. I had tried to become shop steward but the only elected position I’ve had before becoming a councillor was as a school governor some years ago.”
He enjoyed working at British Aerospace.
He said: “It was very important but painstaking work. I went into the inspection side, then into design. In my last years there, I actually finished in the defects department which is basically the part which looks at accidents and errors.
“You are looking at reported failings, working with the Civil Aviation Authority.”
It was around that time that Mr Robinson discovered his Christian faith.
“I had been an atheist for a long time. Because of that, I was always trying to find the reason for why anything existed.”
In the course of a week in 1986, he declared he had a faith. He became a Roman Catholic and decided to become a monk.
“My father was an atheist but he didn’t really think about it much.
“I believe that something doesn’t come from nothing.
“Trying to find meaning was one of the reasons I became so interested in science and mathematics.
“I was 26 when I actually openly acknowledged a faith and started to believe with real conviction.
“It became the most important thing for me. And I wanted to respond completely to this.
“I needed to give it everything and it was at that point I thought that meant I needed to enter religious life.
“And so I joined a religious order. I left the aerospace industry in 1990. I knew I was going to become a monk.”
He joined the Cistercians on Caldey Island in West Wales and was there for five years.
“My faith had become the most important thing to me and it needed a response.
“But going to a monastery is a very difficult thing. I lived the life quite well but in the end, I decided it wasn’t for me. I had taken my simple, temporary vows. I had been a novice and was coming up to that stage when you take your final vows and I decided to leave.”
Before he left British Aerospace his superiors told him there would be a job for him if things at the monastery did not work out.
But going to a monastery is a very difficult thing. I lived the life quite well but in the end, I decided it wasn’t for me. I had taken my simple, temporary vows. I had been a novice and was coming up to that stage when you take your final vows and I decided to leave
CLLR PHILIP ROBINSON
“But I rang them and they had all left,” he said.
“We were kitting out major reconnaissance aeroplanes like the Nimrod AEW3 before I left.
“The Cold War had ended and within a few years it had an impact on the number of jobs available in aerospace.
“So I was about to have a young family and I needed a new career quickly. I had always fancied teaching.”
Mr Robinson completed a Postgraduate Certificate in Education and became a maths teacher in 1997.
He worked at St Mary’s Roman Catholic High School in Lugwardine near Hereford.
“I became a maths teacher at a Roman Catholic school. I hadn’t intended that but looking back it makes sense.
“I was there 22 years. I became its head of mathematics.”
He says he is very proud of what was achieved there in making the school one of the best in the county within six years.
But after retiring in 2019, he considered getting involved in politics again and he joined the Conservative Party. By then he was living in the Forest of Dean and joined the local association.
“I had started to become politically involved. I became particularly animated by Brexit. I was a Brexiteer.
“Politics became very polarised. But Brexit for me was always about freedom, self-determination and sovereignty. It wasn’t really about economics.
“After the result of the 2017 General Election, I decided to join the Conservative Party to have a vote in the subsequent leadership contest.
“I believed it was the right place to be. I turned against the Left when I came to see that the family, whatever we perceive the family to be, is the basic unit of society.
“I felt the Left was not creating the conditions which would allow families to flourish.
“As I’ve got older, I’ve seen that Conservative values are about the family, or they should be. That’s the journey I’ve been on.
“The family fits into that faith. Whatever we perceive the family to be. I think the family works in society however it is constructed.”
He said there was a request for candidates for the 2019 district council elections and he stood for the Mitcheldean, Ruardean and Drybrook ward.
“I put myself forward for it and lost. But after the election I became the deputy chairman for political matters at the Forest of Dean Conservative Association and started work on preparing for the county council elections.
“It was so interesting. I had never been a parish or district councillor and there I was elected as a county councillor.
“I was absolutely a reluctant, accidental politician.
“I met council leader Mark Hawthorne who said he would like to offer me a cabinet role for economy, education and skills.
“I do love this job, being a cabinet member. It’s been a whirlwind since I was elected.”
Mr Robinson said his main priorities are to focus on rebuilding the economy in Gloucestershire and to improve the fortunes of people living in the most deprived areas across the county.
“A nailed-on priority is the post pandemic economic recovery,” he said.
“Unless we recover the economy, we can’t do any of the other things well.
“We’ve talked about levelling up nationally.
“In Gloucestershire, it makes sense to talk about levelling up as there are some real pockets of deprivation.
“I would like to see levelling up in Gloucestershire for those communities which have always seemed to have a raw deal.
“The other priority is education, improving standards in challenged communities.
“That in turn leads to higher levels of youth employment and that then feeds into the economy.
“Education is the best thing of all to invest in.
“You get a continual return from it across the generations.”
He added: “I would like to see a better deal for pupils excluded from school.
“I would like to see a revolving door approach where perhaps pupils who are causing difficulties in schools can have that behaviour modified in our alternative provision schools and then come back to their original schools and finish their education.”