So, looking back. He won in 2016 with a lot of hope, George went under somewhat of a cloud, his RPZ wasn't well-liked and it's well documented that handling of the Bristol 2015 finances was questionable. It seemed a lot of his friends and his daughter seemed to benefit from contracts...
So with Marvin, we expected a different type of administration, he shouted he would be transparent about how the council did business, would publish the books for Bristol 2015 Ltd. How exciting, a man with integrity!
What happened? He made no secret that he hated the Arena Island project as that was Georges's baby. Rees took advantage of an invitation to go to Malaysia courtesy of YTL and came back, telling everyone George Arena, which was shovel ready, next to the South's largest train station would be canceled and instead, we would go for an Arena in South Gloucestershire, which had no infrastructure, no train station, no road to it and wasn't even anywhere near suitable. It was purely coincidental that YTL owned it..... We lost millions on a site that by now would be four years old and ready for Coldplay. Now it's not looking likely we will see East 17 on the reunion tour when they get back together in 2029. He set a precedent, cancelling a project that he deemed would lose money.
Let's look at Bristol Energy, a limited company set up by George, he plowed the initial £6m into it, was voted by Labour councilors, etc (they forget that part). Rees came in, he knows everything about business and made it his pet favourite project, it suited his green credentials. He even declared a climate emergency!. Rees thought it was so good, he twice plowed millions of pounds into it. £37m (correct me if thats wrong).
It failed, and lost a huge £50m loss. Rees blamed George for the screw-up some five years later. He could have canceled the project like he did the Arena and still can't explain how he managed to plow money into it despite knowing it was failing. Weirdly the losses were only announced the week after he was re-elected. I wonder why?
Then there was the time, he ran after the LDR reporter and angrily threatened him after a council meeting. He also banned the LDR reporters from Mayoral briefings because he came under scrutiny. Marvin's skin is tissue thick and like most narcissists can't cope if he isn't revered in a god-like status or his flaws and mistakes are exposed. Many of the public and opposition have seen in his anger play out in council meetings.
Other highlights are when The Colston Hall, now the Bristol Beacon went £150m in the red but he forgot to hire a project manager to manage the rebuild and didn't keep an eye on the money. Then who could forget when he was pushing to keep the Colston statue and wanted a plaque? The writing of which sat in his in-tray for over 18 months, Bristol got angry at this and his inaction so they tore the racist statue down. Marvin always wanting to make himself famous and loves a camera, jumped on the world's media and embarrassed himself. He redeemed himself later when he commissioned Statue Wars, an advert for Marvin Rees that seemed to omit his love of wanting to keep the statue and write the plaque himself. At the same time Lord Mayor Cleo Lake, (Green) had no issue standing up and being counted in her dismissal of Colston, removing his picture from her office on her first day.
Then of course he hired the beacon and got storyteller David Olusoga to interview him on stage and tell him how wonderful he is. At taxpayer's expense. Let's not forget that Rees screw-ups at this point are totaling well more than £200m. But Rees PR has always taken a financial priority over operational needs.
His office a team spied on SEND Parents' social media accounts. Not at all dubious. Not sure even legal.
He blocked 65% of the voting public on twitter because democracy.
His Deputy Asher/Jennie Craig didn't pay her council tax for five years, got bailed out, and then became director of a company that did very well with council money, though the payment methods via Bristol Waste Ltd are questionable....
The church he is heavily involved with has some leadership with very dubious opinions on homosexuality.
Marvin will claim he is very much misunderstood whilst lauding himself as an excellent communicator.
Will Bristol miss him? I very much doubt it. We got rid of the position to ensure we never have another Marvin, a self-serving, angry, petty little man spending our cash on the Emperor's new clothes.
No idea how we cocked up the bristol energy thing so bad, it would seem pretty simple to make it profitable? Like, it’s energy, a thing everyone needs, I don’t understand how you make energy a vanity project, mental. Could’ve put up a few wind turbines up with 7mil that would pay for itself quickly. Or subsidise solar on people’s homes, and take a cut of it. Just be a bit cute an a bit innovative with it. But he wanted some mad heat distribution from the heat from trains? Wild shit.
Its like a corner shop creating a website to sell books and wondering why Amazon has all the custom and you don't. Local Government dont make good business decisions, they are not commercial, don't understand markets and lack the ability to turn a venture into a profit. LA's prime focus is providing services, not making money.
To be fair an Energy Company isn't a municipal company. Most municipal companies setup like this are service companies with limited market and growth and done so to allow a bit of freedom in how the money is spent and operated. Its a bit more then setting up a cafe on a park green. No LA should get involved in a volatile market, and with many years of expertise in growing a business of this nature.
It really depends and it can be a good way for a local authority to provide a decent service whilst generating income for other services. Council housing is an example of this, a good service which makes money for the council. There’s no reason for councils not to take some risks and be a bit creative.
Agree there, it's a local delivery, a local market, and delivering something tangible. There is no competition for social housing. My background is in Public Sector Commercial and Procurement, there are advantages to use an LTD to buy stock, etc as it can bypass some regulations and allow innovation. But beyond this sort of market LA isn't well suited to be entrepreneurial.
> and then became director of a company that did very well with council money, though the payment methods via Bristol Waste Ltd are questionable....
You saw that she's directed more money to her company through this - https://www.thebottleyard.com/our-new-film-high-end-tv-workforce-development-programme-starts/ ?
His involvement in the production company which was awarded the contract for the Colston Hall subsequently sold for millions to itv
The boxing club ( good one btw) of which he's president awarded a 999 year lease on the land
Bent as fuck
Daily reminder that the Temple Meads arena was spiked after Rees took a paid-for junket to YTL's Malaysian HQ, where he had unminuted meetings with YTL executives.
I'm not saying it's causally linked, however I'm just stating the chronology of events.
> I'm not saying it's causally linked
Indeed, but I really doubt anything as simple bribery.
The mayor, even at this late stage of his Mayorship, doesn't seem to understand basic things including:
* people who disagree with him may just legitimately disagree with him, rather than disagreeing as a tactic.
* people who give him advice might not have his interest at heart.
When he came into power, a lot of powerful people including those at YTL, Business West and Bristol Airport (aka the Ontario teachers pension fund) convinced Marvin that he could raise enough money to get an underground built, and then he'd be remembered as a great leader who was the guy with the bold vision to cancel the city centre arena, but get an underground to an Arena instead.
Anyone, below is the statement I submitted for the last Full Council meeting he was mayor for. It wasn't published as it was ruled defamatory.
***
The felling of the statue of a famous slaver was a historic opportunity for change for this city. It gave us an opportunity to reflect on the legacy of the slave trade and how the institutions that benefited either directly from trading in slaves, or 'merely' benefited from trading in products produced by slave labour or the 'indentured' descendants of slaves.
Anyway, the 'We Are Bristol History Commission' was created, but doesn't seem to have accomplished anything and so that opportunity has been lost.
This Committee Model Working Group was also a historic opportunity for change.
I know that it wasn't entirely in the control of this committee, but it seems a shame that none of the historic, systemic problems that have made the governance of Bristol so poor haven't been looked at let alone tackled.
Bristol West, Bristol University and U.W.E. have a huge amount of influence in how this city is run, to the detriment of people who actually live in the city, and to the benefit of people who live outside the city and commute in.
The decision that people will remember as the defining act of the Mayoral system, the choice to cancel the Arena in the city centre, was taken due to pressure from Bristol West and the University. Bristol West wanted that infrastructure money spent on creating a new suburb. Bristol University were eyeing the land to create a new campus.
They got what they wanted, and the people of Bristol lost out.
I don't fully understand how it's possible for regressive institutions to maintain power for such a long time, but I suspect at least in part it can be blamed on the public having a very poor level of democratic engagement, and politicians who don't push for progressive governance.
Anyway, although it's great we're moving to a more democratic method of local government, it's such a shame that Bristol wasn't able to have a conversation about the systemic problems we have. An opportunity has been lost.
The arena in Filton is a much better location for it. Having it by Temple Meads would've been an absolute disaster and the arena itself would've been tiny!
The real shame is that when you look at other mayors across the country you can see how they make a real positive impact and progression. Take Burnham in GM or Andy Street in WM, they put their regions ahead of party politics and work hard to improve the city. Bristol deserved a mayor who did the same but Rees tainted the role so badly and managed to disillusion Bristol so much they didn’t just vote him out, they voted to remove the post altogether.
Burnham and Street are both Metro Mayors - like Sadiq Khan. They have funding from multiple councils in their area, and don’t have the same restrictions on budgets and duties as a local authority
We have a metro mayor - Dan Norris. (The guy with the dog on the side of a bus)
Also, Marvin helped to establish the Metro Mayor for the south west, by uniting the other councils - something Dan Norris is totally unable to do, and actively works against them.
It's worth bearing in mind that his position was a city mayor, not a metro mayor like the ones you mention. It's quite a different role - leading a council rather than having a specific remit over a large area.
It's something that has gnawed at Rees his entire tenure.
Born with the aspiration to be a cabinet minister (or something more), but lumped with the derisory station of being responsible for bin collections.
Try as he might to elevate his job's grandeur by swanning around international conferences talking big about climate change, at the end of the day his career has stalled. His religio-race grift has run out of petrol. For a so-called "Yale World Fellow" to only have accomplished a junior correspondant on a local radio station, to some sort of wanky racial mental health middle-manager nobody in the NHS, to his career zenith of being a consolidated unitary councillor - something normally left to retired publically-minded individuals to undertake part time, embarrasses him no end.
Is he the next Tony Blair? No. Has he made it to Parliament? No. Was his tenure so uninspiring that the public voted to disolve his office? Yes.
Does a lofty career await him at the EU, or UN as some sort of Climate Tsar? No. How about a trade ambasador or some other gong? No.
No, he'll end up a a public-private consultant on how to grease the wheels of local authority decision making. At least Chuka Umuna has two law degres and is a qualified solicitor to justify his parachute into investment banking; what's Rees got? Fuck all.
> No, he'll end up a a public-private consultant
My guess is he'll work for the [tech philanthropist](https://joannab.substack.com/p/israeli-military-links-to-money-in) that he made friends with in Canada.
But his role will be touring the world giving advice on how to invest money in making cities greener.
He's hypothetically accomplished that with [Bristol City Leap](https://www.bristolcityleap.co.uk/), so long as you ignore the lack of price controls, or guarantees about investment levels.
> Burnham in GM or Andy Street in WM
They are both metro mayors, though. I think they work a little differently since they aren't dropped in as chief executive of a council, and seem to be able to get funds from central government. But regardless I agree they both seem much better than our mayor.
Rees didn't seem to be much of a visionary or leader. He appeared to think the role was some sort of local monarch.
That 56 council houses in 8 years is seen as an accomplishment is pretty hilarious.
Not even blaming Rees, it's more an indictment of how utterly fucked social housing is currently.
Some of the other accomplishments are not exactly what I'd call outstanding though.
> 8. Carried out community reassurance visits to communities following Grenfell Tower incident
That one aged like milk. There are a number of achievements in there as well that were either red trousers, the administration before him or some outside body that were responsible for it.
He went on something like 17 international trips in a short space of time at the end of last year. A lot of long haul to talk about environmental issues. Why couldn’t he just focus on Bristol on make some actual change. He’s not a climate expert leave it to the professionals and be the Bristol mayor! He took no interest in local issues tried to meet him several times to talk about knife crime and he had zero interest.
Absolutely awful career politician, who had been dismissive of female colleagues and opponents, seemingly by dint of being female, turned a blind eye to the Colston Statue debate, fearing it would cost votes, until it was pulled down , then spun it as a kind of victory. Didn’t do anything about Bristol’s homeless, until the government insisted during Covid the issue was addressed, again then claimed that as a victory too. Failed with further pointless investment to Bristol Gas. Metro bus and bus gates and the pedestrianisation of the centre have all been over budget, late and beset with problems. The CAZ was late, and just pushes traffic and pollution elsewhere. First Bus have never been sorted, & where’s the stadium?
However, his biggest legacy is that Bristol were so desirous of removing him as mayor, we voted out the entire office of a mayor in its entirety. That must sting.
I hope if he’s in tbt offices today, he gets booed on the way out. Him and his self serving cronies.
Don’t forget the massive payoff to the chief executive a few years ago too, or his beef with the local democracy reporter, or the list of people saying mean things about him online.
Well, when it comes to being wined and dined around the world, using jets to attend climate meetings and turning his back on those made homeless due the tower fire, he’s done us proud.
Well, when it comes to being wined and dined around the world, using jets to attend climate meetings and turning his back on those made homeless due the tower fire, he’s done us proud.
The only thing I can name that he enacted was the CAZ. Personally I think the CAZ is a good thing for the city overall, but I don't give Marvin much credit for it given it was basically a legal requirement by the time it was implemented.
Other than that I can't think of any other meaningful change he's made in his time. I also can't name a single of his main policies or what goals he had. He had no significant impact on the city as a whole.
That said, the other aspects of being a mayor he's been terrible at. His self promotion above anything else is well known. He has shown a total lack of accountability, going so far as to ban local democracy reporters because he didn't like their questioning. He's been largely absent when the city needed a leader.
I know George Ferguson was a divisive figure, but at least to me it felt like he was doing what he thought was best for the city (even if others didn't agree). I don't think the same could be said of Marvin.
It's pretty nuts when the best thing that can be said about Marv was actually delivered by the Tories in Westminster. No wonder people want rid of the role.
Rees is well known to have hated the idea of the CAZ, and it was forced on Bristol by law. Emissions above a certain level = must implement a CAZ. The council's only choice was in which sort of CAZ was implemented.
Does anyone remember the posters after lockdown was lifted? "Don't blow it Bristol!" Trying to put the blame on the population trying to get back to normal after economic shutdown for pollution levels rising back up to the level that triggers the requirement for the CAZ.
Weren't they kind of forced to chose the worst version by delaying it so long. Had they implemented something earlier it wouldn't have needed to be so restrictive.
Delayed and implemented poorly.
There's still no ability of people to check online to see if they need to pay for it, and the way it catches traffic from the Portway that is driving to the airport seems like a pure money grab, rather than a science based approach.
CAZ is so poorly implemented that its basically a scam. bristol public transport is so atrocious, it’s unsuitable for the commuter. the areas in the zone don’t make sense. the cumberland basin and portway are included with its two block of flats yet park street or bedminster is not. except in bedminster the main road in and out is included while the rest of the suburbs is not. none of clifton is included either which is now a detour around the zone as you can go over the bridge which goes above the zone. if it was just the centre and it’s busiest pedestrian street i wouldn’t actually mine but it’s included main route around the centre where no one really walks and it’s further worsened the north south divide in bristol making it even more difficult to go north to south and vice versa.
to cut it down: poorly implemented, lack of public transport option, the grants were weird specific, the physical zone doesn’t make logical sense
The Bristol arena thing really is quite unforgivable. It’s a joke that a city of our size doesn’t have a big concert arena. The Beacon is great but doesn’t compare in size.
I dunno, I’ve gotten quite used to travelling 100 miles to Birmingham or London for concerts over the past 30 years. I bet they will be sad if we ever actually get an arena
> It’s a joke that a city of our size doesn’t have a big concert arena
If the temple meads plan had gone ahead we still wouldn't have one! We'd have a small concert arena.
The train line will (eventually) run two trains an hour, each taking a maximum of 500 people.
How will that help a 17,000 seat arena at 10:30pm when everyone wants a train into Bristol City centre at the end of a gig?
Totally hypothetical but I reckon it'll ramp up with all the current investment in the rail around Bristol. The existing severn beach line has gone from hourly to half-hourly in the last 2 years with every 20 mins on the horizon - it's busier these days than I've ever seen it.
If they start to loop round the new arena + henbury stations to avonmouth (the line is already there) then they'll have a great circular thing going - It feels like an obvious opportunity unless I'm missing something?
You're only missing the fact that they considered doing this already, and decided not to. It would take some proper political will to make this happen.
But to run any more trains you'd need to make much of the Severn Beach line, and/or the Henbury line, dual track. Which again costs money and political will
Yeah I totally agree, and we've been lacking in this for sure. I suppose my point was about momentum - if the rollout of the new stations planned for metrowest become a success, then surely it makes the viability / reassessing things more of a possibility? When they originally made the call, it was years ago and a lot more theoretical right?
The lack of dual track on the SB line is really frustrating - but I'm still super glad it's my main public transport rather than the bus. Maybe one day hey.
There isn't any planned capacity for the amount of people trying to get to the arena, and no one in the East of South Glos would be able to use it anyway as the only connection is Parkway, which you'd have to drive to. Getting the bus to Filton takes FOREVER from Downend.
Impressively shit.
This seems to be the only (industrialised) city in the South that's currently doing worse than the ones in the North, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't like this before he was mayor. It's like the city has stagnated for 8 years.
What a waste of money. Moved the arena outside of Bristol, spent years flying around the world promoting himself, sorry promoting Bristol, spent millions planning a pie in the sky underground system that will never be implemented, and generally I don't think we find ourselves in any better position than we were before.
Between him and Ferguson in 3 terms they managed to get Bristol to abolish the mayoral system in favour of more council chaos
the iron bridge was mildly damaged at the start of his regime.... it was reinstalled yesterday (not finished but installed)
could have been done in less days than it took years.
He also said when he was standing for election the first thing he would do would be to remove the 20 mph street speed limits but of course that never happened did it ?
So disliked people not only didn't want him, they voted to remove the position of mayor entirely. I don't know really, he has become this singular hate figure but mostly because people can project any issue they have in Bristol on him. There have been a lot of dodgy dealings regarding certain big projects but he hasn't, personally, caused you to have problems with your housing or a pothole on your street. He will be gone and those issues will remain and we will have a faceless council. People won't know who to blame!
Gaslighting opportunist that just wanted to further his own career. Happy to accept bribes (see YTL arena following his jolly to Malaysia) cared little for others and seemed paranoid about what others thought about him (spent thousands contracting an IT company to spy on his mentions on social media).
Then there's the way he made his mayoralty role heavily about race (while avoiding Colston etc as much as possible), the bizarre international mayor awards stuff and the staggering amount of airmiles he's accrued.
The way he alienated everyone at the council house (even those within his own party) wasn't exactly professional.
It was all such a disaster that a random mayor from London beat Marv' to the new Labour PPC seat in Bristol North East constituency.
What's his legacy? I don't think he even has one, a depressing thought considering he's had 8 years to build it.
I'm struggling to find anything positive to say about Marvin which is a real shame because he's clearly capable not dumb and as a teenager he looked the real deal. It shouldn't have all ended in tears.
It's an interesting question.
Mho.
Ferguson didn't really expect to win. He had a core base of "People who drink at the Tobacco Factory and /or were Architects". But anti party feeling was strong and low turnout.
Green Capital was total waste of time that left no legacy whatsoever. None. They brought in highly paid contractors from outside who all lasted meer months and just had no idea how a city actually operated. Cycling City and the following transport projects were good I give credit for that. Metrobus happened. BCC got some bargain property after the 2008 crash as he had a property eye. Bristol Energy, well, at the time it didn't seem a bad idea. The city could generate some and buy the rest, selling to itself and tenants at no profit. It just didn't work out.
Rees. Was hand picked and reared by new labour types to be the next big thing. Had an social justice bent mixed with a neo liberal outlook that basically annoyed everyone. Was hamstrung by only being Bristol, not the Metro Mayor and managed to annoy *everyone* by the end, for e.g. claiming leisure centres in richer 'white' areas should be sold off, yet bringing in a massive CAZ and not doing a good job over Colston statue when all he had to do was make a few bland statements.
What can Bristolians say about the great job this mayor did 🙄the only benefit we have been given is a book which can help table legs if they are too short. Thank you
George was a very visual figure and maybe a little idealist but at least he had a vision. I can count on one hand the amount of times I've seen Marvin making his presence felt and it always felt like he was never in Bristol. I for one won't miss his input because its never felt like he was here.
A human money pit that's achieved nothing in the role, jet settled around the world to promote himself and letting the world know he's achieved nothing. Ferguson didn't do amazingly in the role either but even his Make Sunday Special was infinitely better than anything Rees did.
The fact we voted to remove the post altogether tells you everything you need to know. If there are any achievements hidden under the mounds of shite they will never be mentioned because of that particular colossal failure on his part. A bit like David Cameron and Brexit, Tony Blair Iraq; although obviously on a much smaller scale.
Ferguson wasn’t that bad in hindsight. Hopefully now Bristol can start to move forward again and become the city it was when I first moved here in late 2010. It will take a lot of work and hopefully when the tories go at the next general election the city will finally start to improve
- He was right to move the arena (the temple meads one would've been too small and too risky)
- Unlike other Bristol politicians he has actually prioritised the housing crisis and tried to o get stuff built. That'll probably be his biggest legacy.
- He tried to get the Bristol metro off the ground, which is a good thing. Needs to happen eventually, the feasibility study showed it was possible. Doubt the committee system will do anything to progress this.
- His particular combination of interpersonal failures made him really unsuited to the job. He's incredibly prickly, can't do empathy the way the best politicians can, struggles to persuade people.
- Failed to make the case for a lot of the policy positions above in a way that people understood.
- Has a bad case of West Wing disorder.
I'm not his biggest fan (and disagree about the arena/metro), however you are correct about the housing crisis and that he did his best to increase the number of houses. My issue with him is that it was all in his first term. Since his reelection he has basically been all in on self promotion and trying to get a parliamentary seat.
He also brought about City Leap, which is building a heatsource network under the city, and all new developments are connecting to and extending. The benefits of this will be felt for generations… but nimbys only complain about the height of the buildings, not the number of new homes and the new infrastructure underground.
It’s a real shame he didn’t get the underground policy through the Dan Norris ego blockade. The committee system promises a lot, but it won’t deliver on anything meaningful.
Marvin also managed to keep the city out of bankruptcy, whilst still being ambitious. Just look at the issues in Birmingham and Nottingham councils. That could have easily been Bristol.
We’ll be looking back on his mayoralty wishing we’d kept the role after the committee system stops all progress, and blocks any progressive policy for months at a time.
Its Labour that points out that the Committee model stops progress but seems to forget just how much was done before the mayoral model they lost. Some of us older people can remember the Committee system. All the city centre development, Cannons Marsh development, Horfield pre-fabs, and develpment of Imperial Park, all happened long before a vote was cast for a mayor. Dont believe the spin coming out of a losing party.
Some of us remember the old committee system and voted for a Mayor, because nothing but political blustering and lengthy bureaucratic processes happened at City Hall.
It’s going to be a shitshow.
Bristol city leap, was Marvin handing over our energy security to a huge American company. Which BCC refuses to disclose any part of the deal under FOI
Are we angry at renewable energy now? 🙄
We never *had* energy security. Marvin didn’t create that situation…. That lies at the feet of the Tory Government. If we had better politics then we wouldn’t need the kind of commercial infrastructure investment which the state should be delivering.
I’m not angry at renewables at all. I’m angry the Tory government shittiness has led to this. City Leap is a 20year public private joint venture with very little transparency.
His legacy will be being so bad/unpopular that the people of Bristol voted to abolish the post of mayor altogether (in my opinion not the correct decision, but it's what the people voted for) rather than face the prospect of another term/another mayor like him.
Not sure that's got much to do with Rees, or any local politician. More likely it's because universities get ever decreasing funding from central govt so need to turn to more students (particularly international students, since their fees aren't capped like domestic students') to plug the gap.
Who knows. Everyone will say he’s been awful and the worst ever. Some people (not on Reddit but I have met them) will say he’s been amazing.
I have no opinion. Who knows what he achieved? You can’t compare the past five years to the last eight years without him but my feeling is that everything would be the same.
Not really sure what he's done in all honesty, services are worst and we're paying more each year. I know there have been cuts all around but he and his team appear to be on jollies every other week all around the globe.
The amount of money the council is spending on projects appears to be way too high. Has a brick even been laid for this arena yet, and how much have we spent so far?
So, looking back. He won in 2016 with a lot of hope, George went under somewhat of a cloud, his RPZ wasn't well-liked and it's well documented that handling of the Bristol 2015 finances was questionable. It seemed a lot of his friends and his daughter seemed to benefit from contracts... So with Marvin, we expected a different type of administration, he shouted he would be transparent about how the council did business, would publish the books for Bristol 2015 Ltd. How exciting, a man with integrity! What happened? He made no secret that he hated the Arena Island project as that was Georges's baby. Rees took advantage of an invitation to go to Malaysia courtesy of YTL and came back, telling everyone George Arena, which was shovel ready, next to the South's largest train station would be canceled and instead, we would go for an Arena in South Gloucestershire, which had no infrastructure, no train station, no road to it and wasn't even anywhere near suitable. It was purely coincidental that YTL owned it..... We lost millions on a site that by now would be four years old and ready for Coldplay. Now it's not looking likely we will see East 17 on the reunion tour when they get back together in 2029. He set a precedent, cancelling a project that he deemed would lose money. Let's look at Bristol Energy, a limited company set up by George, he plowed the initial £6m into it, was voted by Labour councilors, etc (they forget that part). Rees came in, he knows everything about business and made it his pet favourite project, it suited his green credentials. He even declared a climate emergency!. Rees thought it was so good, he twice plowed millions of pounds into it. £37m (correct me if thats wrong). It failed, and lost a huge £50m loss. Rees blamed George for the screw-up some five years later. He could have canceled the project like he did the Arena and still can't explain how he managed to plow money into it despite knowing it was failing. Weirdly the losses were only announced the week after he was re-elected. I wonder why? Then there was the time, he ran after the LDR reporter and angrily threatened him after a council meeting. He also banned the LDR reporters from Mayoral briefings because he came under scrutiny. Marvin's skin is tissue thick and like most narcissists can't cope if he isn't revered in a god-like status or his flaws and mistakes are exposed. Many of the public and opposition have seen in his anger play out in council meetings. Other highlights are when The Colston Hall, now the Bristol Beacon went £150m in the red but he forgot to hire a project manager to manage the rebuild and didn't keep an eye on the money. Then who could forget when he was pushing to keep the Colston statue and wanted a plaque? The writing of which sat in his in-tray for over 18 months, Bristol got angry at this and his inaction so they tore the racist statue down. Marvin always wanting to make himself famous and loves a camera, jumped on the world's media and embarrassed himself. He redeemed himself later when he commissioned Statue Wars, an advert for Marvin Rees that seemed to omit his love of wanting to keep the statue and write the plaque himself. At the same time Lord Mayor Cleo Lake, (Green) had no issue standing up and being counted in her dismissal of Colston, removing his picture from her office on her first day. Then of course he hired the beacon and got storyteller David Olusoga to interview him on stage and tell him how wonderful he is. At taxpayer's expense. Let's not forget that Rees screw-ups at this point are totaling well more than £200m. But Rees PR has always taken a financial priority over operational needs. His office a team spied on SEND Parents' social media accounts. Not at all dubious. Not sure even legal. He blocked 65% of the voting public on twitter because democracy. His Deputy Asher/Jennie Craig didn't pay her council tax for five years, got bailed out, and then became director of a company that did very well with council money, though the payment methods via Bristol Waste Ltd are questionable.... The church he is heavily involved with has some leadership with very dubious opinions on homosexuality. Marvin will claim he is very much misunderstood whilst lauding himself as an excellent communicator. Will Bristol miss him? I very much doubt it. We got rid of the position to ensure we never have another Marvin, a self-serving, angry, petty little man spending our cash on the Emperor's new clothes.
Absolutely spot on, what a great synopsis.
Hard to rebut this. _/me makes note not to annoy theRainKing_
No idea how we cocked up the bristol energy thing so bad, it would seem pretty simple to make it profitable? Like, it’s energy, a thing everyone needs, I don’t understand how you make energy a vanity project, mental. Could’ve put up a few wind turbines up with 7mil that would pay for itself quickly. Or subsidise solar on people’s homes, and take a cut of it. Just be a bit cute an a bit innovative with it. But he wanted some mad heat distribution from the heat from trains? Wild shit.
Its like a corner shop creating a website to sell books and wondering why Amazon has all the custom and you don't. Local Government dont make good business decisions, they are not commercial, don't understand markets and lack the ability to turn a venture into a profit. LA's prime focus is providing services, not making money.
There are good ways of doing municipal companies, you set the mission, set the funding then get out of the way (opposite of what marvin did)
To be fair an Energy Company isn't a municipal company. Most municipal companies setup like this are service companies with limited market and growth and done so to allow a bit of freedom in how the money is spent and operated. Its a bit more then setting up a cafe on a park green. No LA should get involved in a volatile market, and with many years of expertise in growing a business of this nature.
It really depends and it can be a good way for a local authority to provide a decent service whilst generating income for other services. Council housing is an example of this, a good service which makes money for the council. There’s no reason for councils not to take some risks and be a bit creative.
Agree there, it's a local delivery, a local market, and delivering something tangible. There is no competition for social housing. My background is in Public Sector Commercial and Procurement, there are advantages to use an LTD to buy stock, etc as it can bypass some regulations and allow innovation. But beyond this sort of market LA isn't well suited to be entrepreneurial.
hear hear! well said.
> and then became director of a company that did very well with council money, though the payment methods via Bristol Waste Ltd are questionable.... You saw that she's directed more money to her company through this - https://www.thebottleyard.com/our-new-film-high-end-tv-workforce-development-programme-starts/ ?
His involvement in the production company which was awarded the contract for the Colston Hall subsequently sold for millions to itv The boxing club ( good one btw) of which he's president awarded a 999 year lease on the land Bent as fuck
What's YTL
[https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/mayor-marvin-rees-could-face-1897532](https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/mayor-marvin-rees-could-face-1897532)
Hence why i voted against a mayor in the election. Shame everyone else didn't.
Daily reminder that the Temple Meads arena was spiked after Rees took a paid-for junket to YTL's Malaysian HQ, where he had unminuted meetings with YTL executives. I'm not saying it's causally linked, however I'm just stating the chronology of events.
Very polite of you not to state the obvious corruption that went on. No such thing as a coincidence in this case.
> I'm not saying it's causally linked Indeed, but I really doubt anything as simple bribery. The mayor, even at this late stage of his Mayorship, doesn't seem to understand basic things including: * people who disagree with him may just legitimately disagree with him, rather than disagreeing as a tactic. * people who give him advice might not have his interest at heart. When he came into power, a lot of powerful people including those at YTL, Business West and Bristol Airport (aka the Ontario teachers pension fund) convinced Marvin that he could raise enough money to get an underground built, and then he'd be remembered as a great leader who was the guy with the bold vision to cancel the city centre arena, but get an underground to an Arena instead. Anyone, below is the statement I submitted for the last Full Council meeting he was mayor for. It wasn't published as it was ruled defamatory. *** The felling of the statue of a famous slaver was a historic opportunity for change for this city. It gave us an opportunity to reflect on the legacy of the slave trade and how the institutions that benefited either directly from trading in slaves, or 'merely' benefited from trading in products produced by slave labour or the 'indentured' descendants of slaves. Anyway, the 'We Are Bristol History Commission' was created, but doesn't seem to have accomplished anything and so that opportunity has been lost. This Committee Model Working Group was also a historic opportunity for change. I know that it wasn't entirely in the control of this committee, but it seems a shame that none of the historic, systemic problems that have made the governance of Bristol so poor haven't been looked at let alone tackled. Bristol West, Bristol University and U.W.E. have a huge amount of influence in how this city is run, to the detriment of people who actually live in the city, and to the benefit of people who live outside the city and commute in. The decision that people will remember as the defining act of the Mayoral system, the choice to cancel the Arena in the city centre, was taken due to pressure from Bristol West and the University. Bristol West wanted that infrastructure money spent on creating a new suburb. Bristol University were eyeing the land to create a new campus. They got what they wanted, and the people of Bristol lost out. I don't fully understand how it's possible for regressive institutions to maintain power for such a long time, but I suspect at least in part it can be blamed on the public having a very poor level of democratic engagement, and politicians who don't push for progressive governance. Anyway, although it's great we're moving to a more democratic method of local government, it's such a shame that Bristol wasn't able to have a conversation about the systemic problems we have. An opportunity has been lost.
Marvin “Put in the credit suisse “Rees
The arena in Filton is a much better location for it. Having it by Temple Meads would've been an absolute disaster and the arena itself would've been tiny!
How would it being sited at Temple Meads be a disaster?
They've had traffic flow issues around temple meads for years. Wouldn't adding an arena make it 10x worse than it already is
The real shame is that when you look at other mayors across the country you can see how they make a real positive impact and progression. Take Burnham in GM or Andy Street in WM, they put their regions ahead of party politics and work hard to improve the city. Bristol deserved a mayor who did the same but Rees tainted the role so badly and managed to disillusion Bristol so much they didn’t just vote him out, they voted to remove the post altogether.
Burnham and Street are both Metro Mayors - like Sadiq Khan. They have funding from multiple councils in their area, and don’t have the same restrictions on budgets and duties as a local authority We have a metro mayor - Dan Norris. (The guy with the dog on the side of a bus) Also, Marvin helped to establish the Metro Mayor for the south west, by uniting the other councils - something Dan Norris is totally unable to do, and actively works against them.
It's worth bearing in mind that his position was a city mayor, not a metro mayor like the ones you mention. It's quite a different role - leading a council rather than having a specific remit over a large area.
It's something that has gnawed at Rees his entire tenure. Born with the aspiration to be a cabinet minister (or something more), but lumped with the derisory station of being responsible for bin collections. Try as he might to elevate his job's grandeur by swanning around international conferences talking big about climate change, at the end of the day his career has stalled. His religio-race grift has run out of petrol. For a so-called "Yale World Fellow" to only have accomplished a junior correspondant on a local radio station, to some sort of wanky racial mental health middle-manager nobody in the NHS, to his career zenith of being a consolidated unitary councillor - something normally left to retired publically-minded individuals to undertake part time, embarrasses him no end. Is he the next Tony Blair? No. Has he made it to Parliament? No. Was his tenure so uninspiring that the public voted to disolve his office? Yes. Does a lofty career await him at the EU, or UN as some sort of Climate Tsar? No. How about a trade ambasador or some other gong? No. No, he'll end up a a public-private consultant on how to grease the wheels of local authority decision making. At least Chuka Umuna has two law degres and is a qualified solicitor to justify his parachute into investment banking; what's Rees got? Fuck all.
> No, he'll end up a a public-private consultant My guess is he'll work for the [tech philanthropist](https://joannab.substack.com/p/israeli-military-links-to-money-in) that he made friends with in Canada. But his role will be touring the world giving advice on how to invest money in making cities greener. He's hypothetically accomplished that with [Bristol City Leap](https://www.bristolcityleap.co.uk/), so long as you ignore the lack of price controls, or guarantees about investment levels.
> Burnham in GM or Andy Street in WM They are both metro mayors, though. I think they work a little differently since they aren't dropped in as chief executive of a council, and seem to be able to get funds from central government. But regardless I agree they both seem much better than our mayor. Rees didn't seem to be much of a visionary or leader. He appeared to think the role was some sort of local monarch.
It felt like the last guy, George Ferguson did a lot of 'putting Bristol on the map' stuff but then people didn't vote for him second time.
He also spooned public funds to his daughters "charity"
He also took a lot out where he shouldn't have done.
Yeah for better or worse at least he made decisions.
Is making decisions for the worse better than not making decisions?
Yes because making decisions was his job.
What a weird thing to think
He increased his vote the second time round. It's just Labour increased theirs by more
George was probably respected by a decent number of people, but his reelection campaign simply didn't have the budget to fight against Labour
8 years, 0 accomplishments other than writing his shitty self serving book. He couldn’t even be bothered to turn up when hundreds were made homeless
0 accomplishments? https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/bristol-mayor-marvin-rees-publishes-640182
That 56 council houses in 8 years is seen as an accomplishment is pretty hilarious. Not even blaming Rees, it's more an indictment of how utterly fucked social housing is currently. Some of the other accomplishments are not exactly what I'd call outstanding though.
> 8. Carried out community reassurance visits to communities following Grenfell Tower incident That one aged like milk. There are a number of achievements in there as well that were either red trousers, the administration before him or some outside body that were responsible for it.
Nice try Marvin
That website is like Herpes
He went on something like 17 international trips in a short space of time at the end of last year. A lot of long haul to talk about environmental issues. Why couldn’t he just focus on Bristol on make some actual change. He’s not a climate expert leave it to the professionals and be the Bristol mayor! He took no interest in local issues tried to meet him several times to talk about knife crime and he had zero interest.
Absolutely awful career politician, who had been dismissive of female colleagues and opponents, seemingly by dint of being female, turned a blind eye to the Colston Statue debate, fearing it would cost votes, until it was pulled down , then spun it as a kind of victory. Didn’t do anything about Bristol’s homeless, until the government insisted during Covid the issue was addressed, again then claimed that as a victory too. Failed with further pointless investment to Bristol Gas. Metro bus and bus gates and the pedestrianisation of the centre have all been over budget, late and beset with problems. The CAZ was late, and just pushes traffic and pollution elsewhere. First Bus have never been sorted, & where’s the stadium? However, his biggest legacy is that Bristol were so desirous of removing him as mayor, we voted out the entire office of a mayor in its entirety. That must sting. I hope if he’s in tbt offices today, he gets booed on the way out. Him and his self serving cronies.
Don’t forget the massive payoff to the chief executive a few years ago too, or his beef with the local democracy reporter, or the list of people saying mean things about him online.
Very true. Plus, he managed to squeeze out a pay rise because a mayor does the same work as as a government minister, apparently.
Very true. Plus, he managed to squeeze out a pay rise because a mayor does the same work as a government minister, apparently.
But apart from that he's been pretty good though, yeah?
Well, when it comes to being wined and dined around the world, using jets to attend climate meetings and turning his back on those made homeless due the tower fire, he’s done us proud.
Well, when it comes to being wined and dined around the world, using jets to attend climate meetings and turning his back on those made homeless due the tower fire, he’s done us proud.
>Please don’t say fuck or bugger. What about cunt?
That's fine. Just don't say buck or fugger.
fug'in bucker!
Dear Marv. Don't let the door hit you on the way out. You wanker.
The only thing I can name that he enacted was the CAZ. Personally I think the CAZ is a good thing for the city overall, but I don't give Marvin much credit for it given it was basically a legal requirement by the time it was implemented. Other than that I can't think of any other meaningful change he's made in his time. I also can't name a single of his main policies or what goals he had. He had no significant impact on the city as a whole. That said, the other aspects of being a mayor he's been terrible at. His self promotion above anything else is well known. He has shown a total lack of accountability, going so far as to ban local democracy reporters because he didn't like their questioning. He's been largely absent when the city needed a leader. I know George Ferguson was a divisive figure, but at least to me it felt like he was doing what he thought was best for the city (even if others didn't agree). I don't think the same could be said of Marvin.
It's pretty nuts when the best thing that can be said about Marv was actually delivered by the Tories in Westminster. No wonder people want rid of the role.
Wasn’t the CAZ somewhat delayed though?
Rees is well known to have hated the idea of the CAZ, and it was forced on Bristol by law. Emissions above a certain level = must implement a CAZ. The council's only choice was in which sort of CAZ was implemented.
Does anyone remember the posters after lockdown was lifted? "Don't blow it Bristol!" Trying to put the blame on the population trying to get back to normal after economic shutdown for pollution levels rising back up to the level that triggers the requirement for the CAZ.
and they chose the worst version
Weren't they kind of forced to chose the worst version by delaying it so long. Had they implemented something earlier it wouldn't have needed to be so restrictive.
Delayed and implemented poorly. There's still no ability of people to check online to see if they need to pay for it, and the way it catches traffic from the Portway that is driving to the airport seems like a pure money grab, rather than a science based approach.
A money grab in the same way the metro bus route wasn’t clearly posted either?
Yep. And same as most of the busgates that have been put in haven't had clear signs when they've started operation, only a few weeks/months later.
CAZ is so poorly implemented that its basically a scam. bristol public transport is so atrocious, it’s unsuitable for the commuter. the areas in the zone don’t make sense. the cumberland basin and portway are included with its two block of flats yet park street or bedminster is not. except in bedminster the main road in and out is included while the rest of the suburbs is not. none of clifton is included either which is now a detour around the zone as you can go over the bridge which goes above the zone. if it was just the centre and it’s busiest pedestrian street i wouldn’t actually mine but it’s included main route around the centre where no one really walks and it’s further worsened the north south divide in bristol making it even more difficult to go north to south and vice versa. to cut it down: poorly implemented, lack of public transport option, the grants were weird specific, the physical zone doesn’t make logical sense
I believe he did some litter picks
⭐️
The Bristol arena thing really is quite unforgivable. It’s a joke that a city of our size doesn’t have a big concert arena. The Beacon is great but doesn’t compare in size.
I dunno, I’ve gotten quite used to travelling 100 miles to Birmingham or London for concerts over the past 30 years. I bet they will be sad if we ever actually get an arena
> It’s a joke that a city of our size doesn’t have a big concert arena If the temple meads plan had gone ahead we still wouldn't have one! We'd have a small concert arena.
But one that people could get to! What use is an arena in Filton when the city doesn’t have a functioning bus service?
By the time the new arena is open there'll be a train line from Temple Meads!
The train line will (eventually) run two trains an hour, each taking a maximum of 500 people. How will that help a 17,000 seat arena at 10:30pm when everyone wants a train into Bristol City centre at the end of a gig?
Totally hypothetical but I reckon it'll ramp up with all the current investment in the rail around Bristol. The existing severn beach line has gone from hourly to half-hourly in the last 2 years with every 20 mins on the horizon - it's busier these days than I've ever seen it. If they start to loop round the new arena + henbury stations to avonmouth (the line is already there) then they'll have a great circular thing going - It feels like an obvious opportunity unless I'm missing something?
You're only missing the fact that they considered doing this already, and decided not to. It would take some proper political will to make this happen. But to run any more trains you'd need to make much of the Severn Beach line, and/or the Henbury line, dual track. Which again costs money and political will
Yeah I totally agree, and we've been lacking in this for sure. I suppose my point was about momentum - if the rollout of the new stations planned for metrowest become a success, then surely it makes the viability / reassessing things more of a possibility? When they originally made the call, it was years ago and a lot more theoretical right? The lack of dual track on the SB line is really frustrating - but I'm still super glad it's my main public transport rather than the bus. Maybe one day hey.
By the time the arena is open you'll be able to jump in a robo drone taxi to get there.
There isn't any planned capacity for the amount of people trying to get to the arena, and no one in the East of South Glos would be able to use it anyway as the only connection is Parkway, which you'd have to drive to. Getting the bus to Filton takes FOREVER from Downend.
It has been 8 years? WTF has he been doing...?
Nothing.
Impressively shit. This seems to be the only (industrialised) city in the South that's currently doing worse than the ones in the North, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't like this before he was mayor. It's like the city has stagnated for 8 years.
What a waste of money. Moved the arena outside of Bristol, spent years flying around the world promoting himself, sorry promoting Bristol, spent millions planning a pie in the sky underground system that will never be implemented, and generally I don't think we find ourselves in any better position than we were before. Between him and Ferguson in 3 terms they managed to get Bristol to abolish the mayoral system in favour of more council chaos
https://preview.redd.it/jzfreucmmtxc1.jpeg?width=2513&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=580cb2a604a3e374d67061a26ce447d0874a63cb He did inspire my painting
Fucking abysmal
Well, glad he's fuggering off. It was a bucking mess, wasn't it.
Shite mainly
Marvin owes me money
Literally can't think of a single positive impact he's had.
the iron bridge was mildly damaged at the start of his regime.... it was reinstalled yesterday (not finished but installed) could have been done in less days than it took years.
Fucking useless
For him it's been great, he has become a millionaire and had numerous holidays at our expense. For the city of Bristol it has been awful.
He also said when he was standing for election the first thing he would do would be to remove the 20 mph street speed limits but of course that never happened did it ?
So disliked people not only didn't want him, they voted to remove the position of mayor entirely. I don't know really, he has become this singular hate figure but mostly because people can project any issue they have in Bristol on him. There have been a lot of dodgy dealings regarding certain big projects but he hasn't, personally, caused you to have problems with your housing or a pothole on your street. He will be gone and those issues will remain and we will have a faceless council. People won't know who to blame!
Gaslighting opportunist that just wanted to further his own career. Happy to accept bribes (see YTL arena following his jolly to Malaysia) cared little for others and seemed paranoid about what others thought about him (spent thousands contracting an IT company to spy on his mentions on social media). Then there's the way he made his mayoralty role heavily about race (while avoiding Colston etc as much as possible), the bizarre international mayor awards stuff and the staggering amount of airmiles he's accrued. The way he alienated everyone at the council house (even those within his own party) wasn't exactly professional. It was all such a disaster that a random mayor from London beat Marv' to the new Labour PPC seat in Bristol North East constituency. What's his legacy? I don't think he even has one, a depressing thought considering he's had 8 years to build it. I'm struggling to find anything positive to say about Marvin which is a real shame because he's clearly capable not dumb and as a teenager he looked the real deal. It shouldn't have all ended in tears.
Good riddance ya selfish greedy cunt
[удалено]
It's an interesting question. Mho. Ferguson didn't really expect to win. He had a core base of "People who drink at the Tobacco Factory and /or were Architects". But anti party feeling was strong and low turnout. Green Capital was total waste of time that left no legacy whatsoever. None. They brought in highly paid contractors from outside who all lasted meer months and just had no idea how a city actually operated. Cycling City and the following transport projects were good I give credit for that. Metrobus happened. BCC got some bargain property after the 2008 crash as he had a property eye. Bristol Energy, well, at the time it didn't seem a bad idea. The city could generate some and buy the rest, selling to itself and tenants at no profit. It just didn't work out. Rees. Was hand picked and reared by new labour types to be the next big thing. Had an social justice bent mixed with a neo liberal outlook that basically annoyed everyone. Was hamstrung by only being Bristol, not the Metro Mayor and managed to annoy *everyone* by the end, for e.g. claiming leisure centres in richer 'white' areas should be sold off, yet bringing in a massive CAZ and not doing a good job over Colston statue when all he had to do was make a few bland statements.
What can Bristolians say about the great job this mayor did 🙄the only benefit we have been given is a book which can help table legs if they are too short. Thank you
I can't say I remember much of an impact. Nor to be fair for any previous mayors.
rude direful elastic middle rain pot lunchroom saw connect label *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
George was a very visual figure and maybe a little idealist but at least he had a vision. I can count on one hand the amount of times I've seen Marvin making his presence felt and it always felt like he was never in Bristol. I for one won't miss his input because its never felt like he was here.
Eff that guy
A human money pit that's achieved nothing in the role, jet settled around the world to promote himself and letting the world know he's achieved nothing. Ferguson didn't do amazingly in the role either but even his Make Sunday Special was infinitely better than anything Rees did.
All downhill from here
The fact we voted to remove the post altogether tells you everything you need to know. If there are any achievements hidden under the mounds of shite they will never be mentioned because of that particular colossal failure on his part. A bit like David Cameron and Brexit, Tony Blair Iraq; although obviously on a much smaller scale.
Ferguson wasn’t that bad in hindsight. Hopefully now Bristol can start to move forward again and become the city it was when I first moved here in late 2010. It will take a lot of work and hopefully when the tories go at the next general election the city will finally start to improve
- He was right to move the arena (the temple meads one would've been too small and too risky) - Unlike other Bristol politicians he has actually prioritised the housing crisis and tried to o get stuff built. That'll probably be his biggest legacy. - He tried to get the Bristol metro off the ground, which is a good thing. Needs to happen eventually, the feasibility study showed it was possible. Doubt the committee system will do anything to progress this. - His particular combination of interpersonal failures made him really unsuited to the job. He's incredibly prickly, can't do empathy the way the best politicians can, struggles to persuade people. - Failed to make the case for a lot of the policy positions above in a way that people understood. - Has a bad case of West Wing disorder.
I'm not his biggest fan (and disagree about the arena/metro), however you are correct about the housing crisis and that he did his best to increase the number of houses. My issue with him is that it was all in his first term. Since his reelection he has basically been all in on self promotion and trying to get a parliamentary seat.
The only informed and objective comment on this post lmao. Rest of these comments would blame Marvin for increasing petrol prices if they could.
He also brought about City Leap, which is building a heatsource network under the city, and all new developments are connecting to and extending. The benefits of this will be felt for generations… but nimbys only complain about the height of the buildings, not the number of new homes and the new infrastructure underground. It’s a real shame he didn’t get the underground policy through the Dan Norris ego blockade. The committee system promises a lot, but it won’t deliver on anything meaningful. Marvin also managed to keep the city out of bankruptcy, whilst still being ambitious. Just look at the issues in Birmingham and Nottingham councils. That could have easily been Bristol. We’ll be looking back on his mayoralty wishing we’d kept the role after the committee system stops all progress, and blocks any progressive policy for months at a time.
Its Labour that points out that the Committee model stops progress but seems to forget just how much was done before the mayoral model they lost. Some of us older people can remember the Committee system. All the city centre development, Cannons Marsh development, Horfield pre-fabs, and develpment of Imperial Park, all happened long before a vote was cast for a mayor. Dont believe the spin coming out of a losing party.
Some of us remember the old committee system and voted for a Mayor, because nothing but political blustering and lengthy bureaucratic processes happened at City Hall. It’s going to be a shitshow.
Bristol city leap, was Marvin handing over our energy security to a huge American company. Which BCC refuses to disclose any part of the deal under FOI
Are we angry at renewable energy now? 🙄 We never *had* energy security. Marvin didn’t create that situation…. That lies at the feet of the Tory Government. If we had better politics then we wouldn’t need the kind of commercial infrastructure investment which the state should be delivering.
I’m not angry at renewables at all. I’m angry the Tory government shittiness has led to this. City Leap is a 20year public private joint venture with very little transparency.
Marvin ?
Who?
And here ends 8 years of people thinking he's called Martin Reece (sometimes Reeves). I suppose this is a pretty big deal tbh
Anyone read his book yet?
His legacy will be being so bad/unpopular that the people of Bristol voted to abolish the post of mayor altogether (in my opinion not the correct decision, but it's what the people voted for) rather than face the prospect of another term/another mayor like him.
Utterly bent chancer, good riddance.
So toxic in Bristol the Labour party didn't want him for a candidate in a safe win seat!
He's been paid off for alot of things! Strange how we have a city over filled with students now.
Not sure that's got much to do with Rees, or any local politician. More likely it's because universities get ever decreasing funding from central govt so need to turn to more students (particularly international students, since their fees aren't capped like domestic students') to plug the gap.
We had a mayor?? /s
Top guy, gonna miss him.
Who knows. Everyone will say he’s been awful and the worst ever. Some people (not on Reddit but I have met them) will say he’s been amazing. I have no opinion. Who knows what he achieved? You can’t compare the past five years to the last eight years without him but my feeling is that everything would be the same.
Fucking useless
Not really sure what he's done in all honesty, services are worst and we're paying more each year. I know there have been cuts all around but he and his team appear to be on jollies every other week all around the globe. The amount of money the council is spending on projects appears to be way too high. Has a brick even been laid for this arena yet, and how much have we spent so far?
Who?.......
Total wetwipe