Elected Mayors: The Vision Thing

Nottingham: trying to find a vision?

There’s been a fascinating contribution today to the debate about whether Nottingham should vote for a directly elected mayor.

It’s from a Labour politician, and it’s in the ‘anti’ camp. But it doesn’t mention anything about ‘£1m Tory extra Mayors’ on ‘fatcat salaries’.

Infact, some are bound to view this support for the campaign against an elected mayor as a devastating critique of some of the people behind it.

The contribution comes from Alan Simpson, who was the Nottingham South Labour MP up until the last election, when he retired and the seat was taken by Lilian Greenwood.

Simpson was never a great mate of the city leadership, and there will be a few in Labour who think his piece settles a few old scores.

But there will be a lot of people involved in business, in particular in property and development, who will agree wholeheartedly with some of Simpson’s observations - even if they are actively supporting the pro-elected mayor campaign.

Indeed, those criticisms are probably the reason why they support it.

You can see Alan Simpson’s piece here. To cut to the chase, he argues that an elected mayor simply doesn’t address what he claims is the big issue in Nottingham politics: its lack of ambition and vision. While he acknowledges some significant achievements (like the tram), he points the finger at the city council leadership over its refusal to publish full details about finances and a lack of genuine, big picture imagination. He also takes a swipe at the Tories and the Lib Dems for ineffectual opposition (though I suspect city boundaries count against them).

Simpson says: “Good governance demands strong Opposition as well as visionary leadership. Nottingham has neither. This is the Council’s Achilles Heel. To demolish the case for a mayor, it must open its own books and then be more imaginative.”

He describes Nottingham as a “second division” city, and adds pointedly: “…we have to break from a culture of contentedness that holds the city back. Pride and ambition are not qualities you can claim for yourself, without inviting ridicule.”

This plays to one of the central criticisms of the ‘anti’ campaign: that its relentless focus on the negative demonstrates exactly that point about the absence of the vision thing. Where it could be pointing to achievement and ambition under the current system, or painting a picture of a dynamic future, it instead drones on about the cost of a mayor, the risk of corruption and who’s paying for the yes campaign.

The case for an elected mayor isn’t proven, and Simpson says cities need real power rather than real figureheads. In that context, he thinks an elected mayor would be a sideshow.

But in Nottingham the ‘marmite’ flavour of the current leadership and its failure to give voice to an alternative vision leave the Yes campaign in a potentially strong position. What is most likely to count against the Yes camp is an issue which should cause serious concern on both sides – voter apathy towards politics and politicians. The turnout looks like being low.

Nottingham has a tantalising opportunity to develop an ambitious and genuinely challenging vision for the future, and Alan Simpson’s painfully blunt critique suggests one is sorely needed – whichever system we have.

I go back to the point I made in my last blog: Nottingham needs to think bigger in terms of its boundaries. Simpson suggests those boundaries also appear to encircle the council’s vision like a philosophical wall – that the city’s very horizons are just not wide enough.

You decide which way is best to unlock the potential. It’s YOUR city.