Ex-Bristol mayor George Ferguson says Marvin Rees’s refusal to share power by having a cross-party cabinet is the main reason the city voted to scrap the role. Mr Ferguson, who became the first directly elected Mayor of Bristol 10 years ago but campaigned to abolish the position in last week’s referendum, says his successor’s insistence on an all-Labour executive was the “biggest influence for change”.
A spokesperson for Mr Rees says it is over-simplistic to attribute any one reason to the outcome. Voters decided by 59 per cent to 41 per cent on Thursday, May 5, to abandon the mayoral model and return Bristol City Council to a committee system where groups of councillors make most decisions.
The poll came 12 months after the local elections where Labour lost its overall majority in the chamber and ended up with the same number of members as the Greens, 24 apiece. But Labour’s Mr Rees refused to appoint any councillors from opposition benches to his cabinet, which, under the current set-up, collectively decides major policy and is where power is concentrated.
