Council tax would be frozen for a year and a congestion charge ruled out if Conservatives take control of Cardiff council in May. A new travel and tourism pass could also be created for visitors coming to the city, with support also offered for teachers and carers.
Conservatives have been the largest opposition party on Cardiff council since 2017. Over a cup of tea in a cafe in Rhiwbina, Adrian Robson put forward his case for how Cardiff would look if he were made council leader. Top priorities for a Conservative-run council after the May election would include road repairs, safety in parks, bin collections and other basic services which he believes have become worse in the past five years.
“We have seen council services diminish under the current Labour administration. There have been real issues with waste management. Residents complain regularly, particularly on the outskirts of the city to myself and my colleagues, that they're not getting even the monthly green bin service.
“We would bring back the monthly green bin service for winter and fortnightly for summer. Similarly, with black bin collections, we would ensure that it would definitely stay as it currently is, fortnightly, and we wouldn’t look to explore three-weekly or monthly collections which perhaps other councils in Wales might have flirted with.
“One thing I want to do is decrease the depth of an urgent pothole so it gets filled in more quickly. Things like that, the bread and butter services that people use day in, day out, often they don’t think about, but they have noticed a deterioration over the last five years under this administration.”
Extra support would also be given to carers, teachers, and the city’s tourism industry with the option of a tourist pass for bus fares and entrance to places like Castell Coch or St Fagans National Museum of History. “We want to see how we can ensure people come into the service and become carers and how they can be supported. And that includes unpaid carers, because they form the real backbone of a lot of the support that residents receive. Without them, the services the council and the NHS provide would be completely swamped. We need to do more to support them.
“Bearing in mind what teachers have been through with coronavirus, I would like to see packages in so that as a caring council we can support our teaching workforce and get them, when they need it, the mental health package.
“Thankfully tourists are coming back to Cardiff now that the pandemic is passing, but they’re only coming for a weekend break. Cardiff is a great city and there’s lots in our surrounding areas, but people aren’t using it as a base for a week’s stay to come to south Wales. They come through Cardiff on their way to somewhere else.
“We would like to do some sort of visitor pass available for all the attractions where there are currently fees, and also to enable them to get the bus to St Fagans museum or Castell Coch or wherever. I want to see the tourist offer as a more cohesive approach.”
Labour councillors in Cardiff and council policy often mention the ‘southern arc’ of the city, where there are high levels of deprivation, in places like Splott, Butetown and Ely. A Tory-led council meanwhile would rebalance the focus across the whole of Cardiff, including areas in the north, says Mr Robson.
“I want to look after our residents, whether that's down in the south, in Butetown, Grangetown or Splott, or up in the north in Rhiwbina, Whitchurch, Lisvane and Thornhill. The focus from the Labour administration on the southern arc has been to the detriment of other parts of the city. Whenever we bid for regeneration funding or some straightforward ideas, nothing particularly large or difficult, you look at the forms and you realise that if you’re in a deprived area, that carries extra weight. Places in the north of the city are just not going to get all of these funds.”
Despite the focus on the southern, poorer parts of the city, he believes levels have not reduced there during Labour’s control of the council. “I don’t think it’s made much difference in terms of deprivation levels. Electing some Conservative councillors in those parts of the city will help, because it’s a completely different way of thinking. Labour thinks in a certain way about trying to make everybody equal, but what that actually means is people are levelled down. I want to see people levelled up.”
One idea to help “level up” parts of the city is giving each councillor an annual fund of £1,000 to give in grants to local community groups, which some other councils already do.
“It’s not a huge amount of money, but it’s a small amount each year the councillor can look at, perhaps for a local sports organisation or community organisation to make a difference. And the councillor is the best placed person to do that for those small amounts. The councillor can either choose to use it all at once or split it up into a few smaller amounts.
“I find that small amounts of money, like £250 or £500, can actually do a lot for a community organisation. Some local community groups here have struggled since the restrictions were lifted, they haven’t yet got their vibe back in the way they were meeting beforehand. The council can have a role in supporting those groups throughout the city.”
Changes last year to bin collections were heavily criticised by Conservative councillors, as bins were often missed after the council changed rounds in February and refuse collectors began working a four-day week. A trial is also underway in some parts of Cardiff with residents separating their recycling into different bins.
“That’s a service that affects everybody in a way that they interact with by having to put their bins out, so they notice if their bins aren’t collected or missed. There’s a good reason sometimes, because of coronavirus or the weather, but equally there have been some changes down in Lamby Way that haven’t bedded in. I don’t see sickness absence rates falling at any rate that they intended them to.
“I wouldn’t have changed it in the middle of the pandemic. We were still under very tight restrictions in February 2021. It was an odd time to change it. The four-day week means in theory that people are meant to be more effective because they have an extra day to recover. But it doesn’t seem to be working like that. We also see unions raising concerns about issues.
“We now have these trial areas with the new system, and it will be interesting to see how that works or doesn’t. How does that actually impact what people put out and are they able to do their different recycling streams? There’s two streams at the moment, plus garden waste, which people can understand. Can they then add in a glass waste and another stream as well?”
After growing up in Watford and then the Wirral, the 42-year-old opposition leader studied geography at Aberystwyth, where he joined the Conservatives. He then moved to Cardiff and got a job with the party, before getting elected in 2004. He has led the Tory group on the council since 2017, following the last election which saw the Tories gain 13 seats.
“I’ve always believed in low tax and thought you shouldn’t overtax people. I understand that it’s business that drives the economy, if you support businesses then a lot of benefits will filter out to the local economy. If you get business right, you can start delivering other services behind it.”
Delays to the new bus station have been a main target of criticism throughout his time as opposition leader. The old bus station closed in 2015 and the new one isn’t due to open until next year.
“Public transport is a real issue. The bus station saga has had a massive impact on commuters and passengers. What’s worrying me is that the numbers aren’t back to pre-pandemic levels, so there’s work to be done to get people back on public transport. In Cardiff, the impact of not having that central bus station has really put people off bus travel. In the early days when it shut, people weren’t quite sure where to get their bus, and the trouble was there was no real plan to build a new one, no viable plan anyway. It’s taken far too long and it has been an embarrassment for the city.”
Recently, Conservative councillors warned any plans for a congestion charge in Cardiff could hit residents hard, adding to their bills on top of rising national insurance and energy bills. Labour said any future proposal would be about £2 and only for non-residents. However, Downing Street is also reportedly exploring plans for road user charging, to replace lost £35bn in lost revenue from taxes as drivers switch from petrol and diesel to electric. Asked if he would also condemn these plans, Mr Robson said “they’re different things”, as a local charge could damage the city’s economy.
“A congestion charge for Cardiff is basically a tax on vehicles coming into Cardiff. Until we get a decent transport network and improve the existing lines, sort out overcrowding on the Valleys lines, get the buses back to the capacities they need to be, until you get that you can’t even look at congestion charges. Commuters coming in will have to pay it, so perhaps some people will look to relocate their businesses outside Cardiff. It’ll certainly be a deterrent to businesses wanting to come into the city.
“There’s a lot to think about with congestion charging. I don’t like it at all, I don’t like the principle of it and the practicalities of it are very unfortunate for the people who are affected by it. And it will affect Cardiff residents, there’s no getting around it. They’ll put it in, and either set it at a low fee to start with but that fee will obviously go up, or otherwise they’ll decide ‘we need to now start tackling the people coming in from the outskirts of the city’, and that’s when they move the zone.
“The difference with road charging is that it applies across the board, so it applies to absolutely everybody. There are some questions over how that would work in practice. There might be people in rural areas who have further to travel if they’re being charged per mile. Do you say it’s just a flat charge? If it’s a flat charge and it’s going to include electric vehicles, then essentially its excise duty, just rebranded.
“We have to pay something to use the roads. I’m not naive enough to think there doesn’t have to be an excise duty of some sort. But that has to apply across the board for everybody. It can't just be a particular council saying ‘bang, here’s our toll bridge, you pay if you come over it’. That’s why the Conservative got rid of the Severn Bridge toll, because the then secretary of state could see the damage it was doing to the Welsh economy.”
Tories would freeze council tax next year if they are elected in May, Mr Robson said, to help reduce pressure on people’s budgets amid skyrocketing inflation and national insurance increases.
“Everyone is talking about the cost of living crisis, and I think Labour has as much role to play in this as they blame everyone else for. Council tax has gone up by 47% in 10 years, and that’s astounding when wages are nowhere near that figure. The council has a role and a duty to alleviate some of the pressure with the one tool it has, which is council tax. A Conservative administration would keep it right down.”
This article was amended on Thursday, April 28 to better reflect Mr Robson's views on the southern arc.
