I met Paul Maynard yesterday up in Bispham. For those that don’t know (and who doesn’t?), he is the Conservative Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Blackpool North. You might have seen him on the Politics Show on the BBC at lunchtime yesterday.
It was extremely refreshing to see a prospective politician who could talk candidly and snap out of rhetoric mode and who despite not being from Blackpool has much more passion for the cause than the stagnant Callows, Fowlers, and even Ron “My Name Is” Bell.
One of the first things Paul said to me was that he could and would give me an opinion on anything which is a breath of fresh air. Ideas and opinions are what this town needs and an elected member with both of these and an ear to the ground has to be an asset.
What I particularly liked was that if I didn’t know he was a Conservative PPC, I wouldn’t have been able to guess because he has his own (dare I say) independent opinions which for the most part I agree with. He is definitely not just a barrel of useless party political rhetoric and you can, I think, be sure that if elected he will campaign for the right things for the town and will not be an anonymous expenses sponge like the current incumbents. He even promises – if he gets in – not to travel to London by first class rail so as to reduce his expenses!
Like many of us, Paul accepts that the revival of Blackpool will not be as a traditional tourist resort and that it will not be possible to revive the golden years.
This is what Maxine Callow seems to want, though, but she’s not doing a damn thing to implement it. Cutting Blackpool off from the rest of the world by slashing transport links is sending us all back to the dark ages.
I’ve said it many times that there is a lack of vision amongst the council. You can see it for yourself from the piecemeal development of the town. Roy Fisher’s lot were bad, but looking at the catastrophic failure of civic leadership under the Callows and spineless in-fighting and backstabbing amongst the local Conservatives it is going to take some good people like Mr Maynard to drive the town forward in the future. Unfortunately the Callow and Fowler axis look only to the past and to their own survival, sealing the town’s coffin with their own bile.
They’re happy in their positions, nice and cushty, dropping a press release here and an artist’s impression there. Give them no problems and be on your way, son.
But under the Callows even the town’s jewel, the Pleasure Beach, is failing. Millions of pounds of losses were reported recently and today they are said to be pumping £2.5m into cleaning up the park and implementing a new dodgems attraction – supposedly inspired by Robbie Williams.
So what would Paul do in order to succeed where others have either failed or turned a blind eye?
Well clearly he is a prospective MP and not a state governor so he can’t just walk in, kick all the council out and change things to his own preferences. However he can encourage the council to proceed in a certain direction and try his hardest to secure Government backing for projects as part of the town’s regeneration.
One key point he made was to focus on improving education. Again, we’ve discussed it a few times on here and I believe improving the quality of school leavers is vital in this town given the poor figures. This means giving them opportunities and aspirations, not just packing them off to a youth centre and pretending it has solved all their problems.
There also needs to be jobs for those that are better qualified and currently this is not the case.
Transport is also important but Paul wouldn’t be drawn on whether the tram system was viable or not because the figures are not being willingly disclosed by the council. He agreed that the road system in the town was chaotic, and suggested that ideally the promenade would be fully pedestrianised. Not a view I had heard before but if there were other routes to compensate I would be extremely happy to see that. It would also place more significance on the trams.
I asked about the electrification of the railway into Blackpool North and whether he was of the view that it was essential for regeneration and he came back with the perfect answer, really. He’d already contacted the chief executive of Virgin Rail and asked whether they would run a direct service to London if we had the electrified line to Preston. The answer was a short, and definite, “no”, due to lack of demand.
Based on this, you have to ask whether there’s any point in doing it and whether it’s just another Labour smokescreen. As I mention later, the perception of doing things is a useful tool in this area and is used often to perplex and pacify us. Telling us we’re getting some money, or investment as they like to call it, without regard to what it’s being spent on and whether it will be of any use.
The neglect of the Council, including chief executive Steve Weaver very much in this, on the town centre is a demonstration of their ineptitude yet it’s impossible to get anything to stick on any of them. Nobody can ever be found to be accountable. An elected mayor is a solution to this, but is it the right one? I asked Paul but he wasn’t sure, fearing that the wrong person could destroy the town even more than laissez-faire councils have.
He believes heritage tourism has a big part to play in Blackpool’s revival and would back a museum of seaside town history. Hand in hand with this, surely, would be the modernisation of some of the old trams.
As Paul rightly said, a lot of people come back to Blackpool because they always did, yet when they find that the familiar things they loved have gone and the town is evolving from the happy families seaside resort into something closer to a boozy sleaze fest they don’t come back. Reports on Tripadvisor that Blackpool hosts the worst hotel in Europe certainly do not help.
On the subject of hotels, we discussed the quality of accommodation available in Blackpool and both agreed that there is significant work to be done to improve this. It seems proprietors have failed to realise that the modern person isn’t just happy with a bed for the night and is looking for something more up to date.
Take a look at Travelodge, spunking money into the town on hotels because they know people would rather pay a bit more and get a decent room with a decent bed than stay in a cess pit. More companies like this should be encouraged to either put neglectful businesses out of their misery or encourage them to update.
Like everyone else, I’ve stayed in some decent guesthouses around the UK and there’s no excuse for the low quality of those in Blackpool.
Despite this, all the council seem capable of doing is papering over the cracks. A case in point was the announcement of a big name retailer coming to the Houndshill centre, but all it was was the relocation of JD Sports from Church Street. Net gain of zero but people lulled into believing something has been achieved when it hasn’t. It’s that perception of doing something once again.
Even the local Police do it, trying to spin an almost 50% rise in drug crime as a good thing.
Is Paul able to achieve better than this? On his own, absolutely not. In conjunction with an allied council, there’s certainly an improved chance.
I asked him about whether he thought ousting Joan Humble (or Simon Blackburn as it may well be) was a certainty but he wouldn’t be drawn on this, saying that it’s not over until it’s over but that he’s certainly put a lot of time and effort into his campaign over the last three years.
After the reversal in Massachusetts the other week you can’t take anything for granted but I hope Paul does end up getting in because he deserves to, and I’m sure he knows that we will all be on his case if he doesn’t do what we want!
Tags: blackpool, conservatives, council, elections
He seems a good bloke but the council has to go, a council that is languid and a disgrace to the ideals of conservatism.
Correct, and I think you’ll find that come the next local elections the Conservatives will find themselves losing a fair number of seats that they narrowly won last time.
There’s bound to be a backlash if Call me Dave gets in.
The conservatives need to start living up to their name and standing for what they once stood.
1) personal responsibility
2) hard work
3) sense of fair play
4) Equality before the law (TRUE EQUALITY)
5) aspiration and ingenuity
5) Fiscal Prudence
6) Civil liberties, especially on self defence/freedom of speech
7) and doing what the label means, PRESERVING what is good about society and not trying to fix something that isnt broken, a typical tactic of nulanour. etc
I feel sorry for Paul, he will get in but be lumbered by a council whose ineptitude is legendary by Norma Wisdom standards.
Fantastic article Phil, I would like to meet Mr Maynard myself he sounds like a proper politician of principle who speaks his mind not simply spouts his party manifesto. If Virgin are uninterested then stuff them I say. All credit to Mr Maynard for making an effort though which is more than Marsden and Humble have done in the 8 years since Virgin walked away. They said there was ‘no demand’ for a London link to Wrexham so Wrexham started an open access rail company and it was very successful but then much to my dismay Virgin waded back in after dumping them years earlier and took over again.
I agree totally that Blackpool’s regeneration is not going to be a ‘return to the glory days’. I feel the inspiration for an article coming here. One of Blackpool’s biggest problems is our image which is not helped by a lack of investment and redevelopment. My vision for Blackpool (which I will discuss in my article) is one of modernisation and thinking of the future not the past. I agree it is possible to keep some of the past alive but sometimes you have to move on. I am not saying for example we should flatten the Winter Gardens it simply needs a bit of modernisation while retaining its historical features, while an eyesore like Talbot Rd bus station should be flattened but isn’t now much to my dismay.
What the Winter Gardens needs is a plan, much like the town does.
Pumping money in with no plan has never worked and never will. This attitude is the whole basis for the failure of Labour governments, and when the money has run out, they get voted out.
And guess what, the money has just about run out.
Absolutely, the town and the WG need plans with a proper structure but with ambitionless pessimistic jobsworths like Steve Weaver and Alan Cavill we aren’t getting anywhere fast. That is very very true Labour’s solution to everything is to throw money at it. They claim ‘record investment’ in this that and the other yet really all they are doing is squandering money they don’t have. Socialism is all about spending other people’s money until it runs out.
Socialism is about desocialising society and this government is absolute proof of it.The economic gap has widened and we have ethnic division on top of that.
Socialism’s founding pillars are laziness,hatred, and jealousy; in fact its the 6th deadly sin and by far the most socially destructive.
Gordon Brown’s comments about helping the middle class are as credible as Adolf Hitler saying hes had 7 Bar Mitzvahs.
If he wants to help, then he should resign along with his ragtag motley crew of marxist rabble, who constitute his mickey mouse government.
He has forgotten that the middle class came for the working class, who employed the values of the work ethic and personal responsibility to get where they are and NOT sponge and play the victim.
His government is a total and utter SOCIAL DEBASEMENT.
Only when he goes with his henchmen and women, can this country start to achieve the level of social,moral,legal and educational excellence it once had.
Socialism is the ideological obliteration of society.
Definition of a socialist: A person who hates ambition and progress and stifles it until we are all equally: Destitute
Out of interest what’s this about Blackburn, is Humble standing down? Him getting in is about the only thing worse than Humble hanging on. Many predictions I have seen seem to be confident Blackpool North and Cleveleys is going to turn blue. But for some reason the forecasts aren’t as hopeful for Blackpool South. On one website I go on UK Polling people on there reckon that Labour will breeze back in because Blackpool has fallen on hard times. But we have been going through a rough patch even before 1997 so after 13 years of Labour neglect I don’t see where those predictions come from. I think I can safely say UKIP won’t win in Blackpool South, I think Howitt’s selection has put people off, it certainly ruled out a UKIP vote from me.
Some polls suggest a hung Parliament, True Blackpudlian, has that happened before?
Certainly not in my lifetime there hasn’t been one. The last time we had hung parliament in the UK was in the 1940s as far as I can find. If there was a hung parliament I worry Liebour will form a pact with the Lib Dems and we get another left-wing Government. The Lib Dems have pledged they would not back Labour in a hung parliament but saying it and doing it are two different things.
BTW Absolutely spot on about socialism, it is a parasitic ideology that has no place in modern society.
Its a pleasure True Blackpudlian.
Nice piece Phil.
However he maybe a nice bloke, full of good intentions and promises, but when it comes down to it he will still vote how the conservative party whip tells him to.
Part of the election process is having their spine and balls removed and they are taught how to lie convincingly. The new ones have one hand in their pocket with their fingers crossed
I do agree Bruiser but really considering the situation you have to go for the lesser of two evils really. Here in Blackpool South, personally I think Ron Bell is a decent candidate but does have his faults, but its him or 5 more years of the useless Gordon Marsden and I certainly don’t want Hamish getting in not that that’s a risk really. I would rather have Mr Maynard given a chance to prove himself rather than letting Blackpool North and Cleveleys stagnate under Humble or worse still the smug arrogant Simon Blackburn.
Maybe the case but you could say that about any party, UKIP included!
lol@ Bruisers comments, but very true.
Brilliant Phil, that was a superb article.
Paul is a wonderful man, very honest and I believe his biggest achievement will be to bring all the people who care about Blackpool together and lead the way in citizen led regeneration projects. We can’t rely on the state to help us, it has to come from Blackpool.
I’m very much looking forward to the day I put an x next to Paul Maynard’s name.