Brighton council leader shares achievements with Green conference

Council leader Jason Kitcat has shared some of his local party’s achievements with the national Green Party conference.

In a speech at the Hilton Brighton Metropole yesterday (Saturday 14 September) the leader of Brighton and Hove City Council said: “Conference is going fantastically well. It’s an incredible feeling to have it here in my city, in my ward.

“I moved to this city 13 years ago. Single and just out of university I came here to start a digital business, just like so many others have.

“I began to learn more about this city that I lived in and worked hard in. I enjoyed the many good things about this unique place but also grew impatient with how many things I knew could be so much better.

“I also kept noticing that the strongest, most committed and caring voices on the issues I too cared most deeply about were Green councillors and activists.

“And so, inevitably, within a couple of years I had joined the Green Party and was knocking on doors each election with the rest of them.

“Quite a few things have changed since then. I’m fortunate to have a family now with two beautiful children and my wonderful wife.

“I’m also far more directly involved in running the city than I was 13 years ago.

“The other day I got on the bus and someone said, ‘You’re Kitcat, aren’t you?’

“‘Yes,’ I replied. He cheerfully shook my hand and said, ‘Great to see the council leader taking the bus!’

“The difference is not just that I’m recognised on the bus. The key difference is that finally we Greens are in administration.

“No longer do we have just words to dedicate to the pursuit of our long-held values. Now we can put them into practice.

“Yesterday, with my colleagues on the Green administration, and we launched our report on our achievements of our first two years in office.

“Yes, of course, we’re a minority administration and at any time the opposition can and do gang up to outvote us.

“Yet in spite of that we’ve have delivered huge amounts of our manifesto promises for our city.

“Three quarters of our promises are done or well on course to be completed.

“It’s quite novel that, isn’t it? You stand for election on the basis of a manifesto and then you deliver on the promises. It could catch on. What do you think!

“A few of the highlights for me …

• A living wage for our lowest-paid council workers. We’ve also reduced the gap between top and bottom earners to almost ten to one – another manifesto promise.
• We’ve protected our local economy from the worst of the recession. It’s outperformed the national average. In July alone we had one million people visit the city, which shows that we are committed to protecting all that makes Brighton special so that people have their weddings, conferences and more here which is essential to our local economy. And guess what? The majority of those visitors come to the city by public transport.
• Yes, we are experiencing biting government cuts. We’re the second worst cut of any unitary in the country. We’ve protected council services and funding for the third sector.
• Thanks to the work of colleagues Ian Davey and Pete West huge progress has been made in putting sustainable transport first in this city. The significant benefits for public health and improved air quality are clear. We have been named the least car-dependent place outside of London.
• We have become the world’s first One Planet City, independently accredited by environment charity BioRegional. We are delivering on our promises, we in believe in environmental justice and social justice.
• When we came into office we discovered that despite having the most highly educated parents in the region, we had very poor secondary school results. Led by Sue Shanks, chair of the Children’s Committee, we have brought a new focus to school improvement. This year we have seen record GCSE results while the national average has been going down.
• And if you have a spare 15 minutes, do visit The Level where a £3 million investment has transformed a key city centre park into a fantastic green lung and high-quality public space for all. There are 30,000 households within 15 minutes walk of this park. Go and have a look. It’s truly incredible what we’ve been able to do there and we’re so proud.

I could go on all afternoon, seeing as there’s about one hundred manifesto achievements we’ve already delivered. But I won’t.

“Do have a look at the report which is available online and in the hall next door.

“I’m so proud of what we’ve achieved together as an administration. All the councillors – every councillor in the Green group on this council – are delivering on our manifesto.

“They’re working hard every day to make our values reality in this city.

“We are of course also fortunate in this city to have someone who is, without any doubt, the UK’s most impressive and principled MP – Caroline Lucas.

“I’d like to personally acknowledge the incredible job she does representing the people of Brighton Pavilion and the Green Party in Westminster. Thank you, Caroline.

“I also can’t wait to see what Jenny Jones is going to do in the House of Lords. I think it’s going to be incredible as well. Congratulations, Jenny.

“As Caroline said in her speech yesterday (Friday 13 September), this year in Brighton and Hove has been tough.

“It’s not an easy time to be in local government. It seems to me that councils are the coalition government’s whipping boy.

“Despite being found at the start of this parliament to be the most efficient part of government, by far, councils are bearing the brunt of the cuts.

“On average local government, local councils that affect all of your areas, have seen their budgets reduced by 28 per cent.

“What have Whitehall done? They’ve only trimmed theirs by 8 per cent.

“Those cuts harm our local communities. We have to fight against them. We must keep making the case they aren’t necessary and that austerity does not work.

“But we also must keep campaigning for devolution to independent local government.

“If we don’t fight for local power for local councils for our local people, then our communities will always be at the whim of governments.

“We have to keep making the case for what we believe in, which is true localism and true decentralisation for our councils.

“But until then, until that time when we control all levels of government at the same time, we do have a duty to do the best for our areas.

“It is so much easier to criticise from the sidelines than to govern.

“But in spite of the bad times, we cannot abandon those who put their faith in us to fight for what we believe to be right.

“We need to make the most of whatever resources we have to protect those in the greatest need. And we will.

“Of course, this year we have had another challenge which I feel we really must talk about.

“When we took administration we found that successive Labour and Tory administrations had let unequal allowances for council workers fester for 15 years.

“They had repeatedly tried to push their dirty secret under the carpet for the next administration to trip up on.

“We couldn’t let this go on. So we set upon the huge task of finally resolving the mass of historical arrangements which were leaving men and women unequally compensated for similar types of work.

“Everyone knew this had to happen but only us, the Greens, had the moral fibre and courage to follow through on delivering fairer allowances for all council workers.

“Yes, it was rough on the way, as it inevitably would be. But I’m delighted to say that come this 1 October we will have introduced a new simple and fair set of allowances for all our staff which meets our moral and legal obligations.

“As a result of this many workers, especially women, will be seeing increased take-home pay. That’s Green values.

“Changing this country to the clean, green, fair future we all so urgently want to see will not be easy. That was just one microcosm of the challenges we face ahead.

“The enemies of change, the opponents of fairness, the self-interested, the oil barons, the oligarchs … they will all fight us every step of the way.

“I say to you, as a party we must steel ourselves to this challenge. We know time is short and the stakes are incredibly high.

“And yes, being tested in government is tough. But this is only the start of what we need to do to bring our vision to reality.

“We need to find the courage to retain our unique Green traditions of co-operating and collaborating while being stronger and more united in the face of the powerful opposition our values inevitably arouse.

“As a smaller, newer party the odds often seem stacked against us. But we keep breaking through – in Europe, in councils across the country and in Westminster.

“And I know that together we can do it again in Europe next year – and beyond.

“Never has our message of a sustainable, balanced and fair future been more urgent and important than now.

“We must really keep working together to win arguments, win elections, to win power and deliver real change.

“The better Brighton and Hove we’re building here today is just the beginning. Together we can do it.”