In a powerful open letter released one week after Plymouth’s referendum last Thursday, the man behind the campaign for a directly elected mayor, today accused local politicians of “lying, cheating and stealing” to maintain their grip on power.
Angus Forbes, sponsor of the Mayor for Plymouth campaign, says the deceitful tactics employed during the campaign - fabricated cost claims and improper targeting of postal voters - distorted the democratic process and directly influenced the outcome.
Last week’s referendum saw just 19% of eligible voters turn out to have their say on whether Plymouth should be run by a directly elected leader, or to continue with the current model of the council leader being chosen by a small group of councillors.
The results returned an extremely narrow verdict with 52% versus 48% per cent voting in favour of keeping the current structure with 19,840 votes to 18,044. At the time Mr Forbes said it was not a ‘true reflection’ of the need for change, and that democracy had been ‘trampled on’.
Turning his focus to the next opportunity for democratic reform, Mr Forbes today urged citizens to demand a regional mayor based in Plymouth, asserting that only direct election can deliver strong leadership and real change for the 1.8 million residents of Devon and Cornwall.
In an open letter to the people of Plymouth, he writes:
In the early hours of last Friday morning, a referendum for a Directly Elected Mayor was lost by just 1,800 votes. It was the end of a long constitutional contest aimed at reducing poverty and increasing prosperity. Why this referendum was lost is clear, Plymouth’s politicians were so desperate not to lose power that they lied, cheated and stole.
They lied that the cost of the mayor would be £1.5m every year, a figure the current leader simply made up. The £1.5m lie was repeated relentlessly, with one MP saying it over 300 times on social media. In truth, the average city mayoral office costs £258k per annum, a figure that the Mayor for Plymouth campaign (of which I was sponsor) researched by sending Freedom of information requests to 10 city mayors. We made this number public early on in the referendum period. We also calculated that a Plymouth Mayor would save the city £250k a year, but the lie continued.
Plymouth’s politicians cheated by using the electoral roll to send individually addressed letters to the 33,000 postal voters in Plymouth, when they were expressly told not to by those in charge of the referendum, Counting Officer and CEO Tracy Lee and the Head of Electoral services Glenda Favor-Ankersen. This significantly affected the referendum outcome as postal voters vote in high numbers, and the Mayor For Plymouth campaign was not allowed access to the electoral roll.
At the behest of local politicians and acting in their own political interests, Westminster decided to steal in order to protect Labour power in Plymouth. The Government rushed through a secondary amendment to current legislation to delay Plymouth getting a mayor by a year - should you have voted for one, which was a deliberate act of stealing from the people of Plymouth. Irrespective of the government’s intention to pass future legislation to stop the creation of any more city mayors, they should have stayed quiet and let the citizens of Plymouth have an uninterrupted referendum and championed an act of self-determination that started before the general election which was valid under current legislation.
Instead, they acted in a gross act of frustration and direct political intervention which, along with the tone of reporting by the BBC, was so powerful that many citizens actually thought the referendum was cancelled. The result was to drain hope from thousands of Mayor supporters who decided that there was no point in voting. The end result is that we lost the referendum and the politicians won.
My writing this article is not a case of sour grapes, what is done in done, but truthfully I never thought I’d see the level of underhandedness that we observed during this referendum.
So let us turn to the future. I am concerned for Plymouth over the next couple of years. I pray that our country is not subject to some material economic misfortune in the short term, as currently Plymouth is vulnerable.
In light of this referendum outcome, I believe it is crucial that we get a regional mayor based in Plymouth in order to turn things around. In this regard we are fortunate, as the government is likely to create a regional strategic authority of Devon, or Devon and Cornwall, which comes with a mayor.
We must ensure that this new regional mayor is based in Plymouth, the capital of the peninsula, because in order to improve the lives of 1.8m citizens of Devon and Cornwall, (irrespective of the configuration of the regional authority), Plymouth must be strong, it must be thriving.
Direct democracy is the key ingredient that empowers metro mayors like Andy Burnham (Greater Manchester), Steve Rotherham (Liverpool) or Tracy Brabin (West Yorkshire) to inspire their populations, who together drive their cities forward. It is not just more money and more planning control, it is the invaluable asset of collective belief and collective vision, forged by choosing one’s leader directly. We need this belief as soon as possible.
Whilst the mayor will have responsibility for every citizen across the region, given the unique position of Plymouth to effect change, I am confident that the regional mayor will be first and foremost a champion of Plymouth. They will be a true leader of place, empowered by the purity of democratic legitimacy. Plymouth can be a centre of growth, of hope, of culture, of excellence, of training, of employment, of empowerment, of community, and of beauty. We can change the fortunes of the poor in our city and be a beacon for those who live in rural poverty in the two counties.
With leadership you believe in, you can change Plymouth’s future in an extraordinary way.
As it stands, the election of this mayor will be in May 2028, with an outside chance of it being May 2027. Crucially, the mayor can be a leader from any field: from business, from health, from the armed forces, not just a politician. I am completely confident that you will be presented with excellent candidates who come forward to lead, just make sure you steer clear of politicians.
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