Bristol Needs a Politician With the Ruthless Competence to Actually Run the City.
The personality it takes to fix a city - and why Bristol won't elect them.
Bristol City Council planned to sell 1,222 council homes while promising to build 1,000 new ones annually.
That’s not ideology. That’s arithmetic.
And arithmetic doesn’t care about your values.
This is what happens when you elect people to perform politics instead of deliver services. The Greens won because they offered identity and theatre.
Then they governed.
And the bins don’t get collected. Potholes multiply. Social care budgets consume 70% of council spending while committees deadlock on casting votes. The Bottle Yard Studios gets stonewalled on FOI requests whilst Casualty films in Cardiff.
Think about that.
The council makes policy statements about international conflicts. They debate symbolic gestures.
Meanwhile, core functions collapse.
What Bristol needs isn’t another performer. It’s a politician with managerial ruthlessness.
Not someone who cares what you identify as. Not someone invested in your political awakening. Not someone who’ll validate your progressive credentials or make you feel good about Bristol’s values.
Someone who’ll fix the bins.
Here’s what Keir Starmer and Bristol’s Tony Dyer have in common: both are perfectly decent human beings outside of politics. Both are competent managers. But as leaders? About as effective as a chocolate teapot in a heatwave. They can chair meetings. They can manage process. They can tick boxes and follow procedures. What they can’t do is inspire, intimidate, or impose the will necessary to actually deliver transformation against resistance.
They’re the human equivalent of beige paint - functional, inoffensive, and utterly incapable of making anyone give a damn.
Bristol doesn’t need another manager who governs by committee consensus. It needs someone willing to make enemies in service of outcomes.
Let me describe this person. In detail. Because Bristol won’t elect them - but understanding why reveals exactly what’s broken about how cities get run.
The Personality Profile: Operational Ruthlessness Without Ideological Investment.
This person walks into meetings about homeless services and asks one question:
“What are the measurable outcomes per pound spent?”
They don’t care if the answer comes from evangelical Christians, radical socialists, or private corporations. They care about results. Bins collected. Potholes filled. Children protected. Elderly people receiving social care assessments before they die waiting.
Everything else is theatre.
When Bristol’s activist culture calls them heartless for prioritising delivery over performance, they don’t flinch.
Governance isn’t about making people feel seen. It’s about making services work.
You want validation? Get a therapist.
You want your bins collected, your roads maintained, your vulnerable citizens protected? That requires someone who treats the council like what it actually is: a service delivery organisation funded by taxpayers who deserve value for money.
Not a platform for your personal crusade.
Managerial Competence Over Political Charisma.
Bristol’s current administration promised 1,000 affordable homes annually.
How many have they built?
The person Bristol needs would walk into that meeting, audit every promise against delivery, and either fix the gap or stop making the promise.
No spin. No excuses. No corporate nonsense to disguise selling off council housing whilst claiming to build more.
Pick one strategy. Execute it. Report outcomes.
This requires managerial competence. Understanding budgets. Procurement. Service contracts. Performance metrics. The boring administrative machinery that makes cities function.
Most politicians don’t have these skills. They’ve spent their lives performing values, not managing operations. They know how to rally crowds and write policy documents.
They don’t know how to audit a contract. Track project delivery. Enforce accountability.
This politician Bristol needs has those skills.
Boundary Enforcement: “That’s Not Our Job”
Here’s where it gets uncomfortable.
Bristol City Council has mission-crept into areas that actively distract from core functions. International politics. Symbolic declarations. Identity validation. Community consultation on issues where the council has already decided what it’s doing anyway.
This politician strips that away.
Not because they’re heartless. Because every pound spent on performative politics is a pound not spent on protecting vulnerable children. Every hour councillors spend debating symbolic gestures is an hour not spent fixing service delivery.
When pressure groups demand the council take positions on international conflicts, they say:
“We fix streetlights. That’s not our job.”
When activists insist the council should lead social transformation, they say:
“We collect bins and protect children. Transform society on your own time.”
When residents want endless consultation about decisions the council’s already made, they say:
“We’ve consulted. Here’s the data. Here’s the decision. Move forward or stay angry - but we’re delivering the service either way.”
This will generate protest. Accusations of authoritarianism. Claims of heartlessness.
They don’t care.
Because boundaries protect core functions. And protecting core functions serves citizens better than performing empathy whilst services collapse.
Immunity to Social Pressure: Comfortable Being Called Names.
Bristol’s political culture will test this person immediately.
The first time they refuse to make symbolic statements, there’ll be protests. When they strip funding from programs with no measurable outcomes, there’ll be outrage. When they say “we’re not prioritising climate declarations over fixing potholes,” the Greens will lose their minds.
They need to be comfortable with this. Not defensive. Not apologetic.
“Your disapproval is noted. Moving on.”
This isn’t cruelty. It’s refusal to be captured by performance.
The moment you start governing to avoid criticism, you’ve stopped governing effectively. Performance doesn’t collect bins.
They govern for outcomes, not applause.
The elderly woman who got her social care assessment on time doesn’t care about approval ratings. The child removed from an abusive home doesn’t require the performance of empathy.
They need competence.
And competence requires being willing to be unpopular.
What This Person Would Actually Do: Bristol’s Failures Fixed.
Let’s apply this ruthlessly to Bristol’s specific mess:
Housing: Stop selling council homes OR stop promising to build new ones. Pick one. Execute it. No more contradictions.
The current approach - promising transformation whilst liquidating assets - is dishonest.
Bottle Yard Studios: Keep it public and maximise revenue, or sell it transparently. Stop the FOI stonewalling.
Bristol lost Casualty to Cardiff. That’s revenue, tourism, profile. Make a clear decision. Explain it without the bullshit.
Committee System: If you need casting votes to govern, you don’t have a mandate for radical change. Stick to core functions.
Stop the performative deadlocks. Stop the walkouts. Deliver basic services competently.
Budget Priorities: 70% to social care means everything else gets scaled to what’s affordable. No aspirational spending. No promises Bristol can’t fund.
Build budgets around what’s deliverable. Then deliver it. On budget. With measurable outcomes.
Why Bristol Won’t Elect This Person.
Bristol’s electorate votes for the best performer of their values, not the best service manager.
The Greens won because they offered identity. They spoke the language of transformation and justice.
They delivered committees that deadlock on casting votes and sold more homes than they built.
But they performed beautifully.
This politician offers competence and boundaries. Which sounds boring until your bins haven’t been collected for three weeks and the potholes have destroyed your suspension.
Then competence looks damn attractive.
But by then, you’ve already elected another performer who promises transformation whilst delivering collapse.
Bristol will continue failing until it hurts enough that voters prioritise outcomes over identity.
This person exists. Probably running a business somewhere, wondering why anyone would want the grief of local politics.
They won’t run. They can see what Bristol’s political culture does to people who prioritise delivery over performance.
So Bristol gets what it votes for: beautiful rhetoric, catastrophic governance, bins that don’t get collected whilst councillors debate symbolic gestures.
You can’t manage what you won’t measure. You can’t fix what you won’t name. You can’t govern effectively while constantly performing.
Bristol chose performance.
It got exactly what it paid for.
FACT-CHECK SOURCES:
Council homes planned for sale: Bristol City Council Housing Revenue Account proposals, January 2025. Bristol24/7 and Bristol World reporting confirmed 1,222 homes identified for potential disposal.
Green Party housing promise: Bristol Green Party Manifesto May 2024, page 4: “Increase the city’s target of affordable homes from the current 600 per year to 1,000 per year.” Bristol Green Party official manifesto, April 2024.
Social care budget percentage: Bristol City Council Budget 2025/26 Consultation states social care services “make up by far the largest share of the council’s Revenue Budget (over 70 per cent).” Official budget consultation document.
Committee casting vote system: Following Labour councillor defection to Greens (November 2024), extraordinary Full Council meeting restructured committees giving Greens 50% of seats. Chair casting votes create effective control. Bristol Live and Bristol24/7 reporting, November 2024.
BBC Casualty relocation: Production moved from Bristol to BBC Roath Lock Studios, Cardiff in 2011-2012. Final Bristol episode aired December 2011. BBC News (March 2009) and Wikipedia: Casualty production history.
Bottle Yard Studios: Bristol City Council-owned film and television studios. FOI requests regarding future ownership and management have received delayed or incomplete responses, documented in previous reporting.