For the Common Good: St Helens Green Party launches election manifesto

23 April 2015

For the Common Good: St Helens Green Party launches election manifesto

St Helens Green Party chose St George’s Day, 23^rd April, to unveil its manifesto for a greener, cleaner borough with a brighter future.

Building on the party’s national manifesto, For the Common Good sets out bold, ambitious plans for a fairer, more prosperous St Helens.

Dr James Chan, Green Party Parliamentary candidate for St Helens South & Whiston says:

“We love our bit of England, but we know it could be so much better. That’s why we’ve chosen St George’s Day to highlight that we are standing up for England by standing up for St Helens.

“It’s a harsh reality, but if the main parties really wanted to deliver a better deal for places like St Helens, if they really wanted to tackle key issues such as inequality, deprivation and degradation, they’d have done so by now. 

“The fact is that too many people and too many places in our borough have been abandoned by the ‘established’ parties with their ‘business-as-usual’ politics. Just look at our food banks, the public sector jobs and services being slashed, the zero-hours contacts and the brutal welfare cuts.

 “The Green Party stands for a fair economy that works for all. 

“In St Helens this means a thriving private sector, a resurgent public sector and good jobs that pay a Living Wage.

“It means better schools and other public services.

“And it means protecting and enhancing the borough’s natural environment and green spaces, and stopping the grot that blights the borough.” 

Manifesto highlights include:

• seeking to put Pilkington’s – and its redundant production lines – at the heart of a national scheme to fight fuel poverty through a mass programme to weather-proof our homes;
• creating a poverty fighting fund to help the most vulnerable families escape the clutches of loan sharks and similar creditors, and sign up instead with local credit unions offering low-cost loans and financial stability;
• introducing a raft of improvement measures within a one mile radius of St Helens town centre to address its ‘concrete jungle’ image and create instead an attractive ‘garden city’;
• protecting and enhancing the borough’s natural environment and green spaces by creating ‘green corridors’ across the borough – urban ‘wildways’ that allow children and families to get around by foot or bicycle, away from busy road traffic;
• restoring a discredited local democracy;
• improving public transport;
• cracking down on fly-tipping, litter and dog-fouling;
• bringing empty properties back into use;
• leading from the front on climate change by making St Helens Council a carbon neutral council; and
• addressing St Helens Council’s record on managing secondary education, which has seen St Helens slump to 148^thout of 150 local authorities in England.

Francis Williams, Green Party candidate for the Town Centre ward at the local elections says:

“I’ve been talking to residents across the town centre ward in recent weeks and the message is coming through loud and clear: ‘do something about fly tipping!’ Decent people shouldn’t have to put up with it – and under a Green Council they wouldn’t have to.

“And as for the town centre itself, we have to turn things around – and quickly.

“St Helens Green Party wants a town centre that is attractive and vibrant, with a truly diverse mix of shops, bars and cafes – the very opposite of what we have now.

“We have to find ways to encourage genuinely local businesses that are in St Helens for the long haul, rather than here today/gone tomorrow chain stores that can usually be found on any high street in any other town anyway.

“Two thirds of the country’s half a million retail outlets are independent. Perhaps this is the way back for St Helens? It has to be worth a try. After all, what’s the alternative?” 

Elizabeth Ward, Green Party Parliamentary candidate for St Helens North adds:

“On St George’s Day, and every day, we will stand up for our bit of England against those whose idea of progress is concreting over our countryside and allowing big business to frack the ground beneath our feet.

“We are the only party that will say ‘no’ to government bribes and ‘yes’ to helping residents in Sutton, Newton-le-Willows and Bold fight fracking.

“It’s time for change in St Helens, for a fresh start and a new beginning. We need a borough with an exciting future as well as a proud past. A place where people and communities really do come first, not political parties or self-serving individuals.

“But if you want real change, you have to vote for it. On 7^th May we are asking voters to be courageous, to vote for what they believe, to vote for the common good and be part of a peaceful political revolution.”

In addition to its Parliamentary candidates, St Helens Green Party will field candidates in all sixteen seats at the borough council elections.

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