I spoke to LBC News about the Bonehill-Paine selection — and why Somerset isn’t a lower bar
I spoke to Steve Holden on LBC News about the Crewkerne South selection this lunchtime (Aug 6th) — and what the Conservatives think a councillor actually does. Listen again on Global Player, my interview starts at 2 hr 20.
Joshua Bonehill-Paine, who was jailed for antisemitic harassment, was selected as the Conservative candidate for Crewkerne South. He has since stood down. But the reason I went on national radio isn’t the selection. It’s what was said around it.
Kemi Badenoch defended the choice on the basis that being a councillor is about parking and bins. She was clear that she holds a higher bar for who can be a Conservative MP. So: not fit for Westminster, but fit for Somerset.
Then the leader of the Conservative opposition on Somerset Council, Cllr Diogo Rodrigues, said much the same — potholes, dog poo on the streets, bins, and that sort of stuff. He has been a councillor for ten years. He was Mayor of Bridgwater. He knows exactly what this job is.
Here is what I said on air, and I’ll say it again here.
I believe in second chances. If he has genuinely changed, good. But “has he changed?” and “should he be on a ballot paper?” are two different questions. A second chance is a job, a home, a life. It is not automatically power over other people’s lives.
Steve asked me directly whether I thought the Conservative leader had undermined the work councillors do. My answer was that she doesn’t understand it. I meant that, and I think it is the more serious charge.
Because this is what Somerset Council actually does. We serve more than half a million people on a budget approaching half a billion pounds, most of it going on social care and children’s services. We hold statutory safeguarding duties. We are the corporate parents of every child in care in this county. We handle homelessness, public health, licensing and planning. Decisions taken in our committee rooms change whether a child is safe, whether an older person gets care, whether a family has a roof.
Not understanding that is an available excuse for someone who has never been a councillor. It is not available to someone who has done the job for a decade.
The part that stayed with me most was this. Badenoch admitted on national radio that she had not watched his videos. She made a public judgement about a man’s rehabilitation without looking at what he has been putting out. Rehabilitation is not something a third party announces on someone else’s behalf — least of all when they haven’t done the reading.
Nothing said this week has been taken back. He withdrew. The party did not withdraw him, and it has not corrected a word.
Somerset is not the shallow end of politics. It is where politics actually lands. And it deserves better than being treated as somebody’s low bar.
Cllr Claire Sully is the Liberal Democrat councillor for Mendip South, chairs the Liberal Democrat Group on Somerset Council and is the Associate Lead Member for Community Resilience at Somerset Councils Executive.
Read related article here: Kemi Badenoch has one standard for MPs and another for Somerset!