YOU’VE got Conservative’s pledge to cut your taxes, you’ve got Labour’s pledge to balance the economy with a ‘fully funded’ plan, and you’ve got Reform’s promises to do whatever it is Reform do, but what about a different choice in the GE? The ‘mental health candidate’...
Alex Wilson runs Red Herring Theatre in Penarth and is health and safety governor at Evenlode Primary School, but the Liberal Democrat candidate for Penarth and Cardiff South wants to do more for the community, starting with tackling the mental health issue.
When we spoke to Mr Wilson, he explained: “Theatre is a social outlet and overnight people lost social contact when Covid hit and I could see how that was effecting mental health, and I can see how that is still effecting mental health today.”
Mr Wilson says his journey into politics came about from a lack of contact with his political representatives, so he decided to do something about it.
“I reached out to Wales Labour health secretary and I got nothing back so then I wanted to speak to my local Lib Dem councillor and I realised there wasn’t one, so I thought, I’ll do that, I’ll run as a Lib Dem representative.
Mr Wilson really does advocate the importance of mental health saying it is at the “basis of who we are”, but he’s not just a one trick pony. Mr Wilson has other issues he wants to campaign for on a local level, particularly what he described as the Vale Council’s “arrogance”.
“There is no consultation with people in the community in the Vale and it makes me thing why are we not engaging with people in the county?” said Mr Wilson.
“Vale of Glamorgan Council’s arrogance of power; they will do things just because they can without any consultation from the community. They have lost any duty of acre.”
One of these ‘arrogances’ that particularly riles Mr Wilson is the development of hundreds of homes at Cosmeston on the old farm.
Mr Wilson describes the housing estates being built in the Vale as deserts marooning people from services.
“We are marooning young families on estates with no support,” said Mr Wilson. “There is so much about pushing that Cosmeston application through which is so wrong and just arrogant.”
- Read more on the GE in Penarth: From the Navy, to Hot Diggidy Dog TV, to BBC’s Dragons Den, to Sausage Revolution to Reform UK: Simon Llewellyn
Back to the big issue: Where does the Lib Dems sit in this GE debate? The election looks likely to be fought between the two usual suspects – Labour and Conservative, with all polls suggesting a Labour victory this time around. So what’s the point in the Lib Dems in the grand scheme of things?
“We used to control Cardiff Council,” said Mr Wilson. “We have a strong record at council level, but this is about making change.
“This same old system is not working. Welsh Labour is not good for this country. Look at our public transport and national health service. It is estimated 2,000 hospital beds are blocked at the moment due to not having social care. What would Aneurin Bevan say about the NHS now?”
What would he say indeed?
A full list of candidates running in the election for Cardiff South and Penarth can be found, clicking here.
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