The first feminine chief of Manchester metropolis council has pledged to place the security of ladies and women on the coronary heart of her administration, and believes an excessive amount of city planning is “male-led”, which has created public areas that don’t really feel secure for everybody else.
Bev Craig, who takes workplace on Wednesday, mentioned she beforehand needed to clarify to male colleagues that “as a girl, I’ve been taught if you wish to go for a run in winter, it’s in all probability greatest to go to the fitness center. Don’t go close to the Fallowfield loop [an off road cycling and walking route that has been plagued by muggings]. And certain as hell don’t go close to a park.”
Plans for public areas are usually led by males “who don’t have precisely these worries”, she mentioned, including: “If you concentrate on any city tasks over a substantial time frame, not simply in Manchester, they’re typically male-dominated. Structure is commonly male-dominated.”
Final 12 months, Manchester’s longstanding chief, Sir Richard Leese, a proponent of the skyscrapers which were erected across the metropolis, appeared to dismiss security considerations round Piccadilly Gardens, one in every of Manchester’s predominant civic squares. Responding to the notion that it had grow to be a no-go space for a lot of after darkish, he mentioned: “I simply don’t get it. I’m a 68-year-old bloke, I’m the type of one that is meant to be fearful of areas like that and I simply am not.”
Craig, who at 36 is nearly half Leese’s age, mentioned there had been “a generational shift in politics extra broadly, about recognising that really, individuals expertise the town in another way and we have to be open to these experiences.”
Leese, a former youth employee from Nottinghamshire, is retiring after 25 years within the prime job, saying he desires to spend extra time together with his grandchildren. He was instrumental within the metropolis’s rebirth after the IRA bomb in 1996 and went on to play a key position in Better Manchester’s push for devolution.
Craig can be an adopted Mancunian. She dreamed of transferring to Manchester from Northern Eire after secretly watching Russell T Davies’s Queer As Folks, set in Manchester’s Homosexual Village, in her bed room with the sound down.
Soccer additionally drew her to Manchester: whereas Leese helps Metropolis, she is a giant United fan.
She got here out as a lesbian aged 14 after becoming a member of an LGBT youth group. Her politics started to type there when she realised “the one political social gathering on the time that will even communicate to us was Sinn Féin”.
Craig joined the Labour social gathering in 2009 whereas working for Blackburn council as an equalities and inclusion coverage officer and was first elected to Manchester metropolis council in 2013.
Leese is commonly seen as a prickly determine who goes on the assault when criticised. Craig sees herself in another way: “I’m naturally fairly collaborative, when it comes to my fashion. And I like speaking to individuals, even when it’s a troublesome dialog.” A “seen theme” of her management could be “not being defensive about issues”, she added.
Craig pledged to make use of Manchester Labour’s near-monopoly – 94 out of 96 council seats – to reveal “political bravery” by specializing in tackling inequality and local weather change. “Political bravery in management is the area that Manchester has occupied previously and may occupy sooner or later,” she mentioned.
She guarantees “clear and decisive motion” on carbon discount, placing the town’s poorest communities on the coronary heart of her agenda. One thought is organising a council-run photo voltaic farm to supply low cost, sustainable vitality to probably the most disadvantaged elements of the town.
She has not too long ago began biking once more after an accident and desires to see extra low-traffic neighbourhoods “when performed correctly”. She desires to maneuver in direction of a car-free metropolis centre, however not on the expense of gridlocking suburbs resembling Cheetham Hill, the place virtually half (46.8%) of kids are rising up in “absolute low earnings” households, the place households have lower than 60% of medium earnings.
Craig mentioned she needed Manchester to proceed to develop, however as a “genuinely inclusive metropolis”. Builders must “demonstrably contribute to our metropolis”, she mentioned, explaining that they must pay so-called “part 106” contributions, which can be utilized to enhance native facilities, as properly the inclusion of reasonably priced houses.
She added that “to do enterprise on this metropolis signifies that you must consider within the metropolis, you must put money into the town, and you must put money into our individuals.”