The Bristol Cable

Neil Maggs sits down with Mark Weston, who was first elected as a councillor nearly 20 years ago, and has led the local Tory party for a decade. On the eve of the local elections, they discuss the Tories miserable national polling, the so-called 'war on motorists' being waged by Bristol City Council, and the cultural divides between Bristol's inner city and suburbs. Subscribe to The Bristol Cable...

Jos Clark is an experienced local councillor now leading the Lib Dems into Bristol's local elections. A party that used to have strong support in the city has seen its seats dwindle over the last decade. The critic of Marvin Rees and the mayoral system, who helped manoeuvre the referendum on introducing the new committee system, talks to Neil Maggs about libraries, Bristol's failing bus services a...

Just three years after being first elected as a councillor, Labour's Tom Renhard is now leading the party into May's local elections. Neil Maggs asks him about his record as the city's housing chief, why he thinks the Greens aren't up to the task of being in power and Labour's plans for building new homes, campaigning for rent controls and bringing buses back into public ownership. Subscribe to Th...

It’s almost six months since the Cable asked why Bristol’s performance on FOI requests was so poor. As the city’s political system prepares to change, Alex Turner talks to Priyanka Raval about why this is important, and whether we can look forward to more open local government. Back in autumn 2023, Bristol City Council was being scrutinised over its performance answering freedom of information (FO...

On 2 May 2024, Bristol will wave goodbye to its mayor and return to a committee system. Isaac Kneebone-Hopkins chats with Priyanka Raval about what we can learn from Sheffield's experience of local government reform. In just a few weeks, Bristol will wave goodbye to its mayor Marvin Rees – and to the system of governance that he has represented. Instead of one person being directly elected to lead...

This Cable longread – on co-design, a participatory approach to designing solutions – was first published in October 2022, and followed up on proposals that Bristol City Council had been considering around demolishing and rebuilding some of its estates. The council has so far not pursued these plans. But in light of the Barton House tower block evacuation in November 2023, the condition of Bristol...

Listen: The Debrief, digging deeper into revelations of institutional racism at a local NHS trust Priyanka Raval discusses the inside story of her recent investigation into racism in health services, and what it says about the state of the NHS, with Cable colleague Matty Edwards It was 23 June 2023 when the Cable journalist Priyanka Raval received a tip-off from a source asking to discuss institut...

Over just 18 days at the end of January and the start of February, three Bristol teenagers lost their lives. Knife crime is a national issue that’s as complex as it is devastating, and it doesn’t exist in isolation. It’s set in a wider social context where housing, school exclusion, unemployment, mental health, and government cuts can be issues at play. As part of  Together for Change ,  a city-wi...

This investigation, months in the making, reveals racism in Bristol hospitals. Our journalist  Priyanka Raval  was contacted by whistleblowers from local NHS trust University Hospitals Bristol and Weston (UHBW), many of whom have been recruited by the NHS from overseas to deal with the UK's chronic staffing shortages. The Cable has been investigating claims of institutional racism at the trust, af...

On 15 May 2022, a group of Palestine Action protesters, two of them dissident Israeli citizens, smashed their way into the Bristol headquarters of Elbit Systems UK, a subsidiary of Israel’s largest arms manufacturer. The date of the action is significant – it marked the anniversary of the  Nakba , Arabic for ‘catastrophe’, when the mass displacement of Palestinians began in 1948.The seven Palestin...

Kingswood is about to undergo radical makeover, at least politically. The Bristol-South Gloucestershire border town’s voters will at this year’s general election find themselves going to the polls in one of four new constituencies – with their current one set to disappear altogether under boundary changes being made to the political map of the UK. The area’s local MP, Tory minister Chris Skidmore,...

Salma, a lawyer who spent her childhood in Gaza, shares the 'dystopian' experience of life under occupation and knowing your family are in a war zone, as well as discussing happier memories and pro-Palestinian activism in the UK. Content warning: contains graphic descriptions of war and violence Salma Hajjar is a young trainee solicitor who spent her childhood up to age eight in Gaza, where decade...

Join the renowned writer, broadcaster and academic for a powerful talk exploring his childhood and journalism career, and how his experiences have shaped his work. Gary Younge is a renowned, award-winning journalist, author and broadcaster, and now a professor of sociology at the University of Manchester. In the latest episode of our new Cable Live podcast strand – where we sit down with writers,...

Inside Bristol’s ‘murder factory’ arms facility, with the activists on trial for occupying it Stavit Sinai opens her phone to find she’s been added to a group on encrypted messaging app Signal. The 38-year-old, a philosophy teacher at a community college in Berlin, has been asked to take part in a direct-action protest at the Bristol headquarters of Elbit Systems UK, an arms company that ships wea...

Neil chats to Ruth, a daughter of the Windrush generation, on her decades of work with Bristol's voluntary and community groups, how that's changed as public services have been cut – and whether she feels conflicted about receiving an honour associated with empire Ruth Pitter has been a stalwart of Bristol’s voluntary sector for decades – and in January 2024 was awarded an MBE as part of the New Y...

Shon Faye is a writer and presenter, and the author of the award-winning Sunday Times bestseller  The Transgender Issue , which was first published in 2021 and has since been republished in multiple languages. She also hosted the critically acclaimed LGBTQ+ history podcast, Call Me Mother. Shon is currently working on her second book, has been a co-presenter on Novara Media’s news programme and wr...

Bristol Unpacked with BBC journalist Lucy Proctor on mad cows, Covid and conspiracy theories Thirty years ago, BSE was spreading across the UK while the government insisted beef was safe. Neil asks Lucy, producer of The Cows are Mad podcast, about the scandal – and how conspiracy theories have thrived as trust in the establishment has nosedived. Over the past few years, BBC podcast producer Lucy P...

When a millionaire, yacht-owning rogue landlord evicted the owners of a well-loved St Pauls cafe, it sparked protests. And now, two years on, a clearer picture of the messy situation has emerged… Hidden Corner was a popular cafe and bookshop in Portland Square, St Pauls. So when its owners were turfed out, its doors bolted shut with heavy chains by the building’s landlord – millionaire businessman...

Listen: Bristol Unpacked with Watershed CEO Clare Reddington on cinema, class and council cuts As Bristol City Council slashes spending on venues including arthouse cinema Watershed, Neil asks its boss Clare why funding the arts matters, and whether the sector's reputation as catering mainly to the well-heeled is justified.  Over the past year Clare Reddington, the chief executive of Bristol's fla...

In the last few months, Wesley Bear has been at the forefront of actions by ACORN. That's the community union known nationally for taking direct action to stand up for tenants' rights, which originated in Bristol almost a decade ago. On 17 November Wesley, ACORN's communications officer, was involved in an altercation with security guards at the Holiday Inn in Bristol city centre. Residents of the...

Moya Lothian-Maclean is a contributing editor at  Novara Media  and presenter of the  Human Resources  podcast, which explores British involvement in the transatlantic slave trade and how it touches every part of the nation. She’s a regular on TV and radio, and writes about society, politics and culture for publications including gal-dem, the New York Times, the Guardian and the I. In this episode...

Peter Apps is a journalist at the specialist magazine Inside Housing, and author of the  Orwell Prize -winning book,  Show Me the Bodies: How We Let Grenfell Happen . In the first episode of our new Cable Live podcast strand – where we sit down with writers, academics and activists from across the UK, putting the Cable’s work in the national conversation – he is in conversation with Ruth Day, a Br...

Content warning: audio contains graphic discussions of violence Eight years ago, filmmaker Aodh Breathnach was stabbed multiple times during a night out on Stokes Croft, and rushed in a taxi to the Bristol Royal Infirmary. Aodh was lucky. He recovered from injuries to his head and body within a few weeks and tried to put the attack out of his mind, deleting photos from his phone and throwing away...

The Cable has been speaking to residents of east Bristol on the eve of the city's first so-called 'liveable neighbourhood' coming into effect. The  trial scheme  will stop cars driving through the area along certain roads in an attempt to reduce air pollution, and make the area of narrow residential streets safer for walking and cycling. Similar schemes have been brought in up and down the country...