RED, BLUE, YELLOW, GREEN.

It’s like your doctor / your parents told you to eat healthy food, but when you see the jellies on offer in the supermarket, you suddenly forget about the broccoli, the carrots and the apples; you’re strongly drawn to the colourful rubbish, you can’t resist the temptation, and you buy a whole box of your favourite colour jelly.

You know it won’t do you any good.

You know that whatever colour you buy, it’s the same artificial trash, that it has no substance whatsoever, all the colours taste the same, and it will make you ill.

But you do it, anyway, because that’s what you’ve always done. And surprise, surprise! Nothing good ever comes of it.

Red, Blue, Yellow, Green. Every year, in the local elections, you have the choice between the same four bland political parties. Between four versions of the same old smoke and mirrors. And every year, you pick one of them, and give them your precious vote, despite the fact that deep down, you know it’s a complete waste of time to do so.

You do it mostly out of habit.

Or because of some lies you read in a leaflet.

After that, you don’t hear any more from them until the next election, and everything stays the same, or continues going to the dogs, depending on your point of view.

If you’re ever against the wall, or ever need help solving a thorny problem, you wouldn’t dream of calling the councillor who got elected, and who can blame you? Most of them won’t lift a finger for you.

They’re too busy undermining the things you care about, in favour of powerful interests and corporations.

You don’t believe it? Let me tell you a story: We recently uncovered a dismal tale of betrayal and deception of vulnerable voters, by councillors of what we’ll call--for sake of anonymity--the red and yellow parties.

The Great Stanton House Deception

Stanton House is a sheltered housing complex for old people, between Christ Church on Newmarket Road and the Grafton Centre.

It’s been there for over 40 years, a little haven of peace in the heart of the city.

But now, it stands in the way of one of the most pointless developments planned for Cambridge, opposed by the vast majority of locals, but championed by the City Council: the redevelopment of the Grafton Centre as ‘life science laboratories’:

Stanton House

An ugly, much lower-quality site, previously a car park I believe, next to a crumbling council estate and overlooking the noisy and polluted East Road, has been earmarked for building a replacement old people’s home for the tenants of Stanton House.

Obviously, the residents did not want to move there.

So to overcome their objections, the council played a cunning trick on them. They sent a surveyor to inspect Stanton House.

He reported that due to a lack of fire breaks inside the roof, the property did not meet modern building regulations.

He also stated that the rooms in which the old people had lived for decades “were too small by today’s standards”.

The councillors on the planning review committee then convinced the vulnerable, elderly tenants of Stanton House that it was for their own good, for their own safety, that they were being asked to move to the new site.

The residents confirmed this to us, in person. They reluctantly agreed to move.

Once the new sheltered housing facility has been built, they will be relocated to a much less pleasant and more precarious establishment…built and run by a private developer:

The new site

What will happen to them there, once they are at the mercy of their new, profit-driven private-sector landlord, is anyone’s guess. Rents and amenities are likely to be very different to those they currently enjoy.

This is just one example of how your supposed representatives make light of their mandates and duties, and ride roughshod over your rights and interests.

Did you know that the City Council was planning to knock down Arbury Court in a few years’ time? I bet you wonder why they didn’t consult local people! There are many, many more such stories, in every ward. No wonder there is a widespread feeling across Cambridge that the democracy of our local government is just smoke and mirrors.

To be sure: there is a democratic process, and elections are run fairly. But what happens between elections is completely beyond the control of the residents of our city, and often goes against their interests.

Even the leaflets distributed by the major parties blatantly show that they have nothing to offer their voters: they have bar charts telling you that if you don’t vote for them, you are wasting your vote, so you might as well vote for them. It’s ridiculous!

“People are always complaining. We don’t bother listening to them.”
What a City Counsellor said when I told her most of her constituents opposed the destruction of the Grafton Centre that she was proud to support.

Don’t waste your democratic right: it’s such a precious and important asset. Vote for someone who will act in your interest and do his best to protect and strengthen your community!