In the second in a series of Councillor Snapshots, Liverpool Green Party’s Press Officer, Stuart Borthwick, sits down for a cup of tea and a chat with Tom Crone, who recently celebrated representing the St Michael’s ward for ten years.
Tom Crone (St Michaels Ward)
Tom Crone is the leader of the Green group on Liverpool City Council and an increasingly prominent figure in local politics. I begin our interview by asking him how it feels to have represented the ward in which he lives for over a decade. “It’s hard to believe it’s been ten years. It’s an honour and I still enjoy it. I like it when residents knock on my front door to discuss their issues and it is a privilege to help your neighbours, solve problems and be accessible to the people I represent.”
“I like to support and help the community to come together when there is a particular need. In the past, I helped to organise volunteer days at the Festival Gardens for what is now a thriving volunteer group. We recently set to work cleaning up Tramway Fields and on Saturday I took part in the St Michael’s and Lark Lane Wombles litter pick. We have a big team of volunteers, so we can cover quite a large area.”
Moving on to issues specific in his ward, Tom does his best to ensure that there is an appropriate mix of housing in the area. In particular, Tom says, that there is an ongoing trend of property developers applying to convert existing dwellings into HMOs (Houses of Multiple Occupancy), where St Michaels there is more of a demand for family houses. “Recently, I run a petition to present to council and as a result, the Council are looking into strengthening protections.”
Like any area, there is some anti-social behaviour and Tom has worked with residents in the Dingle Rec/Stanyfields area to see if he could help to address the issues. “We got the football pitches upgraded in 2022 and I recently funded CCTV from my local budget. Local residents have told me about the impact of this and they say this has had a dramatic improvement in the quality of their lives. Now I’m a Green and perhaps I am naturally suspicious of CCTV, but this did made a big difference to people’s lives and I am pragmatic enough to acknowledge that.”
Despite being community focussed, Tom still retains an interest in national and international issues, and being a long-standing member of the Green Party, it is unsurprising that Tom also campaigns to reduce carbon emissions. Explaining his interest in the Rosebank Oil and Gas Field in the North Sea, Tom says that he is worried that drilling in the largest remaining untapped oil field will set the country on course to miss emission targets while only profiting the owners of the field, the Norwegian energy giant Equinor and British firm Itaca Energy, “Labour got into power promising no new gas and oil licenses, sure in the knowledge that the Tory party had approved loads of new ones before the election. The Rosebank Oil and Gas Field is a giant carbon bomb that I cannot ignore as a campaigner and an activist. In July, I bought a motion to Council that the government should rescind the license, which was carried in Labour support – quite something in such a Labour stronghold. Green politics is about linking up the local, the national and international”.
Other national issues also cross over into the local, such as the Liverpool City Region’s plan for a Mersey Tidal Barrage or the government’s announcement of a multi-billion pound Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) scheme in Merseyside. Tom explains, “part of the job of any councillor is to scrutinise the decisions that will impact residents for decades to come. So I helped the Liverpool Green Party to organise a public meeting and debate about the benefits or otherwise of a tidal barrage. I came away from the meeting convinced that while on the surface the plan might assist in reducing carbon targets, it will not generate enough electricity to warrant the damage it will do to local wildlife in and around the Mersey. The same might be said for Carbon Capture and Storage, only here we are dealing with central government spin rather than that coming solely out of the Liverpool Metro Mayor’s office. It is outrageous that a recent sharp increase in lobbying by the fossil fuel industry has led to a £22b project based on unproven technology, which then provides an excuse for fossil fuel companies to carry on polluting. The money would be far better spent on a mass insulation programme so that we can keep the carbon where it is, in the ground.”
One final aspect of Tom’s campaigning that he wanted to highlight before he had to leave was his holding Liverpool City Council to account with the “Liverpool Transport Plan”, which he sees as an opportunity to improve the transport infrastructure in the city. “The three Green councillors are relentless in our campaigning for better transport options. Acting on very poor evidence, Joe Anderson abolished Liverpool’s bus lanes after a year-long trial during which it became apparent that he had already made his mind up. Since then, the Council has published a new Transport Plan. When this plan was in development, Cllr Dan Barrington, cabinet member for transport and connectivity, said he would bring bus lanes back in order to deliver greener journeys and tackle congestion. But nothing has changed. So I am raising this at Council level to ask when the Plan will be implemented for the benefit of the local community”
November 2024