On Wednesday 26 September newly-elected Green Party co-leader Jonathan Bartley visited Newbury to see for himself what local party members have been campaigning about and speak at a public meeting.
He visited the school crossing at John Rankin School that Green Party member David Marsh helped campaign for after the Conservative council decided not to replace the lolly pop man.
He then visited Wash Common Library which will be reopening later this year after the Conservative council closed it in 2016. David is a member of Friends of Wash Common Library and has hosted community pub quizzes to help pay to re-open the library.
On a bike ride with party members Steve Masters and Stan Green, Jonathan saw the senseless destruction of trees by Network Rail along the train track. This happened during bird nesting season, and despite local residents’ appeals to Secretary of State for Transport Chris ‘Failing’ Grayling.
Jonathan expressed his support for the local Green Party campaign against the green garden bin tax, and Steve Masters’ petition against the badger cull which reached more than 13,000 people.
The visit ended with a public meeting where Jonathan spoke about the future for a greener Britain alongside a director of local charity Berks, Bucks and Oxon Wildlife Trust. In an interview with the Newbury Weekly News he said that the local Green Party are ‘acting like the official opposition already in terms of what they’re achieving’. In May 2019, all council seats in West Berkshire are up for election, and we urge anyone who wants to see some Green councillors elected to join our campaign over the coming months.