Election interview: Paul Field
With just five days to go before the General Election, Newbury Today is re-running interviews with each of the eight candidates standing for the Newbury seat that first appeared in the Newbury Weekly News.
Today we profile Green Party candidate Paul Field on his policies and his chances in the upcoming May 7 General Election.
Keep an eye on our website in the run up to the election for all of the Parliamentary profiles
“WE NEED a voice that encourages collaboration, compromise and hope, not a blinkered partisan voice talking only of the problems and failings of other parties.”
That was the offering from Paul Field who is heading the Green Party’s efforts for the Newbury seat at the General Election.
Mr Field is the current headteacher of Basildon Primary School and has worked in primary education for the past two decades. He has lived in Thatcham for the last 14 years and is married with two children.
He said: “I would offer a genuinely positive perspective to the people of Newbury. I firmly believe that people want to live good lives – and that means having nice things ourselves as well as caring for others in their community.
“I will give the people of Newbury the chance to be the good people they want to be and live in successful communities based on positivity and hope.”
The three most important issues for the Greens are housing, transport and education.
“We need to build more houses, but they need to be sensitive to their local environment and form part of a bigger delivery in infrastructure and services.
“We have the most ambitious plans to build more affordable homes – both for sale and rent. We need to rid ourselves of the obsession with home ownership and start to understand that people want, more than anything, a secure home to live in.”
He wants to allow local authorities to build and rent housing, to stop the selling of housing stock and to guarantee that new developments are built in partnership with existing communities.
On transport Mr Field said: “The Green Party has ambitious plans to invest in a strong, connected system which also encourages cycling and walking, which is very much connected to our housing plans.”
Speaking of education, he said: “We have a recruitment crisis which needs addressing and we have an education system unable to deliver what local people want because of central government ideology and control.”
If elected, Mr Field said he would “support local businesses by reducing NI contributions, giving support by raising corporation tax for large businesses and by offering greater access to finance from local banks”.
He wants free social care for anyone over 65, full support for disabled people in the community and a focus on mental health to the same degree as physical health.
On immigration, he said: “We would work to promote a far more positive view of migrants in our communities, celebrating everything they bring and the contributions they make.”
He added: “I am the only candidate from a large party promising to end the disaster that is austerity, ensure the NHS is completely free of private profit-makers and to bring the railways into public ownership.
“I have a greater commitment, to ensure our country takes a long-term, joined-up approach to addressing climate change, international policy and inequality.”
Also standing in the General Election for the Newbury constituency is Barrie Singleton (Independent), Andrew Stott (Patriotic Socialist), Jonny Roberts (Labour), Catherine Anderson (UKIP), Peter Norman (Apolitical), Judith Bunting (Liberal Democrat) and sitting MP Richard Benyon (Conservative).
