08:36 Thursday 5th April 2012
Peterborough Breakfast Show
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire
PAUL STAINTON: Now in around a month’s time we’ll know who’s been victorious, and who hasn’t, in this year’s local elections. In Peterborough there are 19 wards being contested on 3rd May, and it’s set to be an interesting year, as George Galloway proved in the Bradford West by-election. The three main political parties aren’t having it their own way at the moment, and in Peterborough a number of experienced and proven councillors are going to run as Independents this year. So will we witness our very own Peterborough Spring? Or will the usual three parties continue to dominate? Well let’s start by speaking to a former Cabinet Member who’s announced he’s returning to local politics as an Independent councillor in Eye and Thorney. He’s Graham Murphy. Morning Graham.
GRAHAM MURPHY: Morning to you Paul.
PAUL STAINTON: So you had a big falling out with the Conservatives, didn’t you, a few months ago, two years ago now I think isn’t it? And now you’re running as an Independent.
GRAHAM MURPHY: Yes, that’s correct.
PAUL STAINTON: Why?
GRAHAM MURPHY: Why not? It’s just gone completely in the wrong direction, in my opinion. There’s too much dictatorship goes on, and there’s too much .. no matter what the people want, they just get what they’re dished with, at the end of the day. And there needs to be more Independent councillors out there who actually aren’t whipped into shape, to be told what will happen, to fit somebody’s political agenda. Because the people put them there. The people vote them in. The people should have the say. And they should be the person’s representative, not some party political whipping system.
PAUL STAINTON: Can Independents really ever make a difference though?
GRAHAM MURPHY: Who know Paul? If enough of them can stand together and break down this regime, that has become what I see certainly in my opinion more of a dictatorship. Even to chip away at that and break it away, and even put some doubt that we’re running down the line of a dictatorship and nothing else, then yes, I think they can do.
PAUL STAINTON: You started life as a Tory. Then an English Democrat. And now you’re an Independent. Will people really know what you stand for?
GRAHAM MURPHY: I stand for the people Paul. Always have done. When I ran with the Tories, I always ran as the people’s person. Always did as an English Democrat. And I certainly will do as an Independent.
PAUL STAINTON: You’re running in one of the wards of course where the Tories have dropped their current councillor, Ray Dobbs. Dale McKeen I believe is standing against you for the Conservatives. Is that going to be interesting? Is that going to sully the mix?
GRAHAM MURPHY: I think it’s going to be quite interesting in the village. Yes. We’re certainly both very well known. And who knows what will happen, or how people’s feelings will be? But Eye has been dealt a fairly bad hand over the last few years with various issues that have been happening in and around. And they’ve become the poor relation to roadworks and other dumping developments that wish to go on. So yes, I think it’s going to be an interesting one.
PAUL STAINTON: So that’s an Independent standing in Thorney and Eye. That’s Graham Murphy. .. Also running In Eye and Thorney is Mary Herdman for UKIP, Les Lazell for the Green Party, Dale McKean for the Conservatives, and Kieran McManus for the Labour Party.
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