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Bristol Unpacked season 13 episode 4 – Paul Goggin
Neil Maggs
I'm Neil Maggs, and this is Bristol Unpacked, speaking to fascinating Bristolians on topics where others may fear to tread. Brought to you by the city's community owned media, the Bristol Cable.
Paul Goggin
RECORDING FROM COUNCIL MEETING: Now look, this is enough. I had enough in my last meeting. Councillor Clark, be quiet. Lord now. Councillor Clark, be quiet. I need everybody. As I just said, I think my last sentence was to treat everyone with courtesy and respect, and we have not seen…
Neil Maggs
You're listening to today's guest in the heart of the cut and thrust of political debate in the chamber in Bristol. It's pretty cold at the moment. We're in the middle of January, and there is a homelessness epidemic in Bristol, and today we focus a bit on that with Deputy Lord Mayor and Labour's lead spokesperson the housing and homes delivery Paul Goggin. He's a councillor at Hartcliffe and Withywood Since 2016 and was Lord Mayor from May 2023 to May 2024 and he has very personal experience in this area, sleeping rough at times on the streets of Bristol in parks and sofa surfing. So we talked to him about homelessness, about housing targets, about the future of the Labour Party, and in his area, Hartcliffe and with with 20% turnout in the council elections and Bristol safe the lowest turnout in the national general election. So why are people so disengaged in politics? Why is Labour failing in those communities to get people out to vote? And is he concerned about the rise of Reform, who no doubt will be targeting Hartcliffe and Withywood and Bristol safe in up and coming elections. Enjoy.
Hello Paul.
Paul Goggin
Hi Neil. How are you?
Neil Maggs
Yeah, not too bad. Not too bad, mate. I wanted to talk to you for quite a while, actually, because I think and don't, please don't take this the wrong way. Other councillors that I know you all have interesting lives and stuff like that, but in particular, you have lived quite a life before you've gone into politics.
Paul Goggin
It's been eventful, yeah, yeah.
Neil Maggs
We met, I don't know if you remember this quite a while ago when I made a film with Paul Holbrook over in Hartcliffe. Several years ago we were in a meeting in the top of Morrisons. Do you remember that?
Paul Goggin
I do, yeah. Strangely enough. Karen, the community champion organised it.
Neil Maggs
I remember, that's right, yeah. And it was about trying to get in young people that were kind of hanging around in the car park Morrisons sort of involved in in sort of constructive stuff.
Paul Goggin
Difficult to get them engaged. Unfortunately,
Neil Maggs 03:04
Still a slightly ongoing issue, isn't it? I was over there, not long ago actually doing a bit of filming, is it, I guess, is it the next generation since then?
Paul Goggin
Yes, yeah, you know, unfortunately, it's sort of an ongoing thing because of the lack of expectation and the lack of, no, I wouldn't say ambition, because, you know, people are ambitious, but they don't really know where to channel it, to be honest.
Neil Maggs
Yeah. And would it be fair to say the ward that you're in has particular challenges that some other wards do, but not all.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, absolutely.
Neil Maggs
You’re Hartcliffe and Withywood aren't you?
Paul Goggin
I am, yeah. It's got some challenges. I mean, it's not specific to the ward, but it's specific to certain types of wards, you know. I mean the two most deprived wards in the city, I think are Hartcliffe and Withywood and Barton Hill, kind of thing. Yeah. So there's sort of similarities, Hartcliffe and Withywood is a place where the employment, a lot of it was from Wills and so forth, the tobacco factory. And that's all gone. And, you know, there's not a lot there. There's housing estates and almost no other infrastructure, unfortunately.
Neil Maggs
I know difficult, I guess, to make the argument or convince businesses and corporations and companies to relocate and build in somewhere like Hartcliffe.
Paul Goggin
I guess, yeah, it's been difficult, luckily… I met when I was doing the Lord Mayor stuff… I went to a very posh graduation do up at Bristol University, and I managed to get on a table with Evelyn Welsh, the Vice Chancellor, and lots of other slightly posh people, shall we say. And my sort of skill was telling them about what real life is like and making them feel slightly guilty. So we talked about the number of kids going on to post 16 education, and using Filwood as an example, or Knowle West where I lived for 18 years, 4% of kids were going on after 16, you know, 96% weren't. And yet in Clifton, it was 98% Yeah, and it's three and a half miles away as a crow flies. So it's not genetic. It's purely down to expectation, you know, and opportunity kind of thing. So, yeah, that's the big problem that we still face there.
Neil Maggs 05:27
And there is no easy solutions to this stuff is there. And I think, and you mentioned Barton hill, where, you know, that has its own challenges as well, but where, I think, kind of sort of Hartcliffe is slightly different, is, if you don't have investment in the area because of its geographical location, there's a sense of sort of social, economic, kind of physical isolation, isn't there from the city, you know, transport wise, and stuff like that.
Paul Goggin
It's just difficult, yeah, you know. And some kids have never been in the centre. It's crazy, you know. But bus links have never been that good. And, yeah, you know, there's nothing south of the river apart from Southvilee…
Neil Maggs 06:04
Do you think that's understood when you get into the, I guess, the gladiatorial arena with other councillors and other wards, the uniqueness or the extent of the challenge that you have in that area?
Paul Goggin
Yeah. I mean, I've, I've, I've always championed that and pushed and tried to explain to people, and one of the things I've always done is tell life stories and talk truth to power kind of thing, yeah, just to get them to realise when they when they say something like, oh, well, next time you change your car, get an electric one. It's like, well, we don't change our cars until they stop working. Yeah. And, you know, we can't afford an electric car. Be lovely.
Neil Maggs
But yeah, yeah, there's a chasm of experience with politics and with politicians. Would you say that in terms of sort of lived experience of some of this stuff?
Paul Goggin
There is, I mean, up until recently, I was, I was the only one out of 70 councillors that lived in a council house…
Neil Maggs
And you still do, yeah?
Paul Goggin
Yeah. Very, very lucky to…
Neil Maggs
That’s crazy, yeah, yeah. Kerry Bailes does, well she did I think…
Paul Goggin
Yeah, and Kirsty as well now, so all three of us, councillors for the ward.
Neil Maggs
That is an interesting statistic.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I don't know if any anyone from the Greens lives in a council house, but there's no one from the Tories or the Liberals, as far as I know.
Neil Maggs
And sure, I want to talk to you a little bit about an issue which is quite key at the moment. You know, we're now, as we record this from the middle of January. It's actually a bit milder today, but it's been bloody freezing. Yeah, homelessness is something that always comes up, and you've experienced that directly. Just want to park that for two minutes, just a little bit on what you just said then about politics and coming to Bristol, I detect a slight London ish twang. So yeah, you're not from the city. Where did you come from originally? And when did you come here?
Paul Goggin
You can't quite breed the Cockney out. In 2001 or 2002 I can't quite remember now, but Originally, I'm from East London, Ilford in Essex. The London Borough of Redbridge. So, yeah, just on the edge. Now, what made you come to Bristol? It was a winding journey. I used to work in the city of London for many years, and eventually got into finance, yeah.
Neil Maggs
Okay, didn't know that. Okay, that's interesting. What, like a stockbroker or hedge fund thing or whatever?
Paul Goggin
I worked for a number of, investment companies, a lot of blue chip companies. And, yeah, we had a bit of a moral falling out, me and them, I suppose, around, whether we should around transactions to make sure people got their entire dividend, or whether we we could keep the half pennies here, there and everywhere. And we developed a system where we could pay people what they were entitled to. And I used to design the systems to do so. And I went to the bosses and I said, Yeah, we can do this, and it's not going to cause any extra problem. And they went, Yeah, but we don't have to, so we won't. And, you know, it was just making money for people that had too much money to start with.
Neil Maggs
That's quite extreme then, isn't it, that you've so you've been at the kind of the top end, or, you know, in the high sort of powered finance, yeah. And then you've also been aimless. So that's quite a sort of polar extremes experience…
Paul Goggin
Absolutely, you know, and I had problems when I was a kid with my home life and stuff as well. I didn't go to school from the age of about 11 onwards. So through, through luck and and whatever, I managed to eventually work for the Prudential and then get a job in the city. And as I said, stayed there for about 10 years, then I decided to go to university rather than take another job. And so I went as a mature student, I did an access course because I didn’t have that many qualifications, and then I went to the University of Plymouth. To do a degree in geography and fell in love with the West Country, really, you know, going down there and hearing for the first time, ‘all right, my lover?’ My partner at the time came to UWE to do a degree in physiotherapy. So we moved to Bristol.
Neil Maggs
It was whilst you were in Bristol that you've sort of got into politics. Is that right?
Paul Goggin
Not at the time. I'd always been interested party politics, then in terms of Labour party, not until quite a bit later, not until after I'd been homeless and so forth. You know, I was one of the ones just shouting at the telly and all sorts and bemoaning politicians who never gave a straight answer. It was after that. I was in Fishponds. I was there for 18 months, two years, and then the relationship I was in broke down, and I ended up walking away from it and leaving everything behind, basically, and leaving the deposit and so forth. So I ended up with nowhere to live and no money and don't no family in Bristol or anything like that.
Neil Maggs
Where were you sleeping?
Paul Goggin
Started off doing the old sofa surfing, but there's only so much hospitality that you can get away with, with friends and so forth. And then, because it was the summer, you know, I was sleeping in parks and various other places like that.
Neil Maggs
Really, what Eastville Park, Fishponds Park.
Paul Goggin
Yeah up there, Snuff Mills. It's not nice. It was the summer, you know, I was in, almost in a state of shock, having split up there with a long term partner, and I had mental health issues as well at the time. The couple of years before in Plymouth, I'd been diagnosed with bipolar, and it was coming to terms with that. I was on some quite strong drugs, lithium, which was a pretty horrible thing, a sort of mood stabiliser. So it was, I was in survival mode, I suppose.
Neil Maggs
Were you using drugs or drink?
Paul Goggin
Not drugs, but yeah, I was using drink. I mean, there was a lot of rough cider around in Fishponds, and it was very cheap and so forth. And it's a lot easier to get to sleep once you drank two litres of that kind of stuff on a bench. You know.
Neil Maggs
Sure. I think that's one thing that probably people for conversations I've had with people that have been homeless, is that feeling of not being safe, having to be in that flight of fight mode the whole time that you can never feel safe and relaxed.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, and it wears you down. You know? It's a kind of hyper vigilance. You hear a noise or something, and you react to it, and, yeah, I mean, you know, I'm only just getting over there now, to be honest…
Neil Maggs
What, did that have a sort of a longer term, sort of traumatic effect on you?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I live also with complex PTSD from childhood experiences. So, you know, things used to trigger that and then to have that experience. And, yeah, yeah, certain things set it off. And, you know, it's, you end up hardly sleeping, and when you get sleep deprivation, which is used as a weapon of war, almost…
Neil Maggs
Sure. I mean, even if you're, you know, kind of fully mentally balanced and in tune. You know, sleep deprivation, as you say, it's a torture technique. You can it can send anybody digital and paranoid, can it?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, it's pretty horrible. And as I said, it's just sort of like it was something I learned when I was a kid as well. Just to go into survival mode, it wasn't, wasn't about living, it was just about surviving. So
Neil Maggs
So but you are now quite journey for you. Labour's lead, spokesperson on housing and homes delivery in Bristol. So that's so did those experiences channel you to make that step?
Paul Goggin
Yeah. I mean, what happened was, after I was on the streets, I ended up presenting as homeless to Bristol City Council, and they found me some emergency accommodation. And first off, that emergency accommodation was going to be in Weston super Mare, which was a bit bizarre, because obviously I still needed to come to doctor appointments and everything in the city. But yeah, they eventually put me in a hostel in Fishponds. Strangely enough, and I saw some, saw some things there that I wouldn't wish on most people. You know, there were stabbings, there were there was crime, there was drug use. There were a lot of people, you know, like asylum seekers and refugees that just were grateful to have a roof over their head and all that kind of stuff. But yeah, I mean, experience in that, I was in there for six months, which was the one day under six months, which was the legal maximum that they were allowed to keep you and then eventually I managed to get some supported housing with Second Step. And I was there with them. And even there that, you know, there were suicide attempts and again, things that I saw that I'm never going to unsee, sure, but then I got offered a little Council bungalow in Knowle West that was about 19 years ago, and thankfully, that enabled me to put myself back together, having your own space to kind of heal a little bit.
Neil Maggs
And sanctuary, yeah, it helps, doesn't it? Like you said, those sort of hostel environments have been in around that can be pretty intense. It's hard to do that work, isn't it? When you know, as you said, there's a lot of madness all around you…
Paul Goggin
Yeah and people get stuff stolen and all sorts. But I did feel that at that point that I owed the council. And, you know, I wanted to try and help people who were going through the same situation, and that's eventually what led me to become a councillor.
Neil Maggs
You've shared that story quite a lot, you're pretty open about it, generally.
Paul Goggin
You know, you've got to be open about all these things, because there shouldn't be a stigma about any of it. Because, you know, people fall into homelessness for all sorts of different reasons, yeah, and yet people go, Oh, yeah, well, they're, they're a druggie, or they're, they're an addict, or this, and it's their fault, and they're choosing to do this, and it's just horrible. So you have to speak out to sort of educate people that have never gone through it.
Neil Maggs
Do you think there's more pressure on housing services today than there was back then?
Paul Goggin
Yes. I mean, we haven't built enough council houses through the country for decades, and that was always the way that people could get, you know, you know, a home
Neil Maggs
Which is so important, there is a new strategy isn't there aimed at preventing homelessness and rough sleeping in Bristol? Do you have any sort of real hope that this can make a kind of difference today in Bristol?
Paul Goggin
Everything helps, but until we've got more council houses to offer to people we've got, you know, somewhere around 25,000 families on the waiting list. It's, it's, how do you, you know, how do you prioritise people? Because there's so many people within that, and even people within kinds of houses that have got kids now that are overcrowded, it's difficult to see a proper solution, and because of the way that landlords were just jacking up the rents constantly. People have no option. So we need more council houses, not social houses, not affordable houses, but council houses.
Neil Maggs
And that has to come from… that could be driven by council, that needs to come from the state to prioritise that more?
Paul Goggin
A little bit of both. But yeah, no, we need to as a council that's why we set up Goram homes and had developments like Hengrove and so forth. That was going to be 700 Council homes. You know, Baltic Wharf was going to be 120 or something, and so they start making a dent in it. You know, when I used to sit on planning, we also tried to force the developers as much as we legally could to build a certain amount of social rent homes in there.
Neil Maggs
Is that quite tricky? Because, I think from the outside, that, you know, there has clearly been a big drive around housing generally, you know, in the last 10 years in the city, but criticism alongside that, that having to kind of give way to affordable housing targets with big developers and stuff like that. And it's one of the criticisms that's levied at and you know, I know you're quite close to him, personally and professionally, were very much part of the Marvin Rees's administration. Do you think people criticise that without really fully understanding the challenges that are at play?
Paul Goggin
It's frustrating, yeah, because we can force a certain percentage within developments, but then under the national planning laws which we have to adhere to, and otherwise we get judicial reviews, and decisions made in that chamber can be overturned, but then the developers will come up with some kind of report that says, Oh, well, we can't afford to build these houses. We can only give you six council houses rather than 30. And. And it's very difficult to go against that, not because we don't disagree, we do, and we push back as much as possible.
Neil Maggs
What, they just go, we went building there. We'll go somewhere else. Is that?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, or they'll come up with this Profit and Loss report saying it's not profitable. You know, we won't build a development at all without it, and we can only afford this many when we know that if they just took a bit less profit, they could afford them, yeah, but legally, that's how they get around it…
Neil Maggs
Sure. And what about the the state of social housing, the Council have been a little bit in hot water in the last couple of years around the state of council homes. And there is now a kind of drive to try and do something about that. Do you think the Labour administration in Bristol could have been better at that?
Paul Goggin
I don't know. You know, we, we were dealing with a lot of stock that that was old, and I'm not making excuses. Perhaps we could have, I don't know I wasn't, unfortunately, hugely involved with Marvin. I think I had one conversation with him in eight years, my lived experience was, was never really utilised as much as I as I wanted. Yeah, so I was always sort of lobbying from the back benches. Yeah, but a lot of the council housing is good quality. Yes, there are, there are instances, and there's blocks, and there's certain parts of it that aren't so, you know, in my personal experience, I've had two nice little bungalows, you know? I mean, they're old, they're not particularly heat efficient, but they're okay. They're not falling down, and when you need repairs, they generally happen, and as long as they're not contracted out, the Council employees generally do a really good job.
Neil Maggs
So there's been a challenge with some of the high rises.
Paul Goggin
Yeah absolutely. I mean, you know the fact that Barton House may have been built incorrectly in the 1950s there's very little that anyone can do about that. We just have to, you know, grasp the nettle and deal with it as it is. But again, because we haven't got the stocks of council houses just to say to the people that you know, we have to move out of the block, yeah, you can have these. And I really desperately wish, I mean, I am so blessed, in a way, to have got my council place. Obviously, I wasn't a councillor. I had no priority or anything like that. But yeah, it was a lifesaver for me. And it's, it's that must…
Neil Maggs
The fact that you know that the home you have, you've been in an environment, in a situation which wasn't particularly nice, and you've moved into a council flat that's giving you that, presumably, is, you know, is comfortable, and it's giving you space to heal and get on with your life and stuff like that. You must therefore be still quite passionate about this stuff, politically and policy wise. Labour are no longer the majority party, it’s now the Greens. Do you feel that there's enough people involved in those conversations to make this a priority, driving this stuff forward? I guess the question being, are the Greens doing a good job with this stuff.
Paul Goggin
It's a case of wait and see, I think. But for example, when there was a decision made on not progressing with the Hengrove 1b development, and that was made in a chair’s briefing, not in the committee, we knew nothing about it, and we had no chance to question or anything else. It was not my brightest moment in politics, to be honest. It was very, very disappointing having campaigned and faced such local resistance into building those homes from you know, people that often were homeowners rather than people that needed them. It was very, very frustrating.
Neil Maggs
Why do you think they've done that?
Paul Goggin
I don't know. We're still waiting to hear all the full details of what they're planning on doing. They're talking about getting somebody else to develop the homes. But as far as we know, there's no concrete plans. If somebody comes in and changes the development, it could have to go through planning again, and it could be years. And you know, this space in the ground there, we built quite a few homes around around South Bristol Community Hospital. And I was just really looking forward to the jobs and everything again, going back to Hartcliffe and Withywood, but plenty of jobs to be created building those houses over 10 years. So I just don't know where we are now. Unfortunately, I don't really know what the current strategy is for social homes. It's all very well saying housing associations will pick up the slack, but we've seen reports on the condition of Housing Association houses not being good, yeah. And they're not exactly awash with money, either. So I'm scared that it will go to a private developer and they'll end up, you know, using the same old tactics to beat down the number of social homes until we end up with just a handful rather than 700.
Neil Maggs
Yeah, sure. Just to drill a little bit into mental health, really, which you spoke about, how much of a role do you think mental health challenges and issues play in homelessness? I mean, a lot of people you said earlier can be quite dismissive about people's experiences and needs, and it can be, you know, diction and I often wonder whether we have a sort of sticking plaster attitude to this stuff, which doesn't really get to the to the real kind of source of trauma that people are experiencing. Do you think we need to radically look at how we address mental health issues in this country, and what would you suggest that we do? Yeah, question, big question. I know.
Paul Goggin
No, no, it's not really I don't think it's a pretty obvious thing. First off, the one big thing that we need to do is stop differentiating between mental health and physical health, because as far as I know, my brain is a physical thing, and it's in my noggin. So you know, it's a physical health problem. It's just that possibly we don't understand it as well as we should. It just needs. I mean, there's still a stigma. We've still got the biggest cause of death in this country for men under 48 is suicide. There's no talking therapy available. There's just been cut back after cut back, after cutback. And mental health has always been seen as the easy option, because you've got, well, people are faking it, or people are this, and people are that, you know, and it’s…
Neil Maggs
Do you think it's gone the other way though, where you've suddenly got a plethora of different descriptions of different types of mental health disorders that some people are almost using things as an identity, or it becomes, I remember talking to to somebody from the Somali community that was slightly confused about mental health services, because they have like, one word or two words for something, whereas here there's such a kind of range that I think sometimes people are because of the crisis we talk about. People can't get seen. They're sort of self diagnosing themselves a bit.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, perhaps, you know, obviously it's very easy to Google this day or the other and go, oh yeah, I've got that syndrome. And I've got that syndrome. And people, some people, tend to collect it like a like badges, you know. But, you know, getting away from that, there's still that, that stigma, there's still that I remember when, when I used to be in the pub in Fishponds and I wasn't working because of our mental health, and people used to come up and say, what do you do? And that's the first question anybody asks, you know, what do you do for a job, in effect? And I used to get so bored with going, Oh, well, I'm I'm not working. And why aren't you working? I'm not very well. Well, you look all right to me. And then after a while, I just used to say people, and they say, What do you do? And I say, Well, I'm mad. Sorry. I say, Yeah, my doctor says I'm mad, so I can't work. And they'd either run away very quickly, or if they had any inkling about mental health, they might open a discussion and say, Oh, well, what flavour mad are you? I don't know if all the different diagnoses and sub sectors and all that really help. I think I agree with you on that, but yeah, it's still a massive, massive problem…
Neil Maggs
Yeah, and I think particularly men and not sort of, you know, talking about stuff. I'm involved in a couple of charities that do work with young people that experience trauma, and actually just always talking about stuff that isn't always a solution either. There's this sort of slightly lazy thing. Now, you know, talk about something and that will suddenly make you okay. Yeah, that isn't also true, I think, particularly when you're talking about PTSD and trauma and people that have had some pretty tough experiences, you need to really process and integrate and feel that stuff, don't you to move beyond it…
Paul Goggin
It's all very well having this group therapy and all this and sharing your feelings and so forth. And I would do it just to reduce the stigma. I go, Look, I'm a councillor. I was Lord Mayor, and I've got mental health issues. But the problem we have is there's a lack of professional talking, if you like. We don't have appointments available with psychiatrists and so forth. We don't have any help for people in that we'll send them off on a computerised cognitive behavioural therapy course and go, Oh, well, you're cured.
Neil Maggs
Now, yeah, you'll be given tablets to take for some people, that is effective. And you know, I'm not knocking that, but I also think that it doesn't always address that. Key kind of issues. A lot of people, I think, seek support and help outside the NHS, actually, whether that's through sort of alternative help or through other kind of means. The problem is, it's quite a middle class thing, because you need a bit of money to do that. That's the thing that bug bugs me a bit. There is some really, really good stuff out there for trauma, but you have to have a bit of money to be able to afford to get it really.
Paul Goggin
Yeah. I mean, you know, you're talking about probably nearly £100 for an hour session with a therapist or something like that. So that's just beyond most people. Yeah, you know, drugs can help, but as you say, they need to be, they'll help with the symptoms, but they won't help with what's the trauma or what is still causing the trauma, and you know, so you need a more holistic approach, really, to do both.
Neil Maggs
Another thing I'm quite interested in about you. I've got, I've got, been given some notes on you. Is that you're, an active humanist. Is that right? Oh, a lapsed humanist! What is a humanist?
Paul Goggin
Humanism is about just the idea of doing good and being kind, but not expecting some kind of eternal reward for it. Okay? It's not following any specific religious texts or anything like that. It's just trying to be humanistic by taking care of each other, really. And, yeah, it was something that I was quite involved in.
Neil Maggs
What like in a group, an organisation?
Paul Goggin
There's, there's like a the humanist society when you got people like Jim al Khalili and Alice Roberts and various other scientists and so forth, yeah. And, you know, it was to fight back, also, in a way, about some of the pushback on science by, you know, saying the world was 6,000 years old and all that kind of stuff, yeah, the literal religion, if you like, rather than, don't get me wrong, I support religion because of what I've seen that they do, charity wise, and also the, you know, the support, the comfort it gives an awful lot of people. But having had a… I went into hospital in 2023, in June, and I didn't come out until November.
Neil Maggs
This is whilst you were, Lord Mayor wasn't it?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, yeah. I missed. I missed about six months, unfortunately.
Neil Maggs
And what were you in hospital for? I went in thinking, I've got
Paul Goggin
I went in thinking, I've got a bad case of the flu. I'd been doing events right up until the evening before. I did one for Empire Fighting Chance, and then four o'clock the following morning, I couldn't breathe. One of my lungs just wasn't working. They said it was a pneumonia, and then they said it was something called explosive pleurisy, which sounds like something out of Victorian times. Yeah, they tried to treat it, and eventually it turned into sepsis, which is what nearly killed me. And they had to put me in a coma for two and a half months, and on something called the ECMO machine. And I was just very lucky that, you know, I was in a hospital that had one. There's only six in the country. Yeah, otherwise I wouldn't be here. But even then, my partner was told five times I wasn't going to make it.
Neil Maggs
Pretty serious then!
Paul Goggin
Yeah, they didn't think that I was going to make it at all.
Neil Maggs
And when you came back as Lord Mayor, and I don't think this has happened very often, you got a standing ovation, didn't you from everybody? I
Paul Goggin
I did, yeah. And I was a bit dismissive, because I said, Oh, well, Thanks for cheering for me, just for staying alive.
Neil Maggs
Well, yeah, I mean, it's quite that's quite nice though, isn't it? When people can sometimes put the political kind of stuff to one side, and, yeah, human side. You know, you're a humanist comes out, and people are supporting you being back and being alive and being in that position. You’ve been on quite a journey, Paul! And where are you at now?
Paul Goggin
It’s still slowly, slowly. I ended up with 70% lung function when I left, and it's just slowly building that up. I've still got neuropathy, so I still can't feel my lower legs and feet, and I get a lot of pain.
Neil Maggs
Okay, so you have to take it easy a little bit, you know, to dip out every now and again when you need to.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, but I'm alive, and that's that's an awful lot better than the alternative, to be honest.
Neil Maggs
So you had the standing ovation. How quickly did things become heated again? I know you're not shy, you know, getting involved in heated debates in the chamber. How How quick did that good faith run out?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, pretty quickly, as it always does, especially when there's a local election coming up. So yeah, people mistake kindness for weakness, and they did find out that probably wasn't as weak as I thought.
Neil Maggs
I was going to say you've known for, you know, shouting, getting quite animated in that role, because you have to do that a bit, don't you when you have to slam the thing down and sort of get a bit of Order, order and all this sort of thing.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, happened once. It happened once when, see, the thing is, everybody has a set amount of time to speak for their speeches, and I always allowed a little bit of leeway, but I always also think that you've got to chair the meeting properly, and that if somebody's speaking too long, it means somebody else can't speak. And I don't see why any councillor from any party thinks that you know that they can just bluster on forever…
Neil Maggs
And you have the power and authority to do that, don't you in that role. So this is for those that don't know, Lord Mayor… you effectively chair the kind of chamber you can tell people when to shut up and when to move on… you’ve had a few runs ins with Christine Townsend of the Greens and Jos Clark from the Lib Dems, didn't you?
Paul Goggin
I had to correct them. And as I said, I just don't think it's fair for one councillor to not obey the rules and for everybody else to do so. There should be a sound amount of respect, and at the end of the day, we're all there for the same purpose, hopefully… you know, strange enough people go, you're a politician. I say, Well, I'm not really. I can't stand politics. If we put politics to one side, if everybody in the chamber was just elected as themselves, and there were no allegiances, we'd get so much more done for the people of Bristol. Yeah, people try and pretend that they're in the Houses of Parliament or they're somewhere really special, when 20 people are watching on the webcast.
Neil Maggs
Do you think it's a bit of a bubble? I mean, that was always kind of what Marvin Rees would say, that people are in this bubble of what they think is really important when most people see and there's a little sort of Twitter brigade of people that are political junkies that go and watch and sit around, but most of it is not really, you know, reflective of 95% of people that live in the city that, to be blunt, aren't really engaged in it at all.
Paul Goggin
That's the problem, you know, when you've got 20% vote turnout…
Neil Maggs
I was going to say that you're in the lowest voting ward, which is 20% so you understand and know that this thing that feels really important to everybody here isn't actually engaging with 80% of my constituents.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, and it's, it's also, there's a lot of self interest. I mean, there are some wonderful councillors there. You just want to get on and get things done. And I'm a pragmatist.
Neil Maggs
So for you that being a pragmatist and being somebody who's lived, you know, the experiences that you have that doesn't, I guess what you're saying is, you don't feel like a politician… dressing up in all that weird Lord Mayor gear, though, because that, to me, it's a bit like when you see the House of Lords kind of thing. Was that a bit uncomfortable for you? People may not know it's like a weird wig, a gown and all this sort of stuff…
Paul Goggin
Yeah, robes and a sort of frilly collar and a chain and a pirate hat, let's be honest, and white gloves. And yeah, I must admit, when I first go in, I thought, well, we'll try and get rid of this as much as possible. But do you know what? You go and visit charities, and you visit communities, and they love it. They love it and will take photos all day long. Everybody wants a selfie and so forth. You know, you visit the different faith communities. They all love it. They all expect it.
Neil Maggs
So you began to get a bit comfortable in it. Were you wearing it at home?!
Paul Goggin
Strangely enough, I think I'm one of the few Lord Mayors who didn't actually buy his own robes, because, you know, I mean, I don't know exactly what you would do with them at home, and I don't even want to contemplate that!
Neil Maggs
You can see the value, then other people recognise the value. It's a very English thing. I think all that sort of pomp and ceremony.
Paul Goggin
Yeah as far as I know, there's not many Lord Mayors outside of London, so it's kind of a thing. And for some people, they really can raise money for people. As I said, my skill is to make rich people feel guilty and get them to part with their money for good causes by telling them stories that they're not expecting to hear from a Lord Mayor, yeah.
Neil Maggs
Okay, so you kind of use the position as a way to kind of leverage interest and understanding and money towards sort of social causes in the city.
Paul Goggin
Yeah. And I loved it, I must admit.
Neil Maggs
And you would have had to have gone to places like, you know, the Merchant Academy Hall, how do you find that personally in those kind of more sort of affluent spaces? Do you feel like a bit on edge? How do you feel?
Paul Goggin
I didn't, I didn't feel comfortable. And you know, I went to a graduation ceremony at the Wills Hall at the university. And, yeah, I just spent three hours clapping, basically, and not doing anything else. I was just there as window dressing, you know. But then, sitting in a table afterwards, I managed to get the vice chancellor to commit to reaching out to Hartcliffe and Withywood. And we've now got a micro campus that's that's going to open at the Gatehouse Centre, you know, strictly because of that. So that's, that's what you can use it for. But no, I wasn't comfortable. And thankfully, I was, I was in a coma when the Merchants had their I don't even know what white tie is, but apparently there's a there's a thing, there's black tie, and then there's white tie. I don't know, I don't know what it is.
Neil Maggs
I never get invited to these things. White tie. Never heard of that.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, it's some other thing. So, yeah, one up from black tie.
Neil Maggs
Well, I think it's an interesting debate, isn't it happens a lot, you know, in the third sector, you know, which I'm in and around, where there, as you say, there's this bit around trying to get people with money in the city to give in a sort of philanthropic, sort of charitable way, to organisations that do good work with, you know, whatever calls they have, some people would say that's like neoliberal, when what we actually need to do is change the structures and the institutions in the city so w e're fundamentally fairer, and people shouldn't have to do that.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, no, I do agree. I mean, Christ, we need more money from central government. We had a 40% cut Since 2010 two thirds of our money goes on Adult Social Care, children's social care. So unfortunately, it's a necessary evil,
Neil Maggs
And that's the counterpoint to that, isn't it, which is what? All right, well, you're going to sit here and wait for a perfect world, yeah, and not accept that money that's being offered. It's, I get it. It's a tricky bind, a little bit, I think.
Paul Goggin
Yeah. And I mean, some of the organisations, I know Merchants, haven't got a particularly great reputation, but I will say that they do give a certain amount of money to charity. You know, that does pretty much go unnoticed. You know, George Ferguson used to get slagged off for being middle class and all that kind of stuff, but a lot of people don't know that he donated all of his mayor's salary to charity. He didn't take a penny from it, and he could have taken that money, and nobody could have said anything about it, because that was the salary for the job. So, yeah, I was a bit reticent going into it, thinking, Oh yeah, you know, all these posh people and stuff however. You know, just like in any walk of life, there's good people and bad people, and some of them really want to give back.
Neil Maggs
Let's talk about Labour nationally. You've seen this kind of, we see it happen in the States, and you know, other countries in Europe is happening more now. This momentum, which sort of started a bit with Brexit, is now moving into the Reform Party. They must be looking through making inroads in South Bristol, around Hartcliffe, with you, with Knowle West.
Paul Goggin
Yeah. I mean, there was a UKIP councillor years ago in in Hengrove. And, yeah, you know, we had a surge in that, in that kind of vote around about Brexit time. Yeah, it’s a very scary thing, because, again, it's very black and white. It's like, oh, well, the problem is this, and these people are causing it, and it's just not that case. You know, there's so many more nuances to it.
Neil Maggs
Have Labour failed working classes, have they taken their vote for granted a little bit?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I don't think we failed them necessarily, but we have taken that vote for granted. I think that that was pretty clear. And whilst I supported Jeremy Corbyn, as I've supported every other Labour leader, when I was knocking on doors in in Hartcliffe and Withywood, people were saying to me, oh, never going to vote for you. While he's in charge, they didn't see him as a man of the people, you know. They didn't see him as one of us. Yeah, a lot of the MPs and so forth. They're not tradesmen now, they're not trade unionists, they're not plumbers, they're not bus drivers, they're they're the professional politicians.
Neil Maggs
I think so you, I think you had 13,000 people, is that right in your ward? And if we do the maths, which I'm obviously not doing ff the top of my head, it’s written down in front of me, 846, people voted for you. People must feel they must have lost some kind of emotional connection to Labour, emotional connection to mainstream politics in general. I do wonder whether Reform are going to start mopping up these people soon in numbers.
Paul Goggin
I think so, and I think that's reflected with the upsurge in the Green Party as well. I think the Labour Party took voters from ethnic backgrounds for granted, and a lot of people in Easton for example, switched. ‘I've always voted Labour, but they're not looking after me now.’ So there's a disillusionment in politics. You've got Trump coming back in, you've got some really horrible political leaders around the world, and it seems everywhere to be swinging towards blaming poor people, refugees, immigrants. You know, it's going back to the 1930s almost. It's a scary time.
Neil Maggs
But do you not think there needs to be some sort of working class people in the labour movement? I mean, you mentioned about Corbyn being detached, and I think it's a valid point. When I was kind of talking to people, and I made a couple of documentaries in south Bristol got that back as well from those communities, you know, into particularly in terms of the thing around patriotism and, you know, involvement with Hezbollah. That was the stuff that was coming out that obviously they would have read and seen in the press and and feed antisemitism, all this sort of stuff that was coming back from people I spoke to, and I would then ask a probing question, which is, well, what do you mean by antisemitism? Most of them didn't know. It was just they were just parroting what they'd read or seen on the news. So I think journalism has a role to play in some of this stuff as well, which is, actually, you know, cutting through the the nonsense. I also think, secondly, that people on the left, you know, Mick Lynch is a good example, I think, of somebody that has cut through. You know, I don't think Starmer has particularly cut through either. I think he would be is equally unpopular in the conversations now, in particular that you had with constituents in your ward, there needs to be more people that have genuine cut through to counteract this rising populist right?
Paul Goggin
Yeah. And I mean a lot again, a lot of people. Often, when I knocked on doors, the first thing I'd ask is, do you vote? Because otherwise there's hardly any point talking to the person. They'll go, oh, well, I don't vote because you're all the same…
Neil Maggs
But they did vote for Brexit, didn't they? This is the interesting thing, when it's something they care about, likewise. And you mentioned Trump, likewise the Rust Belt United States, you know, I think there was about a 65 to 70% turnout in the Brexit referendum in Hartcliffe. So that demonstrates people will go and vote if it's something they believe in – and this is the slight fear around Reform, I think, is those people who said, they say, I don't vote, they may well start voting. Now, if people feel, and it's a feeling, I think, rather than anything factual, this person speaks directly to me and my experience, I think the right has been far better at doing that than the left in recent times.
Paul Goggin
Yes, definitely. I mean, the one thing I don't really get is that people talk about Brexit and so forth, and they were told all sorts of things, weren't they? There was a bus with three, 50 million pounds away for the NHS and all that, and none of that happened, and yet they're still supporting it.
Neil Maggs
And also the main thing that… there's Lexit, obviously, which people voted for left wing reasons for Brexit and stuff like that, but people that were kind of more on the Brexit wing on the right voted for controlling migration. And actually migrations increased. So they let down on that actual issue that they voted for, rightly or wrongly. But that has actually happened, and that seems to be the key issue still, doesn't it? That stop the boats migration and that sort of wedge politics thing as being a hit and hit and hit, and it's gaining ground…
Paul Goggin
Social media has a lot to do with that. I mean, you know, you can have your opinion amplified if you stick on a group that's got only the people that agree with you, yeah. But I mean, when you look at the consequences, some of the consequences of Brexit, for example, in the NHS, the fact that we've got a million vacancies is because a lot of nurses and doctors left, you know, they've just gone back to Europe…
Neil Maggs
And it's been back filled by a lot of people from West Africa and from India, you know. And because someone needs to fill that space, don't they? I think, I don't know what, what do the Labour Party do? I mean, obviously, to counteract this? What do you think? How do you need to sort of counter this sort of, partly this disengagement from politics, but actually this potential, kind of growing threat?
Paul Goggin
I think we need to do the hard thing, which is to say to people, no immigration isn't a bad thing. When I was in intensive care, for example, 40% of the staff in intensive care didn't come from the UK. So you know, what do people want? They don't want immigrants here, and yet, we couldn't do without them. To be honest. We've got an aging population. We've got a social care crisis…
Neil Maggs
How are you going to make that point land, though? Because I think in Hartcliffe, I don't know… if you're from London, if you live in Dagenham, where your entire community of a certain generation, your entire community, the demographic, has completely changed, and it's so difficult. And often people make that case. And you know, on the whole Bristol is sort of quite a liberal, progressive sort of city where people are very welcoming to people from outside. That isn't the same picture in a lot of the particularly in the north and in the Midlands, in these cities that people have seen a lot of demographic change, and there isn't opportunities, there's a lack of housing, there's a lack of jobs, etc, etc, and there's always been, you know, let's pin it on the other but I don't think the left have been good at engaging in this discussion and giving people a voice to express this and actually working with it effectively.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I think we've been petrified by the rise of the right, and, you know, we've ended up talking almost about stopping the boats as well, and it’s…
Neil Maggs
Okay you see Starmer with the Union Jack behind him and sort of trying to talk tough on immigration, a slight pivot. Isn't that just politics? So you have to do that a little bit?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, he is. But that's about winning votes. You know, when you come in with a stonking big majority, I would hope that you just do things, whether they're popular or not, because you know that they're the right thing to do, and then in time, people will go, oh, well, actually, yeah, that's worked.
Neil Maggs
What, kind of lead the narrative rather than follow it a bit and challenge and be stronger? I think there's a bit of a split. Actually, it's really interesting for me, because I think it's a split in the Labour Party, and there's a split on the left, and it's not the natural ideological… sort of people that lean into Marxism and people who are more pragmatic. I think it's actually split that some people think that you've got to play the game a bit and you have to appease some of these arguments, and you need to accept there's a challenge with immigration. The public opinion is that, and if you don't address that, we're going to be, you know, annihilated eventually, and allow this Reform Party to gain grain. That's one perspective. The other perspective, I think, is you need to win the argument as to why pseudo fascist sort of perspectives aren't wanted and needed, and actually convince people, yeah, they have a voice and a say. That's very much splitting people on the left at the moment as to what you should do.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I think it's splitting a lot of people, not just on the left. But then again, this country was built on immigration. You know, my mum was born in Lahore, and my dad was born in Methyr Tydfil, you know, his father came over from Ireland to work in the steel works in Merthyr, way, way back. But we've always, you know, been very welcoming, and Bristol's great. You know, when we had the right wing riots and people were going down, and I loved the chant: ‘We are many, you are few. We are Bristol. Who are you?’ You know, and that was just so typical of Bristol. But as you say, that is not the pervading attitude in some of the poorer communities, unfortunately. So yeah, we do. We need to, rather than go, oh, well, actually, to get votes, we need to. It is, well, then you're just being like any other party. Then every party is going to do the same. It's all they're going to do is try and win votes and not change.
Neil Maggs
But you also need to be not of – which definitely happened during Brexit – be equally really dismissive of people's experiences and quite sneery about it, and just label everybody racist.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, it's ignorance, you know? It's because people haven't experienced other communities, other ethnicities, and then all of a sudden, as you say, demographics change, and they and they change quickly. People get scared. They don't know what exactly is happening, yeah.
Neil Maggs
I think the change is less I think about the argument against multiculturalism, it seems quite specifically targeted to some groups, particularly Muslims and some of the groups that culturally they feel haven't integrated, particularly in those northern cities, as much as other communities, yeah. And that seems to be very much the persona, the Tommy Robinson thing, and almost trying to create a sort of multicultural right to attack them…
Paul Goggin
Yeah. And, you know, there are people from other ethnic backgrounds.
Neil Maggs
See, well, there's lots of Sikh people, there's, you know, there's Black people in the Reform Party, EDL, stuff like that.
Paul Goggin
I don't think prejudice is limited to any particular skin colour, though. You know, you can have it from anywhere. And you've got the same thing with van dwellers in Bristol, you know, and people who live up on the on Downs going, Oh, I don't want these people outside my home and all that. And yet they don't realise that there's nurses, there's care assistants, living in vans, because they just can't afford to rent. You know, I do work with a group called Muslims for Bristol, and we go out every Christmas Day, and we give out food for the homeless and all that. And the aim of the group to share soon is to talk, you know, and show people that Muslims, Christians, we all look the same when we get in the bath, you know, when you take all your religious clothes and all your political clothes off, we're all the same. And it's just trying to get that message across, really… above my pay grade, I suppose.
Neil Maggs
But yeah, just a tricky one, isn't it? And we've had the grooming gang stuff, which has very much been led by social media. And the wider thing is, if social media is fuelling some of this stuff, are you of the opinion that, you know, we've obviously had conflict between Musk and Starmer, particularly on X formerly Twitter. Are you somebody that believes in some form of regulation for social media? We're coming to a point where we need to start being tougher? You know, we have Ofcom on the radio. We have, you know, there are bodies that control things. Do you think we need to start thinking about that a bit more on social media?
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I would think so. And it was worrying to hear Mark Zuckerberg talking about, well, we're not going to have fact checkers anymore to you know, when we had the vaccinations and COVID and so forth, the misinformation that was put out there wasn't just annoying. It wasn't just political. It was endangering some people's lives. So, yeah. I mean, I don't appreciate Musk coming out with some of the things that he does. He's very much in line with Trump in that. Do you know, if I had his kind of money, I wouldn't, that's not what I'd be spending it on.
Neil Maggs
What's the end game for this?
Paul Goggin
No idea – he wants to be a Martian or something, doesn't he?
Neil Maggs
I mean, intervening in British politics with such vigour and interest, which he's not shown before, what? Why? And obviously gunning for Starmer, and particularly working, you know, I don't know how much you've been looking at it, but nudging it and pushing and probing at the grooming gang stuff, yeah, what's he up to? Why is he doing it?
Paul Goggin
I don't know. He's even turned on on Farage now, isn't he, whereas one minute he's giving him 100 million pounds, and the next minute he's saying, well, he's not the man to lead the party…
Neil Maggs
Now that's because, that's because Farage criticised Tommy Robinson, and Musk has watched Robinson's documentary, not really knowing who he is, and he sees Robinson as this sort of Che Guevara type figure, or, you know, Mel Gibson in Braveheart. Farage probably quite correctly, to be fair to him, sort of pushed back at that, knowing what Robinson is about, because I think he sees himself as, the more you know, the more sophisticated wing of the right, or the far right. But they've made up again now. But I just didn't know whether you felt that. You know, as a Labour Party member, people are a bit concerned about by that influence in that power being pushed.
Paul Goggin
I mean, they should be, because on the television and on the radio, if you if you broadcast something that you know is not factual, you will get done for it that there's a bit less regulation people don't realise in newspapers, they can, they can print whatever they want, but all they have to do is put a little disclaimer on page 28 saying, Oh, actually, no, that was load of nonsense.
Neil Maggs
So yeah, the damage is done. But there's nothing on social media. I mean, it goes against my instincts. I you know, I am a libertarian at heart, but I think, when you're putting out flat out lies, it's not even propaganda, it's just disinformation. And it, as you as you rightly said, it's been quite damaging.
Paul Goggin
Actually. I don't know if you're a fan of Jonathan Pie, but he's just put out a video in the last couple of days talking exactly about this and about Mr. Trump, and he wasn't particularly complimentary about Starmer, but he was, you know, saying there's a difference between between not being good and lying, you know.
Neil Maggs
So, yeah, what's interesting for me was I did a little bit of research on it. It's not just here. He's doing it in Germany, in France, in Denmark, in Norway. He's clearly got a team of people doing this. It's not just him.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, he was tweeting out about the far right in Germany.
Neil Maggs
It feels to me. I mean, I'm asking a question, sort of, probably, because I'm interested in this stuff, is that there is a sort of project, you know, Steve Bannon kind of thing, which is about trying to bring down the EU, bring down Western democracy, bring nationalism back against the globalist. And if it feels like Musk has bought into that hook line, and sinker, yeah. I mean, there's an agenda. There's a big agenda at play here.
Paul Goggin
America First. I mean, we all know the origins of that was when the society was supporting Hitler in the in the 1930s and 1940s Yeah, you know, I don't understand. We seem to be getting less considerate and less thoughtful as time goes on. It does make me sad to be honest.
Neil Maggs
Are you worried with Trump coming in? He's been making a few noises, hasn’t he about Canada, the Panama Canal.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, we've got a big Ukrainian community in Bristol now. We've welcomed a lot of refugees, and I'm worried about what's going to happen there. You know what he's gonna say, Oh, you've got to give up this. And you've got to give up that. That's one specific worry I'm worried about.
Neil Maggs
And just to sort of wrap up a bit, just on Starmer himself, the recent poll: one in three Brits feel optimistic about his government. Do you feel he's got off to a good start?
Paul Goggin
No, I mean, he hasn't. I don't think anyone would say it's been a good start. There's been scandals, and this, that and the other, and, you know, the accepting tickets and what have you. So I'm always more optimistic about a Labour government than a Tory government. I think that they will look after the majority of people better than a Tory government. But, you know, I remain to be convinced. You know, there hasn't been big settlements. We haven't had our grants restored at local council level. We still don't entirely know what's going to happen with social care. I'm hopeful, but I wouldn't bet my house on it, you know.
Neil Maggs
And there is a danger that you get squeezed from the right by the Reform but you also get squeezed or attacked from the left in some quarters by the Greens as well.
Paul Goggin
Yeah, I don't think the Greens are to the left, really. However, yeah. I mean, some people are idealists in that you have to do things perfectly. Otherwise, it's not worth doing. You can't have any private business within the NHS, for example. You everything has to be pure. But we don't live in a world where that's possible. You know – progress over perfection every time, as long as you're making people's lives better, I don't really care how we do it.
Neil Maggs
Is that sort of pragmatic approach to politics born of your sort of experience that you know there was a period in your life where you needed support? It didn't really matter whether that was from the state, from a third sector charity, or from a, you know, a corporate? When people are desperate, people are desperate…
Paul Goggin
Yeah, exactly. And there's, there's less support available for people now than there was when I got it, and it was pretty smart on the ground then. So, yeah, I mean, I, I've never studied politics. I don't follow any dogma or tradition. I don't know the difference between Trotsky and a jet ski. You know, it's kind of okay, yeah, as long as it works, I'll listen to any good idea. Having worked in the private sector, there is no politics. You just come up with the best plan and do that.
Neil Maggs
Okay, we're coming to the end. I'm going to get told off because this has run 20 minutes over, but thank you ever so much, Paul. It's been really good to talk to you. Appreciate your honesty, and I hope you’re… would I say, are you still in recovery from your illness?
Paul Goggin
Still in rehab. And unfortunately, I've been so busy with Deputy Lord Mayor stuff, going back to all my council duties, and I'm now the Interim Chair of the Avon Fire Authority as well.
Neil Maggs
I saw that, what does that involve?
Paul Goggin
We have 20 councillors from across the region, from Bath to Bristol to wherever in the Avon region, we sit and make sure that the decisions that are taken with public money are the right ones. And we look at governance. We look at equality, we look at efficiency, you know. So it's quite a demanding role, but again, another very rewarding one.
Neil Maggs
Yeah, so you're keeping yourself busy!
Paul Goggin
Too busy for rehab, unfortunately!
Neil Maggs
Would you ever consider standing as an MP?
Paul Goggin
I would have loved it, but yeah, I think I'm too old for that. Also, you have to be a certain type of person. It seems to get selected as an MP these days, and you have to have money in certain seats to be able to run your own campaign.
Neil Maggs
It's a bit of a game, isn't it, a party political game internally, I mean, to sort of, put forward and all of that.
Paul Goggin
Yeah and like you say, you know, people tend to be, people have worked for other MPs… you know, it's the same in any industry. I suppose it's never been what you know it’s who you know. So, yeah, I would have loved it, don't get me wrong. But yeah, I think that that opportunity is way past me, if it ever was an opportunity anyway for someone like me.
Neil Maggs
Sure. Okie doke, good chatting and good luck with with everything. I'm making a film about Hartcliffe at the moment, actually, so maybe I'll bump into you. I'll invite you along to screening.
Paul Goggin 1:07:02
Yeah, that would be cool, mate, and keep doing what you're doing as well. Cheers now, bye.
Neil Maggs 1:07:18
Many thanks to Paul Goggin for joining us on this episode of Bristol Unpacked. Subscribe to Bristol Unpacked wherever you get your podcasts, and join the Cable at thebristolcable.org forward slash join. I've been Neil Maggs, and a big thanks to our production team at the Bristol cable. Bye for now.
ENDS
Transcribed by https://otter.ai