A dale parish councillor has been selected to stand as the Green Party candidate for the Bishop Auckland constituency at the next general election. Editor Stuart Laundy caught up with Sarah Hannan
A GAINFORD parish councillor has thrown her hat into the ring to become Bishop Auckland’s next MP.
Sarah Hannan has been selected as the Green Party’s candidate and hopes to attract voters looking for an alternative to the Tories and Labour.
Her political journey began when she joined Gainford Parish Council more than ten years ago in an effort to redress the lack of women members.
“There were no women on the parish council. My husband was already a parish councillor and I went along – I thought there should be at least one woman on the parish council,” she said.
“Now there are more women, but we could always do with more people as there are vacancies.”
During her tenure, she has championed young people’s issues in the village.
“About the time I joined, they put a recreation field in the village and I was involved in setting up a youth club.
“I also took the idea to the parish council for a ‘Fun with Food’ scheme as we were coming out of Covid. It was very successful. We commissioned Swankie Sports and had 92 children come along to the sessions, which were run across four school holidays using the rec field.
“I applied for the grants, got funding and did the admin.”
The seeds for standing in the forthcoming general election were sown last year when she joined the Green Party.
“I joined as a bit of a reaction to some of the things that were going on in the Labour Party. I am not impressed with the candidate for Bishop Auckland,” she said.
“I went from being someone who normally votes Labour to somebody not very happy.
“I joined the Green Party because I did not feel any other political parties were doing enough for the environment.
“Let’s face it, we have got one planet but at current consumption, people of the world are using three planets’ worth of resources.”
The state of the rivers and waterways is disgraceful, bordering on criminal, she says.
“In Gainford, a lot of local people got funding for the Millennium Green, It is a beauty spot visited by a lot of people and people wild swim there.
“My first degree is in applied biology. I would love to wild swim there, but I look at it and hate to think what the bacterial load is there – and getting worse further down the Tees.”
Outside of environmental concerns, Green Party officials felt Ms Hannan had other areas of expertise to offer.
As a welfare advisor for Middlesbrough council she has expert knowledge of benefits and the effects austerity have had on the North East.
Given the far-flung nature of the Bishop Auckland constituency, she is unconvinced of the benefits of being part of the North East mayoral constituency.
“The majority of our problems with things like transport relate to Teesside and Darlington. Location and travel tend to be west to east. Gainford is less than three miles from the Tees Valley area.”
The Lib-Dems’ decision to abandon its commitment to ditch university tuition fees after the 2010 election still rankles.
“I voted for them because I felt strongly that we should not have university tuition fees. When they were in a position of strength they did not implement that.
“If we do not look after our children and young people and give them the aspiration to get the best education, then how are we going to move forward.”
As a mother of two sons now in their 20s she can see the benefits of both a university education and apprenticeships and would support apprenticeships as a way to attract more people into nursing and social work.
Ms Hannan is realistic about her chances at the general election, but as someone who is “really into representation” she believes voters should have choice.
“Too many people are not using that vote and the people who are not using it are young and marginalised people who are the most affected by decisions made by politicians to pander to the people who vote.
“If you have never voted before and don’t like what the other parties are saying, vote for me.”
