It was a privilege earlier this year (2023) to start our 2023 AGM in the company of Monsieur Pierre Hurmic, the Mayor of Bordeaux, who was visiting the City of Bristol at the time. As you’re probably aware, he had been elected as the first green Mayor of Bordeaux in 2020, after first being elected to the municipal council in 1995. So, almost three years into his administration, and having volunteered to be interviewed, was he ready for some questions?
To start with the easy questions: was there a translator in the room? Happily, yes, a member of the large Bordeaux delegation that had joined the meeting with the Mayor; and how well did the Mayor know Bristol? He had visited Bristol before, when, early in his professional life, he had been seconded to a legal firm here for some weeks.
So, if Bristol is managing relationships with 7 twin cities, how do the people of Bordeaux benefit from its 20 or so city links, including Porto, Munich, Lima in Peru, Los Angeles, St Petersburg, Fukuoka in Japan, Ramallah in Palestine, and Ashdod in Israel? The Mayor stated that, although he had travelled to Fukuoka for a climate conference, his approach is to focus on deepening city to city relationships within Europe as they wrestle with climate related issues.
And this of course has been his wider focus, both as an ecologist and a member of Europe Écologie Les Verts: to establish policies for the City of Bordeaux that are capable of addressing the global climate emergency. Words are important for underlining the severity of the issues and to take people with you, and he had declared a climate emergency immediately upon being elected mayor. As to actions, had the previous city administration laid a useful foundation? The mayor characterised policies under the 25 year Republican leadership as too modest to have had a meaningful effect.
So, “to think globally and act locally”? Now we were connecting: the Mayor immediately attributed the phrase to his former mentor. I checked later on Google, and this would presumably have been the noted Parisian ecologist René Dubos. Bordeaux is particularly exposed to climate change, given that it is at sea level, has sandy soil and relatively few trees. And of course, the forest fires in 2022, which were well reported here in the UK and which had horrified Bristolians.
The Mayor described the direct implementation of some of his administration’s new policies, for example segregating more road space for bikes and public transport. His mandate had been clear, and he did not consult before implementation. After a few days, citizens had adapted very well to the new road allocation. This provoked comments about the width of Bordeaux roads by comparison with ours in Bristol, and questions as to how easy it is for travellers visiting Bordeaux. No problems, we were assured.
What would he recommend to Mayor Rees in Bristol? Mayor Hurmic was not biting: a question easily sidestepped by observing that city mayors respect each other’s approaches, and it is for each mayor to find the right solutions for his own city. More widely though, Bristol and Bordeaux are drawing up a Memorandum of Understanding to show their solidarity and commonality of purpose.
After some further questions and a good round of applause, Pierre Hurmic rounded out his time with us very warmly, thanking us for the opportunity to meet and wishing us the very best for the future.