Marvin Rees has rejected a call to name a new road in South Bristol after the last surviving Dambuster who died at his Bristol care home last week – but says another could be with the family’s blessing. The Labour city mayor last month vetoed plans by the council’s own street-naming team to christen a 70-home Curo housing association development Navy Cut Road, after a cigarette brand manufactured at the site’s former Imperial Group tobacco factory.
Instead he announced that the street would be named in honour of Bristol’s first female lord mayor Florence Brown, a decision criticised by Bishopsworth ward Tory Cllr Richard Eddy who said it was “outrageous, partisan and imposed on local people by the mayor’s office”. The late Cllr Brown, who held the civic post in 1963/64, was a long-serving Labour councillor who previously worked as a tobacco stripper and trade union rep at the Wills tobacco factory in Bedminster.
Cllr Eddy has now called on Mr Rees to think again and name the new road after World War Two Dambuster air raid member George “Johnny” Johnson, of Westbury on Trym, who has died aged 101. But the mayor's office says the decision has already been made, although the heroic airman could be immortalised in another street name if the family agree.
Read more: Last Dambuster George 'Johnny' Johnson dies aged 101
Cllr Eddy said he had been a long-standing champion of celebrating Mr Johnson, tabling a motion to Bristol City Council in 2017 to secure a national honour for the retired RAF squadron leader and securing a reply from the mayor to a council question stating he supported a public honour. Later that year, Mr Johnson, who was a bomb aimer during Operation Chastise, tasked with destroying German dams, was awarded an MBE by the Queen.
Cllr Eddy said: “Our generation and its successors owe a massive debt to the heroic sacrifices of the World War Two generation. Few symbolise more the service of this generation than the RAF’s Dambuster crews, and Bristol is truly privileged to have had George ‘Johnny’ Johnson as a citizen of our city.
“What could be more appropriate than the new development in Bishopsworth be named in honour of ‘Johnny’ Johnson?” Cllr Eddy has also tabled a statement to Bristol City Council member forum on Tuesday, December 13, calling on Mr Rees to support naming the new Curo social housing development after the airman “rather than another local politician”.
But the mayor’s office said the name of the road had already been decided. A spokesperson said: “The mayor has proposed, and the lord mayor agreed, for a minute’s silence at full council next week to remember Squadron Leader George ‘Johnny’ Johnson MBE DFM.
“How best our city remembers him, is of course a decision for the future which should be taken in consultation with Johnny’s family. With 2,563 new homes built in Bristol last year, and another 3,500 under construction as of April 1, there will be plenty of opportunities to name a new road after him – as well as the many other deserving figures from our city’s rich history.
“The women who have helped make Bristol what it is today are under-represented in public spaces – there are thought to only be three statues of women in our city and only around two per cent of streets are named after women. Last month we announced that Florence Mills Brown – a trailblazing Bristolian – would be so honoured with a street named after her.
“She was the first woman to serve as Bristol’s lord mayor after nearly 800 years of the system, and one of tens of thousands of Bristolians employed in the factories of South Bristol, where Brown served as a tobacco stripper and then trade union representative before being elected as First Citizen of Bristol, including Bishopsworth.” In a tweet paying tribute to the airman, Mr Rees wrote: “George ‘Johnny’ Johnson came to personify one of the Second World War's most daring missions, and the bravery of the generation who beat fascism.
“Bristol proudly saw him awarded an MBE in 2017, and @BristolCouncil will hold a minute's silence next week in his honour. RIP, Johnny.” Around a third of the RAF Bomber Command died in the Dambuster raid in 1943 by RAF 617 Squadron.
Mr Rees vetoed the proposed name of Navy Cut Road following an outcry from health campaigners who called it “morally unacceptable”. Cllr Eddy objected to the original idea to call the development Crox View, branding it “ridiculous”, because that name comes from a nearby woodland which the residents can’t see because it is blocked by the giant Imperial Park retail estate.
He challenged the council and Curo to come up with a more “gritty” title and Navy Cut Road was agreed, before the backlash and the mayor’s intervention.
Read next:
New South Bristol road to be named after first female lord mayor after tobacco row
Bristol mayor vetoes plan to name new road after cigarette brand
Cigarette-named road "morally unacceptable", anti-smoking campaigners say
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