Frustrating is perhaps one of the milder emotions that have been expressed to describe the recent months of Westminster turmoil that the UK is slowly emerging from. Having witnessed three changes of Prime Minister, sections of the general public and opposition politicians have spent much of 2022 increasingly exasperated by the functioning of Downing Street.
But frustrating still says a lot when it is coming from Ben Bradley. Mr Bradley has become an increasingly influential figure since his election victory in 2017 which turned Mansfield from a Labour stronghold into a Tory constituency, heralding the crumbling of the 'Red Wall' two years later.
Despite remaining loyal to the party, Mr Bradley shares the anger expressed by many when looking back at the recent months of upheaval. The sense of change certainly isn't contained to London, with Ben Bradley being one of the East Midlands leaders to have recently signed a £1.14 billion East Midlands devolution deal.
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Even closer to home, the sense of change for the Mansfield MP is evidenced by the location for Nottinghamshire Live's interview with him on Friday (November 4), before a county council meeting to discuss the devolution deal. Having been elected as the Nottinghamshire County Council leader alongside his MP role in May, Mr Bradley was at County Hall in West Bridgford when part of the building caught fire in July.
Our meeting with him, therefore, doesn't take place in the usual home of the Conservative administration at county council headquarters, given that their corridor is still being refurbished from the summer's fire damage. But it is to the Westminster sense of impermanence that the conversation first turns.
Reflecting on recent months, Mr Bradley said: "Everything has been frustrating because you raise issues with a minister and you feel like you're getting somewhere and then six weeks later, it's a new minister and you've got to raise them again. The last six months haven't been helpful from that perspective, whether that's on those kinds of transport matters or anything else, frankly.
"Regardless of your view of leadership now, at the very least it will be beneficial for all of us to just have some stability and to be able to know that when you go and speak to a minister on a Monday, they're still going to be a minister on the Friday. The by-election result tells you that things ain't brilliant in terms of the public perception at the minute, but the first bit of re-building that has got to be showing some leadership, stability and competence in Westminster."
The by-election result referenced by Mr Bradley relates to the taking over of the Eastwood seat at Nottinghamshire County Council by the independent councillor Kane Oliver. The by-election was called following the death of the Conservative Party's Eddie Cubley in August, but the party this time achieved just 431 votes in Eastwood.
Mr Bradley says he hopes stability at Westminster will turn the party's fortunes around by the time of local elections in May. In the meantime, Mr Bradley says delivering for local residents will be his priority.
One project that has been occupying his time is the so-called 'Sainsbury's junction' on the A60 in Mansfield, a long-running issue where traffic is regularly held up by the position of the supermarket and adjoining retail area. The matter was recently discussed in a Westminster Hall debate, where Mr Bradley said he had been incredibly close to securing funding to fix the problems at the junction.
Explaining the latest situation to Nottinghamshire Live, he said: "It was incredibly frustrating because we literally had the funding, it was about to be announced, and I'd been told that we'd got it by the Department for Transport. Then the next day, because of the pandemic and lockdowns and so on, all those funds disappeared, understandably so.
"That was a huge priority but at the minute, the Government doesn't have those equivalent funds. There are no small project funds in the Department for Transport so I'm keeping it on the radar and will keep pushing the Government.
"Things like that are not nationally massive significant infrastructure, but they're also a lot of money for a local authority. It's that kind of in-between that's really important to residents, so I keep banging on about it."
One of the ways in which Mr Bradley seeks to 'bang on' about local issues is on social media, but he says that this is mainly done through Facebook these days after speaking two years ago about the effect that Twitter trolling was having on him and his family. Mr Bradley has since gone back on Twitter, but says he is engaging with it much more cautiously.
He said: "I don't really do a lot of Twitter myself anymore because it's just depressing. I'm always the first to argue that the overwhelming view reflected on Twitter is not the view of the country or my constituents usually.
"I'm enjoying the two-way conversation on Facebook because I've got a residents' group where they can ask me things directly and I find that really helpful. I'm enjoying the more creative side of Instagram and TikTok where we can be a little bit more human perhaps.
"I've always felt that constituents understanding me as a person and getting to know me is helpful in terms of engagement. If somebody feels like they know you, then it's a much better relationship."
One of the methods of engagement with his constituents saw Ben Bradley running an online survey last month, inviting people in Mansfield to have their say on who the next Conservative Party leader should be. Boris Johnson emerged as the preference, with Mr Bradley initially backing the former Prime Minister before he withdrew from the race.
He said: "I understand why Boris Johnson withdrew and I think he's probably right. I've always found the potential of Boris really exciting because he is so different and he engages people in politics who are not normally interested in politics and that's really powerful.
"But you can't lead a Government if you've only got a third of the party's MPs behind you, it wouldn't have been stable and long-term. The only thing any of us can do now is to get on with the job and try and help Rishi to do it.
"I don't think anything is in the same place politically as it was in 2019. The preference from my constituents was Boris quite overwhelmingly, but I think he's probably done the right thing in not doing it."
With his preferred candidate out of the picture, Ben Bradley now admits that there is a lot of work to be done if the Conservative Party is to do well in local elections taking place across the country next May. Mr Bradley says he hopes to overturn Mansfield District Council's position as the "last bastion of socialism" by getting more Conservative councillors elected there.
But he said: "My sense at the minute is that people are incredibly frustrated because all political conversation is about personalities and arguments as opposed to about doing things. I think that will calm down and we'll get back to something sensible.
"What has recently been coming out for the public is everybody messing about and falling out as opposed to trying to get things done. That isn't good for anybody. It's not good for us and it's not good for the public."
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