Promoted by Robert W Irving on behalf of Bob Eastoe and the Green Party c/o 41 Albion Street, Stratton, Cirencester GL7 2HT
ABOUT CLLR BOB EASTOE, MP CANDIDATE FOR south COTSWOLDS
Bob has lived in the North Cotswolds constituency for just over two years & is currently a Moreton-in-Marsh Town Councillor. He previously lived in Buckinghamshire for 32 years where he stood for the new Buckinghamshire Unitary Authority, creating a new target ward for the Green Party.
Bob is a graduate Mechanical Engineer from Birmingham University, a Chartered Accountant, has an MBA and was a company director for over 15 years.
My story
I was born in Luton and grew up on the fringes of Dunstable. I went to a village primary school by bus every day from the age of five till my parents and I moved to Alton in Hampshire. There, I went to Eggar’s Grammar School. After doing my O levels I went to boarding school in Bedford and on to university in Birmingham where I gained a degree in Mechanical Engineering, and a girlfriend who has been my wife for the past 38 years. We have three adult children and have recently been presented with our first grandchild.
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I did post-graduate training as an accountant and then gained an MBA from Brunel University. I have spent a career in industry in various sectors including brewing, media, software, water treatment and manufacturing, my first passion. The last thirteen years of my career were spent saving and growing a well known bed manufacturer by embarking on a sustainable journey making us the first Carbon Neutral manufacturer of its type in the world, taking out polyurethane foam from our products and creating a recycling business for our products at the end of their life. This journey led the business to receive a Queen’s Award for Export and a Queen’s Award for sustainability recognising the pioneering work done and our commitment to changing an industry.
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I retired from full-time paid employment in 2020 with my wife and I judging we are fortunate to have “enough”. It is now time to give back to those less fortunate than myself and to try and make a difference and build a fairer society. That is why I have become a town councillor where I live and volunteer with a charity called Cotswold Friends.
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I have always been interested in politics and my journey has been ….circuitous. What convinced me to join the Green Party was Climate Change and the need to take radical and urgent action to limit global warming. The threat of global warming is not just a threat to biodiversity and the landscape as we know it, it is a threat to human civilisation through drought, flood, famine, human migration and war. The planet will survive; we may not.
Councillor
Bob was co-opted onto Moreton-in-Marsh Town Council in September 2022 and put himself forward for election in the May 2023 elections.
He has been the Chair of the Finance and Governance Committee since May 2023. Bob has created two working parties for the Council: one to develop a Climate and Ecology Policy and the other to look at the provision for young people in the Town.
Community Volunteer
Since moving to the Cotswolds Bob has become a volunteer driver for the charity Cotswold Friends, taking people across and outside the county to appointments and social activities.
He is aware just how much people and organisations are dependent on the selflessness of others to give people some quality of life after years of cuts to public funding.
“People are, generally, not aware of the swingeing cuts to public services through the misguided policy of austerity. This has led to thousands of people in the constituency in real hardship, whether as families, individuals or businesses. It is time for a different approach and to put people, families and communities first. Only the Green Party is committed to this.”