Becoming a Redland Mum

Everyone was pretty shocked when that Panorama expose of Bristol racism came out. In most of the city, when somebody new moves in, the concern isn't their race, nationality or sexual orientation. It's: how many cars have they brought? Will they bring in enough vehicles to tip this street over the edge? Will one of them start to park in Our Space? That's all that matters.

In this Bristol, egalitarian Bristol, anyone can be a Redland Mum. You don't have to live in Redland, you don't have to be a mum. All it takes is quite simple:

To be a Redland Mum, getting to or from school in your car, on time, is more important than the safety and wellbeing of anyone else in Bristol.

That's all: drive aggressively to school and you too are a Redland Mum.

A video comes anonymously to our inbox proving that a dad driving a Malik's Hair and Beauty van can be as much a Redland Mum as any mother driving her 4x4. Notice how the vehicle comes out the side road without even a hint of attention to the give way sign, to come screaming to a halt at the last bit of build-out before Cotham Grammar, so ensuring their child will make it to school on time. The man driving this -he is proud to be a Redland Mum.

The road he came from at speed is interesting as it's part of the area where residents have been complaining about cycling and skateboarding on the pavement. It's simply not safe to have kids on the pavement, on wheeled toys that could suddenly skid out in front of a parent in a rush to get to school. The sheer presence of children walking, cycling or skateboarding to school will force other parents to drive more cautiously -and so be late for school!

Even if the pedestrians, skateboarders and cyclists are not in front of the car, slowing them down, their very presence in our streets slows us down on the school run and makes us late. We are glad that the police are doing something about the skateboarders and cyclists, and hope that the school can do something about the pedestrians.

Finally, for whichever cyclist took this video, all we can say is: if you felt that this van pulled out in front of you from a side road dangerously, then you were clearly cycling too fast! You should be grateful that we do not report you for cycling fast near a school!