Doncaster elections 2025: Doug Wright says he will create a city “for the many, not the few” if elected mayor

The LDRS has offered one-to-one interviews with every single candidate for Doncaster mayor – offering them the opportunity to sell themselves and their parties to voters and getting them to answer important questions.

Doug Wright is running on a campaign fuelled by his passion for the NHS and said he is standing for a party he founded, the Health and Social Care Party.

Wright said: “I’m here to help the people of Doncaster who I don’t think have been helped. It needs people to stand up for them and if there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s standing up for people.”

He told the LDRS the first thing he would do if elected is improve accessibility to transport for elderly people and students and schoolchildren.

He said: “It only costs a million pounds to have free bus fares for people aged 66. It should go back to 60 and over.

“For students, school people, it should be free. We can afford it. It can be done. That is the first thing I would do.”

Wright said he would campaign tirelessly for improvements to public health services in Doncaster.

“If you can’t live with good health, you can’t get a job,” he said, “There’s no doubt about it that there won’t be any real improvement under this government or any future government.”

He added: “When people see my leaflet… it clearly says what I believe in.

“Justice and equality. Tackling equality justice wherever I see it, and making sure our city supports the many, not the few.”

The LDRS asked Wright what experience he has to run a city council with a budget of £700million.

He said: “I worked for Doncaster Council for 30-years, so I do know a bit of what goes on. Admittedly, times change but the concept is there.

“I stand up to no nonsense. I have defended people all my life [as a trade unionist] and that is what I will try to do.”

Wright said during his time as a “trade union activist” he once took Doncaster council to tribunal and won.

In his election campaigning so far, and in founding the Health and Social Care Party, Wright has made clear his priorities and passion lies with the NHS and health services.

The LDRS asked him how he would balance his time between public health duties and the City of Doncaster Council’s many other services.

“[Public health] will be a very small amount of my time,” he said, “Candidates have this preconceived idea of ‘I will do this, I will do that’.

“This council lost millions of pounds during the Conservative reductions. We need to carefully look at things and not rush into things.

“Apart from transport and social care, I’m not going in with preconceived ideas of what I will do because that is all rubbish and it’s all hype.”

Wright’s campaigning has often included the message “whatever you decide to do, say no to Reform”.

He was asked if he is worried that more candidates standing for mayor increases the chances of Reform UK winning – something he has expressed he does not want.

“As far as I’m concerned, it’s quite simple,” Wright told the LDRS, “I feel sorry for [Alexander Jones], you’re throwing a baby lamb to look after somebody else’s sheep.

“I’m not saying old age is better than young people, but I think Reform is a one trick pony. People are going to vote for them and vote for them for one reason only. The whole thing is a facade.

“People ask me who I want out of the three of them and I say neither I want myself. The mayor is not a nasty person, but she’s part of a system that has to do what the national committee says.

“There’s big brother telling us what to do.”