Day 4140: Brian Paddick and the Liberal Democrats: A Vote You Can Be PROUD Of

Thursday:


What do you WANT in London?

A single policy of an unaffordable fare-cut bribe OR a shiny new million-pound bus?

Wouldn't you rather have a DELIVERABLE low fares policy AND a plan to turn all of London's buses and taxis ELECTRIC for greener, cleaner air!

Do you want a BRAGGING war over who can put more police on the street?

Wouldn't you rather have an EXPERIENCED leader who PIONEERED techniques rebuilding TRUST between public and police AND who pledges to CUT OUT the HARASSMENT of stop-and-search and END the scandal of the POLICE being WASTED on trivial cannabis arrests!

Do you more of the same old failure to invest in affordable housing (while granting planning permission for huge skyscrapers) OR more of the same old failure to invest in affordable housing (while granting planning permission for huge skyscrapers)?

Wouldn't you rather have a REAL commitment to working London-wide to restart PROPER council house building to replace the lost housing stock coupled with IMAGINATIVE plans to bring empty houses back into use AND finding new living space above shops and businesses.

Wouldn't you rather have a PLAN to make London not just an AFFORDABLE place to live but a BETTER place to live, with pedestrianized zones between Oxford Street and Trafalgar Square, with more spent on the PARKS across London and more SPORTS and more ARTS and MORE TREES everywhere!

Wouldn't you rather have someone who'll give young people have SOMEWHERE OF THEIR OWN to go so they don't have to hang about on the streets so they don't risk falling victim to GANG culture AND who'll invest in education and apprenticeships and advice to see that young people have a FUTURE.



Some people are thinking of voting for Bojo the Clown because they think he is HARMLESS. Or, as the Hitchhiker's Guide might have it, MOSTLY HARMLESS. Well, we can do a LOT BETTER than "harmless".

Some people are thinking of voting for Ken because... er... well, even Hard Labour admit that they're reduced to the old CLOTHES PEG strategy – you've got to vote Ken or else Mr Balloon won't understand that he's got to be punished for not having fixed the economic devastation that Labour wrought yet. Er, or something. Well, we can do a lot better than THAT too!

Some people are even thinking of voting for Jenny Jones because even though they think her policies are WOO they would rather feel WARM and FLUFFY than actually vote for what they want. People with an ACTUAL commitment to green policies (or even Green PARTY policies, which are not ALWAYS the same or as effective), good for you; but people protest-voting Green to spite Cap'n Clegg over tuition fees earn my fluffy contempt. (Pod Delusion, it is YOU I am looking at!)

If you think that the Liberal Democrats don't deliver for you – when the UNFAIR electoral system meant we got FEWER seats in Parliament, we STILL delivered ALL FOUR promises on the front of our manifesto.

If you think that we break our promises – we managed to turn Hard Labour's Student Loans into a Graduate Tax that was FAIRER and MORE GENEROUS than EITHER the Conservatories OR Hard Labour wanted or would have delivered. New graduates now pay LESS each month than they would have done under Hard Labour.

And if you think that we're "traitors" just because we backed the other Party that had the larger number of votes and the larger number of seats and the larger DEMOCRATIC MANDATE rather than support a Party that had just spent thirteen years trampling over EVERYTHING we believe in about CIVIL LIBERTIES and INTERNATIONAL LAW – then you should probably ADMIT you we're going to vote for the AUTHORITARIAN, ECONOMICALLY-ILLITERATE, WARMONGERING CRIMINALS anyway, weren't you.


Who's REALLY on your side these days? Let's look at the EVIDENCE.

Times are tough for everyone, but LOCALLY it's only Liberal Democrat councils that have kept open SURE START schemes and LIBRARIES.: unlike those Conservatory vandals' and Hard Labour hypocrites' councils, not one Lib Dem-run council has closed a library. And NATIONALLY it's the Liberal Democrats who have CUT TAXES for the lowest earners and focussed the PUPIL PREMIUM on a better start for the least well off.


I don't care how much tax Ken's been avoiding; I don't care how much Bojo earns moonlighting for the Tell-lies-o-graph. But THEY care or they wouldn't have tried to keep it HIDDEN from you.

There's a BETTER WAY than that.

Hard Labour and the Conservatories are JUST LIKE EACH OTHER, telling you you must vote for them so that the other feller doesn't get in. Well you know what, you don't have to vote for EITHER of them – vote for the REAL alternative and then NEITHER of the other fellers will get in!

I don't want to vote for a clown OR a caricature.

And I don't have to.

I can vote for Brian Paddick and the Liberal Democrats. And I can be PROUD of it.
.

Day 2742: Conservatories Ready For Government… the Resignations have begun!

Friday:


Keen to show that Conservatories are just as useless, incompetent or even downright naughty as the Labour, Mr Balloon’s top elected Tory, BoJo the Clown, has accepted the resignation of one of his claque of SO-CALLED “deputies*”.

Again.

Comparing the scene of Mayor BoJo standing SHOULDER-to-SHOULDER with his “vice-mayor” to announce an inquiry with the LONELY figure of Mr Lewis announcing that he was being thrown to the wolves, er, didn’t want to overshadow BoJo’s work, it was clear that someone – Mr Balloon? – had ordered this humiliating about-face. Oh, I’m sorry: BoJo says he was “misled”.

Would that be in the same way that HE misled US by repeating Mr Lewis’s claims, or some entirely other way of being misled?

Perhaps the media will now pay more attention to BoJo’s habit of IGNORING people who ask a lot of questions at Mr Mayor’s Questionable Time… since it’s clear that he really SHOULD have asked a lot of questions before employing Mr Lewis.

I bet that Mr (former) Mayor Ken is VERY UPSET to hear of this calamity engulfing his rival.

“Why couldn’t the self-flanning idiot have imploded three months ago!”

…is something I am SURE Mr Ken would not say!

Does this obvious idiocy on the part of their most visible elected buffoon damage Mr Balloon’s Conservatory BRAND?

Well, it certainly makes a change to see headlines about the Conservatories’ foul-ups pushing new of the Home Office’s latest data disaster well down the news agenda.

This is clearly why Mr Balloon, er, an UNKNOWN PERSON has acted so fast to force BoJo’s humiliating abandonment of his chum. Forget NATURAL JUSTICE, nothing can be allowed to POLLUTE the brand. Unfortunately, such precipitous action DOES pollute the brand! How many people will be left thinking – in the words of Miss Mattie Storin’s media chums from “House of Cards” – the silly so-and-so, he MUST have done it?

BoJo’s error yesterday was not to suspend Mr Lewis immediately pending a proper fair inquiry. His error today was to nuke Mr Lewis completely. And not attending today’s resignation just made BoJo look COWARDLY!

After last year’s sudden FALL from GRACE after the GRANDMA SCHOOL fiasco, Mr Balloon must surely realise that it does not take a LOT for the Media to stop shining the golden rays – or even the golden Ray Lewises – of positive publicity on you and turn their attention to the fact that you are not all you crack yourself up to be.

Still, he can probably rely on Mr Frown doing something spectacularly stupid to distract everyone’s attention again.


Therefore, please may I finish with an APPEAL to Mr James to write a piece saying that Mr Balloon does not have to resign.

Thank you.

PS:

*Because you know, starting out by IGNORING the law – and the law says there should be ONE “deputy” and they will come from the London Assembly, not just people BoJo has, er, met – ignoring the law is BOUND to be a good way to start!

Day 2712: Bye Bye BoJo

Wednesday:


BoJo the Clown has officially "taken the Chiltern Hundreds".

That's actually just Parliamentary SLANG, the Parliamentary language for saying: "I quit". The Law (by which I mean the Act of Settlement) says that you cannot be an MP and hold an "office of profit" (of which there are two) working for Mrs the Queen. I know that the ACTUAL office of Crown Steward and Bailiff of the Chiltern Hundreds is held by Lord Blairimort at the moment, and BoJo has ACTUALLY taken the other one… the Telegraph Hundreds-of-Thousands.

(Okay, he's REALLY the Crown Steward of the Manor of Northstead, if you REALLY want to know, the office previously held by the entirely un-twisty-turny Mr Peter Mandlebrot.)


Before leaving, BoJo was CHASTISED by Mr Speaker of the Housemartin for turning a question to the Prime Monster into an ADVERTISING FEATURE for all of the SPLENDID things that his flunkies he has achieved since going on holiday to Turkey taking up his mayoral duties.

By terminating the deal for fuel with Venezuela he has increased travel costs for the poor; and by banning alcohol on the tube he has provoked a drunken riot at Liverpool Street. A Conservatory record of delivery that the Bullingdon Club would be proud of.


Incidentally, Prime Monster's Questions was also where Mr Balloon chose to try out his rather horrid new HAIR-DO.

The Grauniad suggests that his old left-to-right-to-left parting may have been a sign of FLIP-FLOPPING and he has now found his MIDDLE WAY, while the Metro this morning thought that Mr Balloon was trying to look more like Mr Clogg!

You will have to judge for yourselves:

Liberal Democrat – Hair Apparent

Conservatory – Split down the Middle

BoJo's much delayed decision to do as he promised means that there WILL be a by-election in Henley, Thame and South Oxfordshire after all.

TRAGICALLY, the Conservatories have decided NOT to establish a REVERSE-DYNASTY by ruling out BoJo's daddy, StoJo the Clown.

Instead they have picked Tubbs from the Local Shop Mr John Howler, already accused by the Greens as being more gaffe prone than BoJo over his over-egged claims to be the only local candidate for local people.

(Funnily enough, getting caught telling a FIB is one of the job interview ELEPHANT-TRAPS that the ALIEN SPACE LIZARDS on the Apprentice fell into on this week's penultimate show!)


Liberal Democrat Stephen Kearney has already been working hard in the constituency, and is being helped by many Lib Dems including Mr Clogg and – more importantly – this Sunday: ME!

I shall be interviewing Mr Stephen for my diary and then lending a fluffy foot with the deliveries.

Come along and help out too!

Day 2678: Always Look on the Bright Side of Life

Friday (just):


Very Well Done Mr Brian!


The results of the London Mayoral Election of 2008 have just been read out:

First Preferences:

Suicide Boris (Conservatory): 1,043,761 (43.2%)
Mr Ken (Labour-Newzilla Alliance): 893,877 (37.0%)
Mr Brian (IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN HIM!!!!!!): 236,685 (9.8%)
Ms Sian Very-Berry (Taxi Party): 77,374 (3.2%)

Second Preferences:

Suicide Boris: 1,168,738 (53.2%)
Mr Ken: 1,028,966 (46.8%)

So Bozza is Mayor. Eek!


So Bozza is Mayor. Eek!

We are off to bed now. Maybe when we wake up it will all be a dream. Or, in Mr Vague's memorable phrase, a Night Mayor!

Day 2677: GO TO THE POLLS!

Thursday:


This is NOT about all the migrant plumbers who are now all heading home because the weak pound means it is no longer worth their while putting up with our grey weather, high cost of living, poor provision of services and generally snippy attitude, especially when they can get a warmer reception in warmer parts of Europe where the Euro is holding its value thank you very much. Obviously this means the British economy will collapse from lack of willing labour… bet you're feeling VERY smart now, UKIP!

No, this is a call to go out there and VOTE, vote for your local Liberal Democrats and especially go and vote for Mr Brian in London. Even if you don’t live in London, come and cheer him on!

All of the Party Leaders have been out on the campaign trail, showing off their TIES.

Mr Frown's is PURPLE, the colour of Mr Mayor Ken's campaign… and, judging by the manifesto booklet, almost everyone else's. Perhaps it is LUCKY. Mr Balloon has a sombre RED tie, in keeping with his new Labour Conservatory personality, no doubt. While Mr Clogg's is bright shiny blue, meaning either blue skies of freedom and fresh new ideas… or that he's not afraid of people thinking he's a Conservatory!

People are saying that a win for Suicide Boris will be a NAIL in the COFFIN of Mr Frown; while a win for Mr Ken will DERAIL the SUNSHINE-EXPRESS of Mr Balloon.

It is IRONIC that the one election in the country where you GET to show who you think is second best and the media has conspired to make it a TWO-HORSE RACE: one OLD NAG versus an ASS.

Personally, I know I want Mr Brian in preference to either of them… and I do not think that Daddy will be able to bring himself to give a second preference.

If there IS one thing that might drive my Daddy back into giving a second preference to Mr Ken, then it's the BRAYING and BOASTING of the Conservatory hunting pack on Politicallybarking.com, foaming at the mouths over the prospect of the latest and last opinion poll.

London has seen a perfectly DREADFUL campaign… not from ANY of the political parties, but from the London Evening Standard, from the Daily Hate Mail stable, which has backed Suicide Boris to the hilt as part of their VENDETTA against Mr Mayor Ken.

(And we all know that if Bozza had IMPLODED they would have backed Mr Brian instead without a blink of hesitation.)

They've used YouGov polls to try and drive a pro-Boris agenda, pushing the suggestion that he has unstoppable momentum. I'm already PRETTY dubious about YouGov's methodology, mainly from the way that they CONSISTENTLY give Liberal Democrats lower and Conservatories higher ratings right up to election campaigns where they MYSTERIOUSLY converge with other pollsters so no one can point at the outcome and say "well, obviously YouGov were MILES out"! But we also KNOW that these polls have asked people OUTSIDE of London (who wouldn't have to cope with the consequences of a "FUNNY" Boris Mayorship) to take part. I am sure that that can't be QUITE right!

Mr Mayor Ken is BAD, but Mr Boris is a TOOL… a tool of someone MUCH MORE BAD, a newspaper using its effective monopoly and unaccountable power to manipulate the election.

So go and vote, but REMEMBER you can vote with your HEART first… 'cos you've got that BACK-UP vote as well, and if you BELIEVE that it's a two horse race you can use THAT to pick the one who least gets your BACK UP.

Use your FIRST PREFERENCE to prove YouGov WRONG: send the Evening Standard a proper message: a message that London is DIVERSE and BROAD-MINDED and has LOTS and LOTS of opinions and WON'T be dictated to by them!

PS:

And if you think that pigs will fly before the Liberal Democrats win in London, just you remember… pigs CAN fly!

Remember… a Boris is for life not just for Christmas Panto; Mr Ken is not regulated by Lee Jasper, your investment can go down the drain as well as up in smoke.

Day 2654: Brian Begins

Monday:


Mr Brian has launched his campaign to be London's next Mayor, pledging a Contract with Londoners and springing into action with CSI Liberal Democrat.



He then clashed with the other candidates, the Labour's Mr Mayor Ken and Mr Balloon's bumbling bounder, Suicide Boris, on Newsnight.

Boris (Tessa Jowell isn't going to ban ME from calling him that!) had earlier been broadcasting in black and white to disguise his florid appearance emphasise his gravitas and seriousness. He was very serious. Very serious INDEED.

UNFORTUNATELY, Newsnight then proved that he DIDN'T KNOW the costings of his own centrepiece Bendy Bus policy.



(Hat tip: Dr Pax)

It is a shame that too few people watched this IMPLOSION for it to make a significant difference. Boris seems somehow able to ride out GAFFES like this, or like bragging that his house was worth SHEDLOADS to the SHELTER/CRISIS Hustings, or admitting to snorting cocaine to Janet Street-Pothead.

HOW are London's police supposed to reduce the drug crime (and associated knife and gun crime) that make people fear their own streets when the Conservatory candidate for Mayor thinks that Class A drugs are just something he "got away with"?

The fact that this CRIMINAL vacuum in rumpled suit and hair might end up being elected Mayor of London fills me with TERROR!

Equally, his inability to answer the question clearly filled Mr Paxo with fury, as Ms Featherweight reports.

Mr Ken was, understandably, trying to play up his SUCCESSES of the last eight years: like the way he has successfully slipped out of his promise only to stand twice, or succeeded in raising the Congestion Charge after promising not to. Er. He made another promise, to resign if he raised the C-Charge on smaller cars… you can decide for yourself what that's worth given his (stuck) record.

Of course, he was also keen to stress that anything that has gone wrong will be somebody else's problem. Problems on the tube… not him guv, don't you know he opposed PPP? Crime on the streets… can't blame Mr Ken, don't you know the Labour have solved all known crimes (so they've had to invent a load of new ones!)?

He's very good at his: "I'm a perfectly reasonable guy, honest as the day is long, no you can't ask me about the stolen money, that sort of thing happens all the time you can't expect ME to know how every penny is spent, can you?" shtick. He never answers the question, but he doesn't have to because Suicide Boris reliably goes into one of his "I yi yi yi yi've never been so, oh oh oh, goodness corks!" blusters and Mr Ken can just keep protesting innocence and no one hears that neither of them are saying ANYTHING.

A case in point was when Mr Brian as trying to press Mr Ken on the deadly bendy buses. One of Ken's minions had, apparently, threatened to cut off police funding if they investigated a death by bendy bus; Mr Ken whined on that the victim was three times over the legal limit. Yes, but he's still DEAD Mr Ken, and the police OUGHT to be able to investigate without your HEAVIES threatening them! Boris, though, just starts Oompah-pah-oompah-pah-ing about the buses and Mr Paxo let's Mr Ken get away with another non-answer.

If Mr Brian has a PROBLEM in this debate, in fact in this entire campaign, it is trying to get a word in edgeways. When he can get a chance to speak, it is clear that he KNOWS HIS STUFF, and is on top of his brief – on transport, for example, he had a clear message about trams as opposed to Boris's daydream of a new Routemaster, and a plan that would cost no more (over ten years) than the Labour's Mr Ken wants to spend on buses. Or on crime, where he's got the experience and the ideas and knows that what we need is to reconnect the local police with the people that they serve, to rebuild the trust so that we can cut crime TOGETHER.


Obviously he is TOO POLITE to use his police training to render Ken and Boris unconscious, but…

Day 2643: Terminated

Thursday:


Heathrow, and CHAOS descends on the opening day of shiny new Terminal Five, with "technical glitches" leaving passengers unable to get to planes and baggage unable to get anywhere!

It's a RELIEF that they'd been told NOT to use the BIG-BROTHER fingerprint taking system or things might have gone from UNMANAGEABLE to completely ANARCHIC!

If this is what happens when they open a new terminal, I dread to think what they could achieve if they opened a new runway!

Of course, all the candidates for London Mayor have united against the third runway…

…giving me a DAYTIME TV link to the Mayoral campaign!

The Labour (and by extension their allies in this campaign, the Greens) actually SUPPORT a third runway. Mr Balloon and the Conservatories are against it one day and for it the next depending on whether it's a sunshine and quality of life day or an economic competence and big business day.

This leaves Mr Brian and the Liberal Democrats as the one Party not sending out MIXED MESSAGES.

The INTERESTING thing about the London Mayor election is that you get to vote TWICE, once for the candidate you like and once as a back-up.

I am indebted to Mr Julian of Orange By Name for going to the trouble of asking the other three parties to send him articles explaining why THEY deserve our second preferences. I think that not only is this the LIBERAL thing to do, it is also a GOOD IDEA for us not to become so PARTISAN that we become ISOLATED and disappear up our own thinking.

But it is also interesting to compare the three different STYLES that they use for their appeal.

First up were the Greens who, having already shot their own credibility dead by saying that their own supporters should vote for Mr Mayor Ken, were trying the INTERESTING tactic of begging OUR supporters to vote for them.

Telling the Liberal Party that the VERY Liberal Mr Brian isn't a Liberal is a bit of a DUMB STUNT anyway, even if your arguments don't all get totally shot to pieces by Citizen Alix!

In contrast, the Labour actually seem to have understood what the second preference vote MEANS, and make a pitch based on "why Mr Ken is like you". Although their clear aim is to build a London-wide coalition on the grounds of "Keep Bonkers Boris Out", they also try to make a positive case.

On the other fluffy foot, bringing up Iraq and the Environment just emphasises what a HYPOCRITE Mr Ken was to put returning to the Labour above his so-called principles. And suggesting that the Mayor who has treated the London Assembly with such contempt is an advocate for London Democracy… is probably just bunged in at the end as a joke.

Still, marks for trying.

The Conservatories though, really DON'T get this idea of reaching out to other people AT ALL, with an article steeped in typical Conservatory arrogance:

"We're going to win, so you'd better join us in giving the Labour a real kicking 'cos then you might stand a chance at the General Election of winning some seats off them to make up for the seats we're going to take off you. So ner!"

Quite apart from alienating people their supposed to be appealing to, casually dismissing the huge policy gulf between Bonkers Boris and reality (never mind the Liberal Democrats) and making no attempt to make a positive case for their own candidate seems to accept that Bozza is basically un-sellable.


Mr Brian himself, on Any Questionables, was pitched the "who would you vote for second" question and did VERY well explaining that people who tell him they WANT to vote Liberal Democrat but feel it will be a wasted vote CAN vote for the candidate that they want first because they have a second vote to fall back on for their arty loyalty. Top marks for an answer that could have been scripted by My Daddy Alex… in fact, it WAS!

Ah, countered the junior Mr Dimbledonkey thinking he sensed an ELEPHANT TRAP, but why won't YOU be using YOUR second vote?

Mr Brian recovered brilliantly: because for me, my conscience and my party loyalty coincide, he said smartly, and I'm not allowed to vote for myself twice.

Huge applause covered the sound of Dimbledonkey slinking away tail between legs.

I should also add that Mr Brian had a very good answer to the last question (bringing me back to where I started): if you were trapped at Terminal Five, how would you drown your sorrows?

Mr B said he couldn't drown his sorrows because he is in TRAINING for the London Marathon, though jogging around the Terminal might be good exercise. And he got in QUALITY name-checks for the three charities causes that he is supporting in his run: Downs Syndrome, Strokes and Mr Elton John's AIDS foundation.

Londoners, clearly if you want to fly, you want to fly Liberal Democrat!

Day 2632: Bendy Buses Banned – Barracked By Bonkers Boris Braying Boisterous Boastful Bombast

Sunday:


Oh fluffy dear: this looks like a bit of a surrender from Mr Mayor Ken, sneaking out the news that he's ending his fleet of spontaneously-combusting mobile road-blocks on the day before the Mayoral election officially gets under weigh.

This comes on top of a YouGov/Evening Standard opinion poll that gives Bonkers Boris a SIZEABLE lead in first preferences of 49% over Mr Mayor Ken's 37%. (Mr Brian, the only SERIOUS choice, starts the race on 12%.)

This means that the actual result is either going to be very embarrassing for YouGov or really FANTASTICALLY embarrassing for London!

Mayor Ken seems to think that he can get away with criticising Boris's transport policies and then stealing the centrepiece of his plan!

But that does not so much rob Boris of his platform as make Mayor Ken look desperate and out of ideas AND make Boris look CREDIBLE. Yes, that IS hard to believe, isn't it!

"I…yi….yi…yi… I should say something REALLY crazy and…and…and see if he does that too," said Boris, speaking at the launch of his new proposal to abolish Tuesdays.

Why are people STILL being fed a false choice between this berk who barks at bendy-buses and that creep who covers-up for crooks?

Day 2602: "If anything goes wrong, the mayor is responsible"

Friday


Those were Mr Mayor Ken's words to the London Assembly this week: "If anything goes wrong, the mayor is responsible."

Then he had Lee Jasper suspended.

"This casts serious doubt on Mr Ken's judgement," said Mr Brian, shocked at the escalation in the SCANDAL.

"This goes far beyond the allegations made by the Evening Standard, which simply suggested that Lee Jasper had broken the rules, not broken the law."

Is Mr Mayor Ken ACTUALLY going to take responsibility? Well, forgive me if I suspect NOT. He does have a history of saying one thing and then denying it later.

Promises not to remain INDEPENDENT and not rejoin the Labour, and to serve for no more than two terms seem to have been just slightly OVERLOOKED.

(Though do not try reminding him, as he tends to get a bit CROSS!)

Even in this current crisis he may have been caught in a BIT of an untruth.

It seems that he knew about the problem of the missing cash – because he'd been TOLD about it – but then denied there WAS any problem. It no doubt just slipped his mind.

Though if he is getting so FORGETFUL, perhaps it would be a kindness to give him a nice long VACATION, say from around about May of this year…


So it is BAD NEWS for Mr Jaspar, as he is under investigation, but will the STINK affect Mr Mayor Ken?

Mr Marty of Mayorwatch suggests that this is ACTUALLY a cunning win-win strategy for him.

If his opponents on the London Assembly go along with the plan, then he gets to kick this whole scandal into the LONG GRASS until after the election, by making the whole thing subject to a police investigation. If they DON'T then he can say they had the chance to put up so now they have to SHUT UP.

And do you know, I think Mr Marty might be RIGHT!


Speaking of people backed by the office of the Labour's Mayor, though, GOOD NEWS from Leyton where Local Labour's CHICKENS came home to roost when the Liberal Democrats recovered the council seat stolen by convicted liar, Ms Miranda Grell.

Pink News covers the same story and so does Lib Dem Voice, of course.

Let me add my FLUFFY CONGRATULATIONS to those of Ms Merel Ace, Mr Matt Davies, Mr Neil Woollcott and many others.

Hooray! Very well done!

Day 2566: The Mayoral Debate: Soap and Flannel

Friday:


Oh dear, a DREADFUL confession: we have been watching ITVnone, Britain's Tackiest TV channel.

It would be nice to say that it was ONLY to watch the debate between Mr Brian, our top quality candidate for Mayor of London, and that pair of ASBO-monkeys from the other parties.

But NO, we have been having a bit of a Ben Millar-fest too, with the return of schlocky Doctor Who wannabe "Primeval" and of course ITV's new Fourth Wall Bulldozer: "Moving Wallpaper/Echo Beach", hilarious in the way that Mr Sorkin's "Studio 60 on Sunset Strip" was meant to be (but wasn't).

"Studio 60" took most of the first episode to TEARFULLY remove the old producer of the show and woo in the series' real stars, Josh from The West Wing and the one from Friends who can act. "Moving Wallpaper" does this in ten seconds flat, and features the defenestrated ex-producer head butting a photograph of Mr Michael Grade and calling him a bas bad word! This wins hands down. Instantly every Dr Who fan in the land loves it (and that's even before the two Doctor Who references in the second episode).

And, of course, unlike "Studio 60", "Moving Wallpaper" actually has the BOTTLE to show us what all the fuss has been about. And wisely rather than the show-within-the-show being the bestest bestest wittiest wisest comedy in the whole of cuddle town, it's a ghastly soap who plot and characters have all been entirely derailed by the producer's megalomania. Wise, and also brave!

The TRULY terrible thing – among MANY terrible things – about the 9.30 soap "Echo Beach" was the nagging worry that Mr Grade had succeeded in commissioning ANOTHER turkey of similar magnitude to the last time anyone tried to mix SUNSHINE into a British soap opera – I mean of course "Eldorado", anagrammatically if unkindly remembered as a "Real Dodo" – and the only way to save the channel from going onto the rocks was to apply heavy IRONY.

British people, famously, do not like their soaps to be "happy". EastEnders and Consternation Street vie to bring gales of misery down upon their inhabitants in between the reigns of terror of the local murderers. (At one point, I tell you, there were more SERIAL KILLERS than GAY DADDIES living in Consternation Street!) Sunshine is UNNATURAL in this context. Usually, the only way around this is by application of wall-to-wall Australian accents. And obviously – even if Jason of Jason'n'kylie wasn't in it – this is why the model for "Echo Beach" is meant to be "Neighbours" (although so far the production standards are managing to make "Home and Away" look CLASSY and "Hollyoaks in the City" look like DRAMA). With the exception of Mr Hugo Speer and (perhaps astonishingly) Mr Jason himself, no one up to and including Tiffany can actually act (though she can tremble a lower lip with the best of them). What you are left with is a load of what my disgusting daddies insist on calling "totty" in not very many clothes.

It ought to be TOTALLY UNWATCHABLE.

But you cannot escape from the awfully impressive cleverness of placing GIGANTIC AIR-QUOTES around the whole edifice through the addition of "behind the scenes" show "Echo Beach Confidential". Er, "Moving Wallpaper".

With more laugh-out-loud moments in the first ten minutes than in "Studio 60's" first ten EPISODES (literally: three!) it centres around Mr Ben as "Jonathan Pope" the "producer" of ITV's new "hit" soap. In the first episode he crushes a little girl under a stack of lobster pots, spends the design budget on his own office so announces that the surf shack will have to be derelict, and puts Tiffany in the pink dress to avoid "diva tendencies". I thought he was VERY funny. But having seen the second episode – when he beats up a CUDDLY PANDA – I now realise that he is the UTTEREST BAST BAD WORD on television! (I am sorry, Mr Charlie Brooker, your crown has been taken.)

The "clever clever" part, of course, is to spot which bits of "Moving Wallpaper" will appear in the subsequent episode of "Echo Beach". Little girl, derelict surf shack, pink dress and panda all do.

Although pitched as a "comedy drama", "Moving Wallpaper" is a SATIRE – satirising television production itself, and just as mercilessly as, for example, "The Thick of It" skewers the government. That is why it appeals to "smart alecs" like my Daddies. Then they watch "Echo Beach" to play "spot the jokes" and feel quite clever about this. People who do not like that sort of too-clever-by-halfness can skip it and watch "Echo Beach" IRONY-FREE.

This, I believe, is called a "double whammy"!

For genuinely BAD television, then, you had to wait for later in the evening.

The Mayoral "debate" on ITV's "London Talking" (presumably they couldn't afford the more iconic "London Calling") was BAD in all the ways you EXPECT ITV to be bad: cheap set, dreadful format, Blue Peter presenter being patronising to the viewers in exactly the way that she wouldn't be when playing with terrapins.

Each candidate gets to make a little speech, then they get cross-examined by the other candidates, then they take questions from the floor (where everyone wears a handy badge so you know they are all party supporters and you only get questions from the OTHER two parties).

But rather than taking turns at each stage, what they did was have Mr Brian do all three stages and then Mr Mayor Ken do all three and then Bonkers Boris do all three. It meant that it was more like watching three JOB INTERVIEWS rather than generating any sense of DEBATE between the candidates. MY suspicion is that this is because they could only afford one LECTERN!

Mr Brian was jolly good, in spite of this format not playing to his strengths. To see how good he REALLY is, you want to see him CHAIRING a meeting and fielding questions, often with a dryly WITTY response and always with the facts and policies at his fingertips. It is JOLLY IMPRESSIVE.

In the studio, he was not able to set the audience ALIGHT in the way that the two seasoned hacks were. That is his strength and his weakness – he is an ordinary person, with extraordinary talents. And not a huge gob with legs attached. (Also hair, if Boris.)

His best moments were when facing the audience, as he was able to make a real connection with them, even if they were supporters of his rivals. Possibly a note to the other parties: if you want to try and trip Mr Brian up, maybe best not to try to "surprise" him with details of his police career – he really was really, really good at that job, you know, and he WILL have answers.

The other candidates, though, were bad, and in quite different ways. The Mr Mayor started with a very GOOD pitch – no, really – "if you think I've not improved London then don't vote for me". The problem was he was REALLY cross-patchy if anyone actually referred to his record – promises that haven't been met, opinions that have been switched. At one stage he was asked why he had said a mayor should only serve two terms and was now running for a third: "this will be the last job I do in politics," he said – well yes, Mr Ken… unless you change you mind AGAIN and do another one! Also, it SERIOUSLY isn't on to say that youth crime in the city is because those kids' PARENTS grew up under the Queen Maggie government. I mean, obviously, the answer is because they have grown up under a Thatcherite government TOO: the Thatcherite governments of Lord Blairimort. But since he's broken ANOTHER promise and rejoined the Labour, Mr Ken can't seem to say THAT any more.

Boris is all FOR blaming Lord Blairimort, but doesn't really have any ANSWERS as to what to do. Bus conductors… no, maybe not bus conductors, that was Mr Ken believing his own press releases… well maybe SOME bus conductors. He didn't half old school tie himself in knots. And while it seems the Labour's record is fair game, he didn't have a lot of defence of his OWN, particularly on the subject of race ("let's just move on," hmmm) and then Mr Ken fair bludgeoned him with his voting record: number of speeches in the House about London – none; number of debates about London attended – none; number of votes cast on motions about London – none; number of MENTIONS of London – n… oh, one actually, but in passing and about something else. Oops.

More subtle were Mr Brian's quick puncturing of Boris's ego: "Boris, you need to pay attention, I've already said all that!" was one; and another was replying to the assertion that if you needed experience then no one would ever stand: "But Boris, we ARE standing and we're trying to choose the BEST candidate." Terrifyingly, though, Mr Boris still thinks that he can run London the same way that he ran the Spectator.

The only "news" coverage to come out of the debate was the somewhat unedifying SPAT between Boris and Ken over teenage murders. "What are you going to do about these 27 murders in the last year?" thundered Boris. "I'll try to get more of the buggers next year," Mr Ken IN NO WAY REPLIED!

And it is a SHAME, because the Mayoral race needs people to be serious about London.

This election is an important one, one that concerns the lives of six or more million people and the governance of the world's TOP city. It deserves better coverage than some rubbish late-night slot on ITV.

What it needs is a big advertising campaign to get people watching and a prime-time slot for a huge audience and, and, and… and a "behind-the-scenes" show to show the drama and the comedy of the teams producing the mayoral run… now, hang on: there's an IDEA there!

Day 2508: Life of Brian!

Tuesday:


Hooray for Brilliant Mr Brian!

I have not been VERY good at keeping my OBJECTIVITY on this one, have I? So I doubt that anyone will be surprised to learn that I am JOLLY PLEASED to hear that Mr Brian won the contest to be the Liberal Democrat candidate for the Mayor of London.

It was a stunning victory, with Mr Brian gaining 73% of first preference votes (that is ALMOST a shame, because the other two candidates were also VERY GOOD, but it does show that we pretty much all recognised THE MOST QUALIFIED LIBERAL for the job.)

I think that it is excellent that a policeperson with such a HIGH PROFILE background in public service should WANT to represent the Liberal Democrats. People often complain that their politicians no longer have REAL LIVES outside of the "Westminster Bubble" – that is not the case with Mr Brian who has BAGS of EXPERIENCE in the real world, dealing with real people and solving real problems. And it should be obvious to anyone that his police policy has always been a LIBERAL approach of reaching out to people, to make a safer community through cooperation and engagement.

He reached the heights of Deputy Assistant Commissioner by working his way up from the ranks, and has seen frontline service – not least during the Brixton riots – as well as guiding the famous Brixton experiment that ACTUALLY saw crime FALL.

Let's USE some of that experience and enthusiasm to:

• Make London safer – with more properly trained policepeople sent where they're needed to cut crime

• Make London greener – starting with powering the tube with renewable power

• Make London united – with an All Zone Mayor, not a Zone One Mayor

So now you know your choice if you want to replace King Ken (and Newtzilla): a man who can COMMAND the police and gain the RESPECT and love of the public… or a chap who can't keep control of a panel game.

Not a TOUGHIE is it!

Day 2502: Found Guilty? Don't Worry – the Labour's Mayor's Office will back you!

Wednesday:


The Labour certainly stand by their CRIMINAL element.

No doubt you remember Ms Miranda Grell – found GUILTY of telling lies. The Labour have decided to fund her appeal, despite her own statement to the police admitting that she lied. She is reported as "suspended" from her job working for Deputy Mayor Ms Nicky Gavron – suspended as in NOT FIRED for being a convicted, self-admitted liar, then?

No doubt you remember Sir Ian Clone of Lord Blairimort – found GUILTY of putting the public in harm's way. The Labour's Mayor Mr Ken continues to stick by him, even though the TOOTHLESS London Assembly has passed a motion of no-confidence. Obviously the London Assembly was created by the Labour, so you can hardly expect them to have given any POWER to the democratically REPRESENTATIVE body, can you? (And how can Mr Ken claim to REPRESENT anyone if he IGNORES the views of anyone who disagrees with him?)

Ms Grell has put out a statement saying that she doesn't accept the court's judgement. So, scratch "law abiding" from her CV as well.

Her friends and family have started a campaign to overturn the court's verdict. They claim that they never heard any of the things she is meant to have said. Presumably they weren't in court then, when there was testimony from the people who INDEPENDENTLY reported her to hate-crime unit ALERT, or the further FIVE WITNESSES there to testify that she accused her opponent of sleeping with boys of 14, 15 or 16 or HER OWN LABOUR RUNNING MATE, Mr Nicholas Russell, who was "disgusted" by her attitude and also heard her claim her victim had a "fourteen-year-old Thai boyfriend."

No, apparently it's all some kind of RACIST CONSPIRACY. Hmmm, who EXACTLY is playing the RACE card, then?

In court, Ms Grell claimed that SHE was the victim… leading the prosecution barrister to label her a "fantasist".


And speaking of dangerous fantasists, Mr Ken continued to talk nonsense in support of his chum Sir Clone, claiming that there was a "Cynical campaign" against him.

The Cynics, founded by a pupil of Socrates, believed in leading a life of self-sufficiency and virtue, achieved by eschewing the false influences of wealth, fame or power. They reached the height of their influence in Roman times when their philosophy was honed down to responsibility and willpower.

Hmm, yes, they DO sound like the sort of people who would find Sir Clone's love of power without responsibility UTTERLY REPELLENT. On the other fluffy foot, I can't see them hanging around for two-thousand year JUST to campaign against HIM! Perhaps Mr Ken is thinking of someone else.

"Al-Qaeda must be laughing at us while we busy ourselves pillorying the police who keep us safe," said Mr Ken.

Well, no actually Mr Ken I suspect Al-Qaeda were laughing at us when the police started killing innocent Londoners for them.

If I believed for ONE SECOND Mr Ken's LUDICROUS claim that ONLY Sir Ian is competent to lead the Met then it would surely ON ITS OWN be a reason for Mr Ken himself to RESIGN IN SHAME for overseeing a police force composed of such incompetents.

I do NOT believe it! I think that there are MANY brave and capable people in the police and Mr Ken is NOT FIT to serve as Mayor if he is going to diss their talents like this!

It is about time that someone challenged the Labour in their complacency and arrogance.

PS:

One person who IS calling the Labour to account – in a small way – is Liberal Democrat Mr David "I am the" Laws. (We met him yesterday while on our way to see Mr Huhney-Monster!)

Mr David had CAUGHT OUT the Prime Monster. Mr Frown was giving a speech on education last week, and his office contacted the local paper in Yeovil, Mr David's constituency, to say that a local school would be mentioned – with quote from the speech – and they might like to give Mr Frown some jolly nice free publicity please.

Except, when he gave the speech – gasp – no mention of the school.

And then Mr David checked around and GUESS WHAT… several OTHER local papers in different constituencies had ALSO received a note from the Prime Monster's office, ALSO telling them that a local school would be mentioned, and ALSO giving the same quote. Only the names were changed to protect the GUILTY LABOUR SECRET STALINS in Number Ten.

It is so difficult to hold the Government to account when they have NO REGARD for the TRUTH.

But we said very well done to Mr David for at least catching them this time.

Day 2496: Police! Stop or I'll Not Resign!

Thursday:


Let's start with a statement of the OBVIOUS: you CANNOT make the public more SAFE by SHOOTING them at RANDOM.

We listened to the wise words of Mr Brian on Questionable Time last night, saying it was TOO SOON to call for the resignation of Sir Ian clone of Lord Blairimort, that we should not RUSH to JUDGEMENT. There is the report of the Independent Police Complaints Commission to be published in the next few days, and then there will be an Inquest. Mr Brian is right – we should wait for those.

And THEN Sir Ian should resign.


Reaction to the guilty verdict in the case of Jean Charles de Menezes has been MIXED: Mr Mayor Ken says that Sir Ian has his FULL SUPPORT. Everyone else thinks he should GO.

Leadership candidate Mr Clogg, with his Liberal Democrat Home Secretary hat on, put it well when he said:

"It's absolutely nothing personal about Ian Blair. I have a lot of admiration for him. I just start though from a very simple principle that policing needs to be seen to be accountable."

This is the key point: it's about TRUST.

You have to appreciate what a rock and a hard place Mr Brian found himself in: he has worked for the police all his professional life, he knows these people and the job that they do – and especially how difficult it is. This is what would make him such a GOOD candidate for the Mayor of London: he UNDERSTANDS.

It was a BRAVE decision to support his former colleagues and try to explain a more NUANCED position, especially when the POPULIST PUNDITS – Ms Eggwena Curry, I am looking at YOU – are saying fatuous things like "less of this building relationships with the community; we want the police to catch criminals". Oh and just HOW do you think the police go about "catching criminals" WITHOUT building community relations?

It's about TRUST.


Mr Mayor Ken has said that the court's decision will make it more difficult to protect London from terrorists. HE IS WRONG.

(And, yes, this is the Labour attacking the courts (AGAIN!) because they don't believe the Rule of Law, only in the Rule of the Daily HateMail)

The REAL moment it got more difficult to protect London was the moment that Sir Ian – without knowing the truth – gave a press conference saying that they HAD shot a terrorist when in fact they HADN'T, and members of his police force KNEW that they hadn't.

Because that means that people do not believe him and do not trust his policepeople and that is the SECOND most UNFORTUNATE thing about the de Menezes case. And although Mr Brian may see and know about the GOOD IMPROVEMENTS that Sir Ian has made, there remains that VITAL question of TRUST.

It is tragic but UNDERSTANDABLE that mistakes can be made – even mistakes that end up with an innocent person dead.

But it is NOT acceptable that the police should DENY making those mistakes, cover up, mislead even DECEIVE people about those mistakes. That makes EVERYONE'S lives more dangerous – not just from the risk of FLYING BULLETS, but because it will DRY UP the sources of INFORMATION that the police and security services need in order to stop things before it is too late!

A police force that makes mistakes – and mistakes WERE made – is not protecting London as well as a police force that gets things right. And a police force that is IN DENIAL about those mistakes will make them again and again.

Someone DIED, and we have not been told how it went so wrong. We need to know what it was and we need to know that it was FIXED.

• Why was the building only being watched by one officer? Even the most bumbling spy knows that you need AT LEAST two observers in case one gets "caught short" – which is EXACTLY what happened!

• Why was Mr de Menezes not stopped before getting on a bus? Or onto a second bus? Or before entering the tube? Apparently the police were waiting for the armed officers – or, more accurately, the MORE HEAVILY armed officers – but why did they not know those officers would arrive too late? Does this not mean that the police allowed a person THEY BELIEVED to be a terrorist to REACH his TARGET?

• Why is it possible to get to a situation where armed officers respond on a shoot-to-kill basis against a man they can clearly see is restrained APPARENTLY without anyone instructing them to? Is it not EXTREMELY DANGEROUS to wind armed men up to a height of terror and then let them go running into a crowded tube? Pumped on ADRENALINE they nearly shot one of the surveillance officers too.

• Why did Sir Ian give out misleading statements at his press conference? Who briefed him? Did no one tell him his briefs were on fire? Did they have direct knowledge of the incident? Didn't he CHECK with someone who did? And why didn't THEY tell him the truth?

• And why did the defence go to seemingly ANY lengths – distorting photographic evidence, character assassination (Traces of cocaine alleged to be in his system? Hey, he was only a druggie!) – to try and avoid a guilty verdict?

The police have NOT answered these questions. Instead they have DENIED getting things wrong and denied that they endangered the public, even though one member of the public was very obviously endangered TO DEATH.

On the CRUDEST LEVEL, Sir Ian's decisions – including the decision to contest this case – have cost the London taxpayers over half a million pounds because he wouldn't accept that mistakes had been made.

Mr Mayor Ken makes more excuses:

"Police officers operated against suicide bombers in conditions of extreme danger – and subject to strains – both of risk to themselves and of their desire to safeguard Londoners lives, that no one not in their position can understand."

But that is FLIM FLAM trying to distract us from the point. NO ONE is blaming the firearms officers. They were placed in a position there they believed they were "in conditions of extreme danger" and they did their job. But who put them there and why did they genuinely believe they were in danger? Because that belief is what killed an innocent man.

In a case, ANY case where lethal force is thought to be necessary, there MUST be someone who is responsible. If there isn't, then bullets will end up flying at random and people will get killed. There has GOT to be something wrong with a system that allows that to happen. And the person responsible HAS GOT TO BE the man at the top who – ultimately – is in charge of the operations and systems and procedures.

You might think that that is not fair – making one person be responsible for a decision, a decision that could cost them their JOB. Well, it cost someone his LIFE.


But do not have NIGHTMARES! This is, thankfully – and as the Judge pointed out – a very RARE incident. How many times have the police wrongly shot a suspected terrorist? Only Mr de Menezes. And the Forest Gate incident.

And just remember how many times they have shot a GENUINE terrorist in that time… oh.

Day 2469: Elections, elections, elections

Saturday:


If you think that the elections have been cancelled, you need to THINK AGAIN!

Coming in 2008 is the important election for LONDON MAYOR, and we need to get working fast! Then in 2009 there are the EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT elections – here in London we NARROWLY missed out on getting a second representative and so we need to work harder next time!

That is why I took Daddy along to the Liberal Democrat London Hustings in Bethnal Green.

Part way through, we received the news that everyone had been on tenterhooks waiting for… England had beaten Australia at Rugby. Oh, and also Mr Andy Marrmite had been up to Mount Sinai and received some tablets of stone from Mr Frown saying "NO" and "ELECTION".

Is it just me, or is Mr Frown's FACE slowly MELTING?

Going...

...going...

...gone!

So yes, Mr Frown has decided to rule out an Autumn election, though he denies that poor performance in the polls changed his mind.

"The… uhhh… weather looks a mite… uhhh… nippy… so I… uhhh… just didn't fancy it… uhhh…" stammered the stumbling Secret Stalin.

Sir Mr the Merciless was first on the case, saying Mr Frown has lost his nerve and calling for fixed term parliaments so that the Prime Monster (whoever he is) cannot put the country (or himself) though this sort of DITHERING again.

Mr Balloon has spent a lot of time smugly harping on about Mr Frown treating us like fools.

It does, of course, take one to know one.

Some people, though, might think that it's not TOO clever to keep on saying, "he's just fibbing: everyone knows that he wanted an election!" when everyone ALSO knows that you desperately DIDN'T want one, even if you keep saying that you did.

Anyway, our magnificent Ms Lynne Featherweight has called Mr Balloon's bluff by telling him to PUT UP or SHUT UP. Either he is serious about democracy – and will back the Liberal Democrats on our fixed term parliament bill – or he is ALL MOUTH and NO TROUSERS.


So anyway, THAT was all a storm in a teacup. We have proper elections to fight, not just Mr Frown's phoney war.

So, back to the hustings...

Getting a seat early

The message that came strongly from our Euro-candidate hustings was that we are just not Pro-Europe ENOUGH! Or rather, everyone KNOWS that we are the pro-Europe party – as one candidate put it: UKIP are Liberal Democrat ANTI-MATTER – but we sometimes seem to be EMBARRASSED about it, as though we don't want to get caught having the strongest support for the most brilliant European peace and prosperity plan since, well, ever.

Mr Simon James asked us why it is that while in local elections and even general elections we manage to raise our performance ABOVE what the opinion poll ratings say we are getting, in Europe we fall below expectations.

He pointed to the media's OBSESSIONS that Europe is about BIG CENTRAL IDEAS: "the Euro", "the Constitution", "the straight banana" (err…) but the European Parliament is NOT about those things.

Mr Simon put forward the suggestion that we should remember our roots in COMMUNITY POLITICS. We need to take community politics to the EUROPEAN LEVEL: connect people to how Europe affects THEM, not in some abstract way, but directly, in their own local area, and not just the person on the doorstep but our own local activists, who have to campaign for us, and need to be fired up by how important Europe is to THEM too.

Mr Jonathan Fryer told me – in one of the SEVEN European languages that he speaks! – that we need to talk about Europe's SMALL BUT PRACTICAL achievements as well as the big ideas.

Things like "the environment" seem large, but can come down to better controls of air quality or whether we get a third runway at Heathrow (supported by the cosy Conservatory Labour partnership; only the Liberal Democrats are speaking out for the local people who don't want it). Do people know that Liberal Democrat votes in the European Parliament helped secure cheaper roaming charges for their mobile telephones? Not to mention protection from dangerous toys… I gave him a VERY HARD STARE for that!

As Lady Ludford added, Europe should not be boxed off into a separate area. She's used her time in Brussels to press for CIVIL LIBERTIES (she's been praised by Ms Charming Chakrabati of Liberty for her Human Rights work) and that is CENTRAL to Liberal Democrat policy.

I wonder if – just like our manifesto has a Green Thread running through every page – we might need to have a EUROPEAN thread running though all of our policies too.


After the Euro-hustings, we got to hear from the three candidates hoping to stand for the Liberal Democrats for Mayor of London. (For those of us who had been at the packed-out hustings in Brighton this was "another chance to see".)

On the panel

This time around, Mr Fizzle gave a very stirring speech (to be quite honest it was a LOT better than the one he gave in Brighton!) full of passion and promises. He STILL had too many things to say in the time though! Then came Mr Paddock, who was more serious this time, with fewer jokes. He was less impassioned than his two rivals, but more focused and really knew his stuff on the questions (I bet my Daddy has been giving him LOTS of homework). Last to speak was Ms Chamali, whose speech was quite similar to the one from Brighton. (I must admit that she did stumble slightly, using her "rose between two thorns" line twice, I suspect because she was trimming for time.) However, she was much improved answering the questions – apparently she has grade 5 in ballet too.

All of them are TERRIFIC candidates, each bringing different skills and experience to the table, and I would be PROUD to support any of them. In fact, it is a shame that we cannot have ALL THREE as prospective Mayor!

What we REALLY need, though, is to have a candidate who has a better RUN UP to the election.

We know that developing a council seat or a parliament seat we have to work for often SEVERAL elections before we can build up our support. The same MUST be true for the London Mayor – and yet here we are still choosing our candidates with less than seven months to go! Excellent though they are, we have left them with a big handicap at the start of their race.

What we SHOULD do is have a candidate who can campaign for us for four solid years, and always be ready to appear on the news as "Liberal Democrat Mayoral Spokesperson" – just like we try to choose prospective parliamentary candidates early in our target seats.

It is not like Mr Ken has not been campaigning solidly for himself for the last four years – what are all those "Mayor of LondOn" posters if not adverts for HIM!

Of course, part of the problem is that while Mr Balloon can lose an election but still gets a paid office in Parliament from which to call Mr Frown names, runners up to Mr Ken get no such luxury. Being leader of the opposition to the Mayor is not a paid position… or is it? What about the London Assembly members?

Now, this is just a thought: how about if our mayoral candidates are also one, two and three on our list for London-wide members of the London Assembly. That way, even if we do not succeed this time, our terrific team will be in a proper position to KEEP CHALLENGING Mr Ken and developing their – and the party's – profiles. (I am not sure if you are ALLOWED to stand for Mayor and Assembly at the same time, though.)

(I don't mean any offence to the likes of Lady Tope and Lord Hamwee but at least they do already HAVE jobs in the House of Lords Club to fall back on.)

The London Assembly OUGHT to be where top-quality candidates want to be; it OUGHT to be the OBVIOUS place to look for a Mayoral Candidate as well as for potential top London MPs like Ms Featherweight; and it OUGHT to be full of people who can hold Mr Ken to account and not let him RUN RINGS around them!

After all that, all that remained was for Humph to thank the lovely Samantha…

Sa-mathon-tha?

…for keeping them all to time and then to usher us out to do our (Cancelled) Election Special Focus delivery rounds!

PS

If you still have anything you want ask the candidates, you can visit the online hustings.

Day 2450: Suicide Boris Blunders In

Thursday:


We woke this morning to the sound of Mr Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson spluttering his way though an interview on the The Today Programme and denying that it was inevitable that he would be the Conservatory candidate for London Mayor.

Inevitably, he is.

I am not sure what was more alarming – the fact that he appeared to have done NO PREPARATION for the interview whatsoever, or the possiblity that this is what he is like when he HAS!

"Um um um um um," he said in reply to a question about terrorism. Terrifying indeed!

But I am getting ahead of myself. He had opened with the INTERESTING promise that he was both going to interfere less AND to put a stop to building "rabbit hutch dwellings" (or FLATS as most Londoners who have to live in them call them). Wasn't this a contradiction, he was asked by Today's Mr Naughty. Mr Boris explained – he wasn't in favour of affordable housing in new developments, but he did want new buyers to be able to afford houses.

"By day I like to worship the little baby Jesus, and at midnight I sacrifice a goat to Beelzebub and I see no contradiction in that," …is actually something Mr Jeremy Hardy once said while pretending to be Lord Blairimort, but the quotation seems apposite for some reason.

Clearly used to the dark art of "sexing up" a CV, Mr Boris then tried to make it look like he had the EXPERIENCE for the job by claiming to have run an eleven-million pound business. Now there're a number of things here – firstly, there IS a difference between a business with a TURNOVER of eleven million (like Boris's magazine) and controlling a BUDGET of eleven million. Someone with real experience would know that; if you don't, then confusing one with the other leads to making a LOSS.

But secondly, there is the question of what "running" the business actually means. Mr Boris's Beano, The Spectator, has an OWNER (at the moment it is the notorious Barclay Brothers) and a PUBLISHER (you will no doubt remember Ms Petrolpropeller Wyatt and her, er, friendship with suddenly-former Home Secretary, the very-generous-with-his-expenses Mr Bluntgit) – Mr Boris's title was "editor", wasn't it?

Isn't the editor USUALLY responsible for picking the writers, trimming their articles and supplying the leader column?

The person who actually RUNS the business has to get the sales, oversee production and publicity, pay the employees… you know, all the trivial but vital details of actual management.

So was Mr Boris actually doing any of that, or was his full time job just wining and dining the guest writers and then doing the tiniest touch of EXAGGERATION?

Actually, it would be interesting to know what Mr Boris thinks a FULL TIME job really IS.

At the moment he is doing quite a lot of MOONLIGHTING from his supposed occupation as representative for the people of Henley, earning AT A MINIMUM a-hundred-and-fifty-five thousand pounds from speaking and appearances (it could be up to two hundred and seventy-five thousand – there are twenty-four engagements earning him five to ten grand or ten to fifteen grand and so on), and that's WITHOUT the nearly quarter of a million that the Torygraph are paying him to work for them as a columnist.

It DOES all seem to cut into his time. He has only been able to speak in 16 debates this year, and only managed to turn up to vote 52% of the time, both well below average among MPs. It must be jolly inconvenient for him that all those after-dinner speeches and TV studio recordings clash with those boring old debates in the House of Commons that he is supposedly being paid to attend.

He didn't even seem sure whether he would give up his Westminster stipend if he actually (imaginary god help us) became Mayor of London, blustering about Mr Ken staying on as an MP before finishing with a grudging "oh well I suppose I would."

But then, of course, there was the terrorism question: was he SERIOUS enough, Mr Naughty wanted to know, to speak for London in the aftermath of an outrage like the July 7th bombings?

"Um um um um um," said Mr Boris.

Had it not even OCCURRED to him that this was a VERY OBVIOUS question to be asked? Did he just BUMBLE into Broadcasting House, fluffy head empty of any plan or thought, and just walk onto the punches as they came? Is this NUMBSKULL really, REALLY the best the Conservatories could put forward to run London? Had the "Have I Got News for You?" TUB OF LARD turned them down?

After his horrible rabbit in headlights moment, Mr Boris tried to recover by blethering on about uniting London people. Like people will be united by an elitist Old Etonian whose career reads like a catalogue of "It's WHO you know, not WHAT you know" (I mean WHO just goes from the Wolverhampton Express & Star, excellent organ though it doubtless is, to being Daily Torygraph leader writer?). It is important to distinguish the concepts of "popular TV personality" from "butt of a popular joke on TV".

Am I worried by Mr Boris? Yes, very worried – worried because people might think that it is FUNNY to vote for this gonk on the SPURIOUS basis that he is a "larger than life" personality. Well, so is Godzilla and just LOOK what a mess he made of Tokyo when he was Mayor there!

Mr Ken – no stranger to personality politics – has let down a lot of Londoners with his unaccountable antics and ignoring of the suburbs and we need a proper challenge to him, a challenge to him on POLICIES for London, not who has the silliest hair and voice.

Liberal Democrats have the policies and have the serious candidates. We've always said that we stand a BETTER chance than the Conservatories of beating Mr Ken in the run-off if only we can get into second place. If Suicide Boris continues to follow the Ealing Southall "Dave Balloon's Conservatories" trajectory – big name, big publicity, big launch, big splash, sinks without trace, big mistake – then this may turn out to be our best chance yet!

Day 2437: Dinosaur Stops Tube

Tuesday:


No, this is not about Dr Who and the Invasion of the Wobbly Rubber Monsters.

Large, Placid & Stupid

This is the Tube strike by the RMT or Really Mean Transport Union.

The fault – unsurprisingly – can be traced back to the Prime Monster. Yes, it was Mr Frown who insisted on flogging off the Tube to one of his CRAZY off-balance-sheet PPP schemes, against the wishes of Londoners who had elected Mr Mayor Ken to OPPOSE the government (yes, look how well THAT worked out).


Back in 2003, nine of the twelve London Underground tube lines were handed over to a company called "Metronet" who promised to spend seventeen billion pounds improving them. (The other three tube lines – the Northern Line, the Pick-a-dilly Line and the Julie Bee Line that goes to the BIG TENT in Greenwich – were given to a different company called "Tube Lines" who are going to be sending four-and-a-half billion on similar upgrades).

Earlier this year, though, Metronet suddenly announced that they had OVERSPENT rather a bit. To the tune of one BILLION pounds, it turned out. And could they have the money back, please.

Well, the reaction of most people was: "TOUGH!" After all, wasn't the whole POINT of these "Public Private Partnership" schemes SUPPOSED to be that the private company would get the REWARD in return for accepting the RISKS? The government would agree to pay over the odds prices making profits for the companies involved… so long as those companies controlled the costs. If they started overspending, then the extra would come out of their profit NOT out of the government's pockets. Which are – of course – YOUR pockets.

So Metronet were told: "you're NOT getting any more money! Oh, all right, have a-hundred-and-twenty-one-MILLION-pounds… but that REALLY is it!"

"Okay," said Metronet. "In that case… we're BUST!"

This, of course, is the point where the whole PPP idea is shown to be not worth the paper that Mr Frown scribbled it down on. When it comes down to it, companies like Metronet do NOT have to take the risks: they just go BUST and dump the problem back in the government's lap.

It is not like the government can REFUSE to RESCUE the London Tube: the entire economy is supported by the profits of the City, and most of the rest of the business in the UK gets done in the Capital too. (Yes, that IS a really dumb idea and we should encourage people to move businesses to the north and the west where life is cheaper and happier, but unfortunately that is the opposite of what has actually happened under the Labour and Conservatory governments.) So the country RELIES on the infrastructure that gets most of its businesses to work in the morning… and that means the Tube.

On the other fluffy foot, that very reliance means that ACTUALLY the jobs of the Metronet workers ought to be a lot SAFER than other people's – these jobs are VITAL!

(Whereas jobs in RETAIL disappear all the time, especially with the rise of home shopping on the Wibbly Wobbly Web and DOUBLE especially when some MANIAC shuts down the Underground for a day and costs all the shops millions in lost sales!)

But even so, the RMT wanted a copper-bottomed assurance that their jobs would be guaranteed COME WHAT MAY.

Now, in order to avoid ACTUAL bankruptcy – in which case the Union Workers would have NO JOBS AT ALL – Metronet had gone into what is called ADMINISTRATION, which is like the LIFE SUPPORT WING for companies. This means that the company gets a bit of a reprieve from the people it owes money while it tries to EITHER arrange new finance from the bank or shareholders OR it finds a "white knight" who will buy it up, pay off its debts and start again OR, in the worst case, comes to some kind of arrangement with the creditors to pay some part of their bills and try to limp on. If none of those work, then it's time for the old pearl-handled revolver in the board room.

Judging from their press release, there were TWO main sticking points for the union.

The first was about the pension scheme, and whether all their members would get the pensions that they had been paying for. Now, under the law brought in after Cap'n Bob took the Mirror Group Pension Fund swimming with him in the Med that really ought not to be a problem because the scheme ought to be completely separate from the company anyway. But the union wanted a promise that that was so.

And the other issue is that it looks like Metronet were thinking of making savings by cutting the workforce BEFORE they went bust, and the union was not happy that the administrator was only promising their jobs were safe so long as the company actually was in administration. They wanted the administrators to promise that their jobs were guaranteed even when the administrators were no longer in charge.


So, after hours of negotiations, they were finally promised that even in the event of the ACTUAL END OF THE EARTH there will still be jobs for them the following morning. With this sworn in blood by the Mayor and the administrators, the RMT finally agreed to call off what was left of their strike.

As a promise it is obviously WORTHLESS. If the union makes it IMPOSSIBLE for the administrator to find a buyer or a new loan from the banks then ALL their jobs will cease to exist. Certainly, the government will have to set up a new Tube maintenance company – but they will start hiring from scratch and will employ as many or as few of the RMT workers as they think they need. Or maybe they will hire some Polish plumbers instead.

Maintaining the London Underground is dirty and difficult and dangerous work, and the people who do it would have a lot of sympathy if it were not for the fact that they make millions of other people's jobs just impossible by going on strike for completely ridiculous promises.

Actually, as a service industry, Metronet basically IS its workforce: they do not OWN the tubes, they do not MAKE things, all they have is the people who do the work. As the largest stakeholder – if not shareholder – perhaps the RMT should think more about RUNNING the company, instead of just RUNNING IT DOWN.

Day 2419: Plot to Scupper Conservatory Mayoral Candidate

Thursday:

Apparently Mr Bonkers Boris is standing…

Day 2405: SO when IS an innocent man being shot dead a calamity, Mr Mayor?

Thursday:


Today we got the report into the aftermath of the tragic shooting of Mr Jean-Charles de Menezes.

If you remember, this was in the days after REAL terrorists had exploded fifty-two people on the London tube and on a bus, so the police were on high alert and probably a bit PANICKY when they mistook him for a threat and so shot him very, very dead.

In anybody's book, this is a TRAGEDY. Another innocent victim in the War on Adjective, and doubly so because we are supposed to be the GOODIES.

Well, I SAY in anybody's book, but not, apparently in the book of our very own Mayor of London Mr Ken, who rubbished the idea "that this is some sort of catastrophic error of judgment on the part of an officer".

The office in question is Mr Assistant Commissioner Andy Hayman who was ALSO in charge of the shooting of ANOTHER innocent person in the raid in Forest Gate last year. Though that is just a coincidence and you shouldn't hold it against him.

"Well, basically, he's my mate so he can shoot anyone he wants to, really," the Mayor very nearly added.

Of course, the report – which DID find errors of judgement – was in fact about the rather curious events AFTER the police made their horrible error. I am talking about the news stories that were MYSTERIOUSLY leaked to the press about how Mr Jean-Charles was wearing a heavy overcoat (suspicious in the HOT July weather) and how he supposedly LEAPED over the barriers at the tube station, clearly making it more urgent that the police catch him before he could escape or WORSE explode himself.

Except of course he was NOT wearing a coat and he entered the tube station at a walk, picked up a Metro and read it standing on the escalator.

So, these stories were NOT TRUE. They were FIBS. But they were fibs that were terribly handy to the police in justifying their precipitous and ultimately WRONG actions.

That wouldn't be a problem except that the police, and by "police" in fact the report rather specifically means Mr Mayor Ken's mate, rather seems to have KNOWN that they were fibs and carried on letting people believe that they were true, and by people the report includes his own BOSS the clone of Lord Blairimort who is Head of the Met.


But Mr Livingstone said: "It's all very well for academics, which is largely what the police complaints authority are, sitting in their office saying this is how it should have worked.
You try doing it while you are waiting for the next bomb to go off."

Actually, this report is from the INDEPENDENT Police Complaints Commission, and you might guess that the point of them being INDEPENDENT is that they AREN'T police officers. In fact, the Chair and Commissioners are a group of lawyers and public servants and you can read all about them HERE… but basically they are people pretty much like Mayor Ken and if he thinks that means THEY aren't qualified to oversee the police, then he ought to be calling for his OWN immediate resignation too.

Ooh, just listen to the silence.

And ANYWAY, this FIBBING – well, all right "allowing people to go on believing in fibs that you could and should have corrected" – was being done AFTER the shooting, not while waiting for the next bomb. No, more like in the time after it turned out not to be a bomb at all.


I am afraid to say that this is a very SOCIALIST attitude: "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one, unless…" as Mr Mayor Ken might put it "…the one happens to me ME!"

Mr Mayor Ken has done many good things for London… but like any good old-fashioned SOCIALIST DICTATOR, he knows that the first step to a successful POLICE STATE is to get the Police on YOUR SIDE.

Oh, and speaking of the police not having enough evidence, the Joint Human Rights committee says there is not enough evidence to extend detention without trial beyond 28 days.

Day 2404: Mr Ed Pushes Mr Lembit under a Bendy Bus

Wednesday:


It was ALL OVER in an INSTANT! One moment it looked like just another London FUN RUN and then BLAT! Mr Lembit Icepick was out of the running for mayor.

(Though not before Mayorwatch had responded with a TIMELY call to call OFF the Clowns!)

We have LOADS of much better candidates anyway – Ms Lynne Featherweight, Queen of Bloggers; Ms Sarah Ludford, Baroness of the House of Lords Club; Ms Susan Kramer versus Kramer (though she would probably want to let someone else have a go). Even my BELOVED Sarah Teather could stand for mayor! Possibly on a box! Would that not be WONDERFUL! I could follow her around London leafletting lovehearts!!!

And yes that IS an amazing coincidence that they're all women, isn't it.

Daddy is suddenly struck by the idea that we should draft Ms Alison Goldsworthy to stand under the slogan "Vote Ali G - in this election, I'm the one who ISN'T a comedian"!

Day 2386: Duck-filled Fatty Puss

Saturday:


Science has discovered that an ANCIENT MAMMAL may not be EXTINCT after all!

Although thought to be one of the most OLD-FASHIONED types of living creature, and nowadays never seen in many parts of the country, it turns out that this rare, timid beastie may actually be… considering running for Mayor of London.


Oh, and biologists have found a platypus.


The PROBLEM with Mr Boris – apart from the fact that he's succeeding a Mr Norris, meaning that the NEXT Conservatory candidate will have to be a Ms Doris – the PROBLEM is that he is EXACTLY THE SAME as the Mayor that we have got.

That is to say, each has CULTIVATED a "media personality" that is a little bit funny and a little bit ludicrous, but is entirely an ACT to cover up the real ZEALOT underneath. Both of them are autocrats; both of them think that rules are for other people.

Mr Boris's scrapes are of course LEGENDARY – and indeed he has made them a part of the persona that he wears. But in making them FUNNY, he does rather gloss over that his "LARKS" do real harm to real people: his wife, his godfather, the person Darrius Guppy allegedly wanted to beat up…

In some ways the "Boris will be Boris" approach, excusing him of being NAUGHTY because being as he is a CAD and a BOUNDER, being naughty is what you can EXPECT him to do.

Well, no actually, some of us expect CADs and BOUNDERs to get their COMEUPPANCE, not a free licence to carry on pleasing their own selfish ambitions, thank you very much.

He is sometimes described as a Libertarian – but his voting record in the House shows only moderate opposition to I.D.iot cards or the smoking ban, and a mixed record on equality for gay daddies. His strongest support has been for exploding Iraq and hunting foxes. And are we sure Britain's most COSMOPOLITAN city really WANTS a confirmed Europhobe in charge?



Confidentially, I HAVE been asked – on the Q.T. – if I should like to stand as the LIBERAL DEMOCRAT'S fluffy Mayoral candidate.

I would LOVE to be Mayor of London – this is my city, this grand, silly, chaotic, marvellous old lady on the Thames. I would introduce electric cars at weekends; lots of bicycle parking, with showers and changing rooms so that people can all bicycle to work; and free sticky buns on the London Eye.

But honestly, what sort of a contest would it be between a SOFT TOY and Ken and Barbie Boris? Being Mayor is an IMPORTANT JOB and it need to be treated as a SERIOUS and RESPONSIBLE position – that is why we should NOT lower the dignity of the contest… by including Ken and Boris!



Meanwhile "Tory Lite" candidate Tony Lit turns out to be standing in the Ealing By-Election under the party name of "Dave Balloon's Conservatories". This is presumably because he needs reminding that he's not one of "Lord Blairimort's Conservatories"!