CG white, this is your territory. you know the ins and outs of all this.

i asked my Irish London friend why/how boris got elected and he was spitting blood big time about it. Having grown up going to protest marches with red ken he was in disbelief that Londoners would vote in a non Londoner, a rent-a- quote TV aristocrat personality as a mayor. but my friend hasn't lived in london for ten odd years.
me, ive never been to london.
so Londoners tell us why?

As a Londoner, and someone who has spent the last few months running the Boris campaign in outer London in Uxbridge, I should be fairly well placed to tell you why London has changed.

London was always regarded by Ken as 'inner London' -- the suburbs, where a significant proportion of the electorate live and commute in, were forgotten. So your friend Sean, who was in disbelief about the result is mistaken in thinking that all Londoners are liberal lefties. Substantial numbers of people are conservatives, or have no political allegiance.

Crime has risen, including petty crime, as has the fear of crime. Transport has deteriorated into ramming yourself onto the tube in rush our and getting your nose wedged in someone's armpit. Back gardens - the green spaces of London - have disappeared as inappropriate developments have risen and impacted on local services such as schools and local traffic.

Despite Ken's achievements - the Oyster card, his reaction after the 27th July bombings and the congestion charge, Londoners haven't seen value for money. They have seen Ken fill City Hall with cronies who embezzle money for their own gains. They see a London that requires change to tackle the crime and disorder. And Boris was emblem of that change.

You may think he is a buffoon, but his in reality a very intelligent man. As someone said to me recently, far better to have a man like Boris acting like a buffoon, than a man who is really a buffoon. London will slowly change, and hopefully for the better.

Crime has not risen. Burglary and car crime has fallen 88% since 1997 for example. One reason behind Boris' win is his misrepresentation of facts and all the scare stories perpatrated by the Evening Standard. Transport hasn;t deteriorated. The tube's are less crowded as bus capacity has doubled and more and new lines are being opened such as the East London line extension. Ken wasn't great and did have faults. The fact that the Conservative leader kept trying to reassure us that Boris will be surrounded by a great team of people tellas us that even he has no confidence in this lying racist who's just been elected mayor. It is not acceptable for example to refer to black children as piccaninnies as Boris did a few months ago. If the suburbs don't like living in a liberal multicultural society they are better off voting to join Kent and Surrey rather than stay in Greater London. A sad day.

I'm pretty sure the piccaninnies text was satirical.

Watching my country of birth from the other side of the world I'm not really sure what Labor have been doing so wrong. Sounds like they're going out, but I don't really get why

Of course it was the same here with Howard getting voted out for Rudd, maybe people just like to blame all their problems on government and believe that the opposition is going to be perfect

If Boris Johnson isn't a buffoon, then he's the world's greatest actor....

Kestasjk I think you're right... and for the last few months everything Labour has done has gone wrong and Brown has made himself look like a dithering fool... This is a man who waited impatiently for 11 years to be PM and you might have thought he would have had some ideas up his sleeve for what he would do with the power once he got it!

To be fair to him, Brown started well. However, all things in politics take quite some time to come through. The great economy Britian has had through New Labour was set up primarily by the previous Tory governments. Now their plans have had time to come through we're seeing a less rosy picture. The abolition of the 10p tax rate has alienated traditional labour followers, as can be seen from the loss of area's formally thought of as their heartlands. Moreover, the poor management and preparation for the possibility of the 'credit crunch' can be blamed on no-one other than Brown: who was it who has supposedly been running our economy for the last 10 years?

> and for the last few months everything Labour has done has gone
> wrong and Brown has made himself look like a dithering fool.
I don't really see what he did to deserve that assessment

> you might have thought he would have had some ideas up his
> sleeve for what he would do with the power once he got it!
Not really looking for a big surprise from the PM, he's not a celebrity :-| we just want him keeping the government ticking

> The great economy Britian has had through New Labour was set
> up primarily by the previous Tory governments.
Well the '90s were boom times all-around (and so has this decade); no government's expert tweaking of the budget creates this kind of global growth

> The abolition of the 10p tax rate has alienated traditional labour
> followers, as can be seen from the loss of area's formally thought
> of as their heartlands
To be honest I wonder for everyone who talks about what a blunder the 10p tax was how many actually know exactly what it is, how it affects them, what other changes have been made to the tax system in the recent past which counterbalance it, etc.
When tax cut/breaks are given your average person probably won't hear anything about it. It's easy to calculate how much this one change will cost you, but it's not so easy to work out how that compares to benefits you receive
And also if this is a mistake I don't think it's Brown's, it'd be the chancellor. Though I can't see either adding in something as if to spite the "little guy", after all the benefits to help support poorer people

Cameron is slagging Brown off for this as usual though, going on like a broken record. If you can use a data leak as a reason Brown should /resign/ I guess you can use anything :-| I just hope he manages a government as well as he gives smug, repetitive speeches

> Moreover, the poor management and preparation for the
> possibility of the 'credit crunch' can be blamed on no-one other
> than Brown:
The US sub-prime sector is pretty well out of Brown's sphere of influence. No-one saw it coming, and Brown wasn't going to fly to Florida to trace mortgages and reevaluate loans anyway
What the UK govt did do was to take steps to limit the damage done, some (Northern Rock loan) were very controversial, but things aren't turning out as bad as most predicted

I didn't study economics, and I'm on the other side of the world, so my only point is that people think Brown is doing a worse job than he is; for all Cameron's whining and moaning nothing will change

Yea, as someone from the right side of the spectrum, I really don't get all the hate for Brown. I am disappointed that he withdrew from Basra(a decision that has already backfired), but the problems of the economy are something that can't be pinned on Bush or Brown, or any single world leader. Economic downturns happen, and the recession is global. Of course, the recession is going to make parties fall world-wide, but I don't think it is fair to blame it on any one person.

I'd actually prefer Brown to Cameron. Just Call Me Dave is Eurotrash who will sell out more British sovereignty to the EU, something that should never happen. The English speaking(sensible) nations of the world need to band together, not fall apart as we join silly societies of lesser cultures.

My call, as someone who gets just about everything he knows about British politics from the Economist and the BBC, is that the Tories just traded on disaffection with the Labour on a national level. That is, like the Congressional elections in the US in 2006, it was more a referendum on policy and performance of the Executive than it was on strictly local issues.

Ken did great things for London Transport, especially the buses. All of this despite the Labour government's PPP and years of underinvestment by... Tories. I mean, look at what the Tories did to the trains! Remember all thoses mortal accidents?
In the next few months, expect buses fares increases (they were kept low by Ken), and the return of MetroNet (but with another name).
A shame, really.

"> and for the last few months everything Labour has done has gone
> wrong and Brown has made himself look like a dithering fool.
I don't really see what he did to deserve that assessment"
-- The election that never was and his u-turn on the 10p tax would be two examples.

"
I'd actually prefer Brown to Cameron. Just Call Me Dave is Eurotrash who will sell out more British sovereignty to the EU, something that should never happen."
-- Cameron surrendering more sovereignty to the EU would be the fastest way to divide his party and ensure he loses the next election, or in other words, he wouldn't.

The moment Brown didn;t call the election he signalled that in that moment he felt he would lose and Cameron would win and I don;t think he can recover from the fact that we all recognise that he acknowledged that he is a loser in his own mind.

As for the other mistakes, Brown looked good at the start... He did but only because he was dealing with crisis after crisis and he is good at looking serious. On the other hand in his first month the UK suffered a terrorist attack and the return of Foot and Mouth. Add on the lost data discs, the handling of Northern Rock and you get a building sense of one calamity after another.

As for the tax, this sums it all up. Brown axed the 10p band ahnd used the money to cut the main income tax rate from 22 to 20p... His total lack of control over the political agenda has meant that this good news has not been heard.

As for the comment that the 10p row is the fault of the Chancellor, well there is truth in that,... The Cahncellor of the Exchequer who abolidhed the 10p band in the Budget of 2007 was Gordon Brown!

This is all the fault of the MPs though,.... they wouldn'y back anyone else to run against him. He's got to go within the month or it's all over.

Brown, just like Major, had a bounce. Boris won because of the issues cg mentioned, plus the 10p tax. It is inevitable that national issues would have an effect.

Plus, David Cameron is a stronger politician in PM's questions by far.

I dont' think it's necessarily the case that Brown losing the election would have been a foregone conclusion, even in his own mind. I imagine he just said to himself one day, "Why bother taking the risk?" Unfortunately, this was after he had already given some signs they would occur.

Myself, I'd have just requested a vote of confidence from the House of Commons and gotten on to business and waited for a time when the advantage was clearly mine, but these things are always simpler in retrospect.

The results of the English local elections bring me to the conclusion that the voters never voted for new labour, they voted for Tony Blair and now that he is gone the party will lose the next general election and recede back into the obscene middle left policies it inhabited before 1997.

oops, policies was supposed to be politics

A great many voters never voted for New Labour, but voted against the Conservatives. A week might be a long time in politics, but some of us still remember the poll tax....

I personally believe that the ellection of Boris will prove to be a god send for labour during the British Parliamentary elections.

I am with CG White. Boris will surprise most who write him off as a buffoon. You do not get to be president of the Oxford Union if you are an idiot, of run a successful business.

I know that Boris will not have an easy job, partly because the central goverment will make things very difficult for him. But he does have a huge advantage in that he can make astronomical savings by plugging the gaps due to Ken's cronyism and madcap plans. I think that we will find that the corruption went deeper than we suspected.

I do think that Ken has done a good job in some areas, and hopefully Boris can build on those, while putting other areas right. And I am against the idea of not extending the congestion charge for Chelsea Chariots (large 4x4s), as they clog London's streets. But generally, change can be good.

A final point - I thought that Boris was very gracious in victory, and in a way that Ken could never be.

Hippykin, your comment about people voting for Blair not Labour is an interesting one. However, your second point I do not agree with. You believe New Labour will drift back to middle-left, but I think the most notable point at the moment is that new labour has actually gone further over to the right. It has spend the last few years trying to persuade dissallusioned ex-Tory voters to support them instead, and in doing so has stopped being the Labour Party.
They were, historically, a party for the common man, but their current policies are not thus. I know its a widely used example, but the removal of the 10p tax band is a clear case of this.
No workers party would remove the band that helps the poor, whilst reducing the taxes for the upper and (most noticeably) middle classes. These are not New Labour, they are New Tory.

Perhaps after this public showing of mistrust they will think back to what the party stands for, and make a decision. They can continue to target the middle classes and steal Tory votes, or alternatively the party can realign and try to regain the lower class votes on which it is built.

Oh, and I don't think Boris is a buffoon. He speaks from the heart, and puts in little 'jokes' here and there, which are often very funny. However, because he does these things and answers freely, he makes mistakes. Many politicians will hear a question, then repeat it slightly misquoting, allowing them to answer the question they wanted to hear.
And anyway, even if he is a buffoon, it can't be that bad: look at Bush. To quote the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
"Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job"

"I feel responsible", says Brown. "There are no excuses on my part at all."
He's doing a great job of appearing to be less capable than he actually is. Sure, he goes on to tell us how everything's going to get better, but who's listening?
Tony Blair had the advantage of advice from very good spin doctors. Where are they now?

Having reread the thread - I noticed this from Kestas which I would like to clear up:
"To be honest I wonder for everyone who talks about what a blunder the 10p tax was how many actually know exactly what it is, how it affects them, what other changes have been made to the tax system in the recent past which counterbalance it, etc.
When tax cut/breaks are given your average person probably won't hear anything about it. It's easy to calculate how much this one change will cost you, but it's not so easy to work out how that compares to benefits you receive
And also if this is a mistake I don't think it's Brown's, it'd be the chancellor. Though I can't see either adding in something as if to spite the "little guy", after all the benefits to help support poorer people"
---
1) I believe there wasn't much increased income on this because he reduced taxation on other bands
2) The whole reason people are blaming Brown is that he _was_ the chancellor who's final budget removed the 10p tax band.