London

Jonathan Freedland’s column in The Guardian today, explaining why he can’t vote for Ken Livingstone, is a remarkably direct piece of journalism. Freedland states that he ‘can no longer do what I and others did in 2008, putting to one side the statements, insults and gestures that had offended me, my fellow Jews and — one hopes — every Londoner who abhors prejudice’. Now, as Paul Goodman argues, we shouldn’t overstate the importance of a traditionally Labour supporting Guardian columnist coming out against Ken Livingstone. But Freedland’s reasons for doing so are ones that, I suspect, will resonate with a significant section of opinion. The issue with Livingstone is that

You’d think the American sub-prime crisis would have taught politicians the world over not to try to rig the housing market. But no, David Cameron is back on it today — about how to ‘unblock’ the system so the debt geyser starts to gush again. ‘The problem today is that you have lenders who aren’t lending, so builders can’t build and buyers can’t buy,’ says the Prime Minister. ‘It needs the government to step in, and help unblock the market.’ The idea that lenders may not lend because they feel the housing market may fall, and people may be unable to repay, is instantly dismissed. He speaks as if debt

What does No.10 make of Boris’s campaign so far? Not much, judging by Alice Thomson’s column (£) in the Times today: ‘Downing Street is worried. When the mayor came in with his Australian election strategist Lynton Crosby last week, they thought their plans were “underwhelming” and lacked a simple ‘retail offer’ for voters.’ This certainly fits in with what I’ve noted before: that Team Boris is being significantly quieter than Team Ken. Indeed, further research suggests that the current Mayor is trailing far behind his challenger in the all-vital Evening Standard campaign coverage. I’ve sifted through their archives for the past six months, and it turns out that for every Boris initiative being mentioned

The declaration by Len McCluskey, the leader of Unite, that public sector unions should consider disrupting the Olympics is going to re-ignite the whole debate about union power. McCluskey tells Andrew Sparrow that ‘The attacks that are being launched on public sector workers at the moment are so deep and ideological that the idea the world should arrive in London and have these wonderful Olympic Games as though everything is nice and rosy in the garden is unthinkable.’ McCluskey’s ill-considered threat is a headache for Labour. Unite is Labour’s largest donor and the Tories are already calling on Miliband to denounce him. I suspect that the Boris campaign will be

When David Cameron addressed Tory MPs on Friday, he told them that the London Mayoral elections were ‘the binary moment of 2012’. He argued that if Labour lost in London, one of their traditional strongholds, it would be a disaster for Ed Miliband. In the Cameron narrative, a Boris victory in May would mean that the Labour leader would remain under pressure and continue to be the subject of regular attacks in the press. Interestingly, there are Liberal Democrats close to Nick Clegg who share this analysis. Their worry is that a Livingstone victory combined with bad local election results for Lib Dem could turn the deputy Prime Minister back

Remember Downhills Primary School? This was the underperforming school in Haringey that became a political battleground towards the end of last year. On one side was Michael Gove and the coalition, proposing that Downhills — and schools like it — become academies, as that’s how to boost academic performance. On the other was the local MP, Labour’s David Lammy, as well as the school hierarchy and various union types, all apoplectic at having academy status ‘imposed’ from above. Harsh words were traded, meetings were convened, and little was resolved by it all. I mention this now because, late yesterday afternoon, something was actually resolved in Haringey: Downhills was put in

When is a homophobic comment not a homophobic comment?  When it is spoken by somebody on the ‘left’ of course. Ken Livingstone has just reminded us of a prevailing rule in British politics. His comment that the Conservative party is ‘riddled’ with homosexuals ‘like everywhere else’ would have earned him a sacking if the parties had been reversed and a Conservative politician had talked of the Labour party in this fashion. In the same way, if a Conservative had made the kind of smearing racial generalisation that Diane Abbott recently twittered, they would have found themselves sent beneath the bottom rung of the political ladder. And I dread to think

A week that began with an insane decision from the European Court of Human Rights has come to an end with a sensible decision from Ofcom. The Iranian government’s propaganda channel in London, Press TV, has just had its license to broadcast revoked. Insomniac Islamists will no longer be able to enjoy their weekly dose of programmes presented by the likes of Lauren Booth, Tariq Ramadan or Derek Conway. And of course they will now forever miss The Real Deal with George Galloway. On that show you could see such treats as Galloway interviewing ‘President’ Ahmadinejad. It is a wonderful interview, not least thanks to Galloway’s thoughtful attempt to lay out the terrain

It looks like the May’s election for Mayor of London will be a close run thing. A new poll today from YouGov has Ken Livingstone two points ahead of Boris Johnson – a big turnaround from the eight point lead Boris had in June: Ken shouldn’t be popping any champagne corks yet, of course. His lead is well within the poll’s margin of error, and there’s three and a half months to go before election day. But he’s certainly looking more likely to topple Boris than he did seven months ago. So why the change? YouGov’s Peter Kellner has a good article on the poll’s details here, but two key points jump

Boris Johnson was very well behaved this evening when he appeared before the 1922 Committee of Tory MPs. He stayed off the topics of Europe and tax and instead confined his remarks to London, saying that he wanted the capital to be an example of ‘cost-cutting, one nation Conservatism’. Those MPs inside the room say the performance was classic Boris, as one put it ‘he left no erogenous zone unstroked’.   Afterwards, Mark Reckless, a north Kent MP, asked the Mayor a sceptical question about his plan for a new airport in Kent. In the questions, I understand that Boris also took the chance to express his support for Rebecca