It would be too much to imagine that former Mayor Ken Livingstone’s spat with US Ambassador Tuttle over the Congestion Charge would have escaped comment in the Wikileaks exposures. What the US embassy said was dry but correct, says Damian Hockney.
Unbalanced – time to protest against the Orwellian election rules
Party funding is still on the Agenda and you have a week left to make your submission on it to the Committee on Standards in Public Life. Damian Hockney hopes that smaller parties and non party candidates who have stood for London Mayor are going to take the opportunity to make clear the dramatically unfair […]
Primary Level Thinking
Rumours that the state might pay millions of pounds for political parties’ candidate selection processes could be the final straw for the public, says Damian Hockney. “David Lammy’s recent call for ‘Primaries’ for the London Mayor elections was worthy of Marie Antoinette in one of her less thoughtful moments,” he says. “These exercises in central control will not fool anyone. And if the state were to pay for this process, then the tumbrils might finally roll.”
Hail Mayor Boris – saviour of the Congestion Charge
Former London Assembly Member Damian Hockney reckons that the announcement about the scrapping of the Western Extension in London helps the Yes campaign in Manchester (results due later this week). Hockney also believes that the Mayor’s move has actually rescued the London scheme, and may even have given a boost to campaigners to introduce it elsewhere. An opponent of the charge as conceived, he explains why the Mayor may have given it the kiss of life, and offers a few interesting insights into the impact of London’s experience on the plans of other cities on the eve of the knife edge vote in Manchester…
Democracy, you’re nicked
When he was an MPA Member, Damian Hockney was alone for a year in calling openly for Sir Ian Blair to quit, at a time when the Conservatives were publicly backing the Commissioner. As an unknown politician from a small party, he was given lead item on all three national evening news broadcasts for his low level call and he says that’s when realised that the politicisation of the role of Met Chief was complete. He thinks that the latest developments hold dangers which are a logical extension of government muddying the waters of the way London is run. Today’s MPA meeting, the first with Boris as Chair, did not allay his concerns…