Labour party campaigners in London have welcomed an ITV/YouGov London poll which puts support for Ken Livingstone four points ahead of that for Tory rival Boris Johnson.
The poll shows Ken Livingstone’s support at 44 per cent, with Mr Johnson on 40 per cent and LibDem Brian Paddick trailing on 8 per cent.
Under Mayoral election rules voters can select two candidates in order of preference. Unless any candidate has more than 50% of first preference votes the second preference votes of lower ranked candidates are distributed until a winner emerges.
The poll comes after weeks of torrid headlines which the Mayor’s supporters claim these form part of an organised campaign of support for Boris Johnson and a Channel 4 documentary which made a number of serious about Livingstone’s administration.
A spokesperson for Mr Livingstone’s campaign said: “This is a welcome opening up of Ken’s lead, especially as Internet polling has always underestimated Ken’s support compared to actual elections and other opinion polls.”
Dismissing recent media reports the spokesperson said “the election for Mayor will be decided on the key issues of transport, crime, affordable housing, good community relations and the environment and Londoners will refuse to be distracted by nonsense and falsifications being spouted out daily in media storms from his opponents.”
“Ken will run on his record and extending London’s success into a third term. He has already announced two new commitments – to extend the hours of the Freedom Pass to a twenty four hour service and his plan to extend student travel discounts – and others will follow on the environment, crime, good community relations, transport and housing.
“For six weeks Andrew Gilligan and the Evening Standard have poured out masses of vitriol in the dirtiest campaign in London for twenty years, in an attempt to divert attention from the real issues in this election and to assist the Tory candidate Boris Johnson. Londoners have given them the answer they deserved.’
“London can continue moving forward with Ken or adopt the dead-end right wing policies of the Tory party under Boris Johnson, who lacks any serious answers to the issues facing London.”
Mr Johnson’s campaign team failed to respond to requests for a comment.
kevin says
I struggle to pay my council and GLA taxes and now discover they are wasted on phantom projects,so called advisors with no experience that don’t attend meetings and a mayor that is happy to grandstand with a far right muslim leader that believe homosexuals should be executed and suicide bombers are heroes.
Time to put sicko Livingstone out of his misery.
Kevin Thompson says
I would like to ‘speak as I find’ in which case I can say that bus travel in London has improved massively from five years ago. There still needs to be more attention given to the provision of cycle lanes however.
Either way I would prefer to give my support to Mr Livingstone since he has made a positive difference, rather than the inane bumblings of the ‘pseudo politician’ Boris Johnson.
joel says
why dose ken charge £25 congestion charge for big size cars when police officers are driving around rang rovers with the highest c02 emissions? why not start to help reduce emissions by instaling solar panels and energy efficient boilers in all public buildings in london rather then squeezing us out of every hard earned pany that we make? one thing I can say, borris is not the answer for a fair london but it will definitely not get as bed as it will under ken, ken will always find a way to charge us more with an excuse for something great
Steve says
Funny “London moving forward with Ken.” Yeah, it’s definetely moving forward for the muslim community which will soon become the majority in London as in the rest of the UK. Well enjoy spiraling out of control crime rate, massive immigration, sharia law and the tolerance you voted for, Brits. Luckily, you’ll be dead or replaced by muslims before the turn of the Century and ya have no one to blame but yourselves. But just know, if Lib/Lab/Dem/Con get elected, you can expect ONLY MORE of the above mentioned. They’ll run your Country in the ground and turn it into a socialist paradise, as if it weren’t already. Thanks for listening.
_Steve
Dep says
Many things have improved under Ken but his Old fashioned Loony Lefty attitudes are still there and are still irksome. His anti English/British/white/Londoner bigotry is too much to take.
I consider myself a liberal and veer towards Paddick however, if the opinion polls show a close call between Ken and Boris then Boris will get my vote.
desmond abbot says
as a black londener i cannot stand how ken patronises our community and pretends to care when its election time we need a mayor that doesnt divide us in to groups we are all londeners and il vote boris as ken only cares for his cronies and to get more money out of us .