Why we should elect Ken.

London goes to the polls today to elect it's Mayor and Johann Hari did a wonderful piece in yesterday's Independent to remind us all of why we should be electing Ken.

I have long argued that Boris's bumbling nature allows us to overlook the fundamentally flawed aspects of both his candidacy and of Boris himself. It's not just that he belongs to another age, it's that his views are homophobic and racist and we overlook them because people say "Oh, that's just Boris" as if the fact that it's simply Boris saying these things means it doesn't matter. Hari does well to root out some of Boris's gems:

Do we want to risk having a mayor elected by the white outer suburbs who has repeatedly called black children "piccanninies" (and not just in spoof articles), tells a black presenter "you can't out-ethnic me"?

On driving Chelsea tractors through London Boris says:

"Tee hee, I said to myself ... out of my way, small car driven by ordinary person on modest income. Make way for the Nissan Murano."

Please note "ordinary" people are defined by their "modest" income which presumably makes high income earners extraordinary.

Boris has also compared gay marriage to bestiality. Is this really the person that one would want representing the most multicultural city on Earth? Can one imagine any other politician being able to call black children "piccanninies" and comparing gay marriage to bestiality and for them not to be hounded out of office? Again, Boris's bumbling nature allows people to overlook these antiquated and offensive views as somehow being "just Boris".

But then there are his actual policies.

Ken has introduced a rule saying that if you want permission to build homes in London, half of all the stock has to be affordable to people on an average wage. And he has now – finally – been given £4bn by the government to launch the biggest home-building programme in the capital in a generation. Boris, by contrast, says Ken is "hung up" on the percentage of affordable housing – maybe it does look like a hang-up from Henley – and will ditch the rule demanding it. His plan is very different: he is committed to spending £130m on a First Step Housing Scheme to help first-time buyers. Sounds good – but look at the small print. You would need an income of £60,000 to qualify – and that rules out 80 per cent of Londoners.

In Spectator-Land, these people are the "struggling middle class" who must be the sole beneficiaries of state support. In the real London – Ken's London – they are the cosseted elite who need help less than the rest.

He's putting forward a housing policy which only cares for the richest 20% of the city's earners, presumably the same people who ask "ordinary" folk to get out of the way of their Nissan Murano's.

Boris is not a joke. He's a product of the British class system and a throwback to the days when homophobia and racism were tolerated. He's also made no secret of the fact that he lacks the skills needed to run a city the size of London. He has already tried a career as a management consultant and lasted merely a week:

"Try as I might, I could not look at an overhead projection of a growth profit matrix, and stay conscious"

And yet this man wants to run a city with a budget the size of London's?

He's simply the wrong man for the job on every level.

So I am going to vote today to reject Boris and his homophobia and his racism and his rejection of global warming and his stupid comments regarding "ordinary people" and how they ought to "get out of the way" of him and his Nissan Murano.

He's not a buffoon, he's a dangerous right wing nutcase who deserves to be utterly rejected at the polls.

If you reject homophobia and racism and think ordinary people deserve not to be priced out of London's housing market, you should vote for Ken.

Click title for Hari's article.

Tags: Ken Livingstone, Boris Johnson, London Mayoral elections