Author: Phil

Boris Johnson launches on teen death toll

Post author By Phil
Post date 7th Jan 2008
1 Comment on Boris Johnson launches on teen death toll

Boris Johnson effectively launched his mayoral campaign today with a hard hitting column in the Evening Standard, a full page ad in the Standard and a redesign of his own website which brings his campaign themes into sharper focus. He has chosen to major on the wave of gang-related teen killings that plagued London last year ands looks like being repeated this year with two deaths to-date. Johnson is quite right to raise this issue. It is one that the Mayor and the Met Commissioner have consistently ignored because it flies in the face of their “we’ve cracked crime” mood music. If you look at the figures in any kind of detail it is easy to see that they are essentially talking rubbish, see previous posting.

Johnson’s ad in the Standard pretty much says it all. There is some argument about the actual number 26 or 27. I believe this arises from one of the cases which happened just outside the formal GLA boundary, see Assembly Member Roger Evans’ comment here. The Standard and Boris are going with 27. The BBC and I are going with 26.

Ex-Mayor Livingstone

Jasper at it again

The Evening Standard’s Andrew Gilligan continues his one man campaign against the egregious Lee Jasper tonight. His latest revelation is that Jasper, who is meant to be a City Hall employee pulling in a £117K salary has, somewhat laughably, been running his own “talent” agency called ibubble25. It seems Jasper’s main talent is promoting himself and lining his own pockets. His latest project, peddled by ibubble25, is a talk show hosted by Jasper on BEN TV, a tiny station you weren’t have heard of which has received cash from … yes, you guessed it the GLA. See full story here.

Ex-Mayor Livingstone

Admission of failure

I guess this is as near as we will get to the Mayor admitting that his young person’s concessions may not be wonderful for everyone, certainly not grown ups trying to get around on London’s buses.

The Zip card seems to be a half-hearted attempt to restore some discipline to young persons’ bus travel.

It is almost certainly also an attempt to counter some of Boris Johnson’s more resonant lines about respect and civility and making it more pleasant to live in London.

Ross Lydall of the Standard seems to agree.

If the Mayor had any sense, or any guts for that matter, he would turn all of the Zip cards off at 9pm. For my money if a young person wants to be out after 9pm they should be using their own cash – not mine.

Ex-Mayor Livingstone Policing

2nd teen knife murder in 2008

Post author By Phil
Post date 6th Jan 2008
No Comments on 2nd teen knife murder in 2008

After last year’s tally of 26 teen murder victims, see previous posting, we have already had 2 in 2008 so far, see BBC story.

The latest took place in Erith, South London. According to the BBC:

The youth is the second London teenager to die of stab wounds this year.

On New Year’s Day, 17-year-old Henry Bolombi was chased by a group of youths and then stabbed in the chest in Edmonton, north London.

Last year 26 teenagers were killed in stabbings and shootings in London.

With one murder on New Year’s Eve and one on Saturday morning 2008 is looking like it will be grimmer still for London’s teenagers.

Ex-Mayor Livingstone

Faith, hope and charity

I have tried to devote some time to other things today after having spent too much time on my Mayor’s stooges story during the previous two days. I spent a large part of Thursday and most of Friday afternoon checking out the backgrounds of the Mayor’s chorus. It was strangely fascinating but time comsuming.

Jonathan Hoffman points out today on the Harry’s Place blog that 16 of these signatories claim to represent charities which according to Charity Commission guidance “must not support a political party or candidate”.

48. Following the principles, it is acceptable for a charity to advocate support for a particular policy, even if that policy solution is advocated by a political party or candidate, providing the policy is in furtherance of the charity’s purposes. However a charity must not support a political party or candidate.

The story was well covered on other blogs. Thanks to Iain Dale and Tim Mongomerie (ConservativeHome) for linking to it.

Ex-Mayor Livingstone Mayor Johnson

Mayor’s stooges try to speak for Muslims

Post author By Phil
Post date 3rd Jan 2008
17 Comments on Mayor’s stooges try to speak for Muslims

After yesterday’s news that Boris Johnson is neck and neck with the Mayor today the Guardian is reporting that:

Prominent Muslim organisations and individuals have pledged to back Ken Livingstone as mayor of London, saying it is in the “best interest” of Muslims to vote for him in this year’s elections on May 1.

In reality 63 left-wing Muslims, many of whom enjoy the Mayor’s direct or indirect patronage, have pledged to back the Mayor. Now that this list has been published some of them will be embarrassed by the company they are keeping. The Mayor has devoted a big effort over the last few years to cultivating the Muslim vote (607,000 according to the 2001 census) and here are his hired help doing his bidding.

Here is their statement.

Seven of them are leftish contributors to Guardian Comment is free.

Six of them are members of the steering group of the Mayor’s Coalition to defend freedom of religious and cultural expression.

Six represent mosques cited by Policy Exchange for harbouring extremist literature.

Twelve of them are connected with the almost entirely Labour government funded Muslim Council of Britain (see here and here).

Five of them are spokespeople for the British Muslim Initiative which initiated the exercise.

At least eleven are connected with the Muslim Brotherhood.

At least eight and probably many more are not even based in London.

Ealing and Northfield

87% of Ealing’s streets A grade clean

Post author By Phil
Post date 2nd Jan 2008
1 Comment on 87% of Ealing’s streets A grade clean

I have just seen the latest stats from the people that check up on ECT, the Borough’s street cleaning contractors. Across Ealing 87% of streets are A grade meaning there is nothing on the street when the graders come round. They try to come just after the scheduled weekly street clean so if you see the odd discarded can or bag of crisps it has probably only been there a matter of days since the last clean.

Northfield is often top of these lists but in December we were only second at 93.3% to Ealing Broadway at 94.7%. The picture across the whole borough is remarkably consistent with the worst ward coming in at 80%. So even in the worst part of Ealing 80% of the streets are perfect.

These figures do accord with what I see walking and driving around town and with what friends and neighbours tell me. Well done to all of the staff involved. And well done to us too for not making a mess in the first place.

Ex-Mayor Livingstone Policing

It’s not hard – get the knives off them

Post author By Phil
Post date 2nd Jan 2008
No Comments on It’s not hard – get the knives off them

Media tart Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, is finding it hard to keep out of the media. Only last month he was on the Radio 4 Today programme describing himself as a limpet, see here.

He was at it again on the Today programme yesterday morning effectively complaining that the Police’s remit was too wide. The Tory candidate for the West Central London Assembly seat, Kit Malthouse, writes about Blair in the Times today and is not overly impressed. Blair talked about how the Police have to deal with everything from terrorism to social cohesion. Apparently people on the Metropolitan Police Authority have been on at him to tackle wildlife crime in London. What? How hard is it for Blair to reply to whoever it is on the MPA as follows: “We had 26 teenagers, one every fortnight, stabbed or shot or beaten to death in London last year. I am very happy to look at tackling wildlife crime once I have got this death toll down to maybe one or two a year. Until then bog right off.”

I note that Blair has not been using his airtime to draw attention to the teenage death toll in London. Probably because it runs against the positive mood music that Blair and the Mayor are trying to put out around policing in the run up to the mayoral elections.

I note that Blair didn’t complain about Police resources being diverted to policing the Mayor’s New Year’s Eve party.

One of the biggest problems with policing in London is that you and me as precept payers provide the largest share of the Met’s revenue but its commissioner is appointed by the Home Secretary and the Home Secretary gets to tell him what to do. To the extent we have local accountability it is down to the Metropolitan Police Authority which is packed with appointees who have no mandate. If it was left to Assembly members Blair would have been fired already.

In a sensible world the London Assembly would appoint a commissioner who would worry about London and leave the Home Office to discharge its own responsibilities using its own agencies as it saw fit. London’s police could then protect London and Londoners and Blair wouldn’t have to stress about what his role was. If he lost focus on it the Assembly could quickly remind him.

Ealing and Northfield

Goodbye furry lodger

Unwanted lodger

I have just been up to the loft at the behest of Joe from Arrest-a-Pest to look for the body of our squirrel. A week before Christmas we heard rather loud noises from the loft and realised that we had a squirrel in residence.

Having worked for pest control services like Orkin Termite Control Services or Nature First Pest Control as a young’un, and being a member of the specialist scrutiny panel looking into pest control I was interested to know what the council’s response would be. I used the website to find the number. It was pretty easy. Click A to Z of services tab, select p for pest control, scroll down to the pest control link, click link, click the contact us link and straight to a phone number. Called it up and was told they do not offer squirrel removal services in private homes. Slightly disappointing but the phone was answered quickly and the call was handled well so fair enough. Looked in the Thomson Local and found Joe from Arrest-a-pest. He would come round three times at £60 a visit plus VAT. The council’s service for rats and mice involves three visits but only costs £60 including VAT for all three visits.

He came round the same day and laid poisoned bait which consisted of about five trays of grain. On arrival he took one look at the bird feeder in the front garden and suggested that this might be the root of our problem. Joe called today to follow up. He told me what to do so I went up into the loft to check the bait and see if I could locate any bodies – many of his customers are too squeamish for this job so he pays them another visit. I decided to save the £60. In one corner of the loft the squirrel had made a nest of roofing insulation and eaten its way through two adjacent trays of poisoned grain. It did not take long to find the body. Wrapped up in a double layer of carrier bags the squirrel is now in the bin. Joe will come round and block up the holes in the roof for me next week if we don’t hear or see any more signs of the lodgers.

Mayor Johnson

Boris comes out fighting

Back Boris Boris Johnson, Tory candidate for London Mayor, has come out fighting with a typically rumbustious New Year message:

ITS TIME TO GIVE LONDON BACK TO LONDONERS

I want 2008 to be a year of change and improvement in London.

It is time for an end to the tragic series of gang-related stabbings and shootings that have cost the lives of 28 teenagers and which are spreading a pall of insecurity over too much of the city.

I want all Londoners to have the optimism and confidence that goes with increased safety on the streets, on the buses, at station platforms – and the sense of opportunity that comes with better transport and wonderful new housing.

All these things can now be better achieved if we put an end to the tired, divisive and cronyist regime of Ken Livingstone, where there is now an epidemic of wastefulness bordering on corruption.

It is time for a new administration that stops the bullying and the bossing, that stops mainlining fines from motorists, that gets on the side of the hard-pressed commuter and stops the grotesque abuse of taxpayers’ money.

It is time we gave London back to Londoners. Happy New Year”.

He is right to prioritise public safety and highlight the continuing toll of death being visited on our young people. It was only a few hours into the New Year when London claimed its first young victim, see here.