Can Ken get his old job back? The big news this morning in the 2012 London Mayoral race is that Boris Johnson has confirmed he will be seeking re-election for a second term. In an LBC interview he said he wanted to stay on beyond May 2012 because he had “more to do” improving the capital and overseeing the Olympics – “It is my intention and indeed I have written to seek the nomination to serve as Mayor for another…
Guardian Who’ll win the old-Etonian stand-off over Cross-Rail? The big development over Boris that Morus only touched on briefly in the last post was the huge row that’s apparently developing between Johnson (Eton and Balliol College Oxford) and Cameron (Eton and Brasenose College Oxford) over plans by Osborne (St. Paul’s and Magdalen College Oxford) to force a 5% cut to the £16bn London CrossRail project. According to the Guardian, though denied by the Mayor’s office, Johnson has let it be…
Is it worth 4/1 that she’ll be the one to take on Boris? Until now I have followed the received wisdom that Ken is a near certianty to secure his party’s nomination for London mayor in that other Labour election that will be taking place in the capital next month alongside the vote for next leader. The wily Ken, the argument goes, has been about for so long and he has such name recognition that he’s almost untouchable. But is…
Can she really beat Ken AND then Boris? I’ve been taken to task by a couple of people within London Labour for my contention in several recent posts that Ken Livingstone is a near certainty in this summer’s race for the party nomination to take on Boris in the next London mayoral election. This will be voted on by individual party members and trade union levy payers in September’s postal ballot that will run alongside the Labour leader ship election…
The 2012 race for the London Mayoralty has seen two developments in the past 24 hours: Lembit Opik has said he’ll go for the yellow team’s nomination while the big uniion with massive influence in the Labour movement, UNITE, has said that it’s endorsing Ken. Voting amongst London party members and levy-payers in the trade unions will take place at the same time as the election for next Labour leader. This is further good news for the former Mayor who…
Is it time be taking the 5/1 that he’ll get his job back? There’s another election taking place within the Labour party – that of who should be their candidate in the next London mayoral race in 2012. Like the contest for the leadership this will be completed by the time of the party’s conference in September. Such a truncated process so far ahead of the mayoral election itself has sparked off a row within the party suggesting that this…
Oona’s website Price moves in from 33/1 to 12/1 There’s been a big move on the 2012 London mayoral race betting following the announcement by former Bethnal Green & Bow MP, Oona King, that she’s seeking the Labour nomination. Overnight I got 33/1 against here winning the mayoralty with Victor Chandler – that’s now tightened to 10/1 though Ladbrokes have her at 12/1. Five years ago, of course, Oona lost her Westminster seat to George Galloway in a fierce campaign….
Reproduced from the London Evening Standard CON 39% (32) LAB 35% (39) LD 17%(22) YouGov finds a bigger Tory swing in London A new YouGov poll for tonight’s London Evening Standard suggests that the Tories might be on target to make a dozen gains in the capital at the election. The shares are above with the changes since the 2005 general election. The swing of 5.5% is higher than that we’ve seen in national YouGov polls taken over the past…