Some reflections on the elections

In 2000, Ken Livingstone (left, admitting defeat) was expelled from the Labour Party for running against party candidate Frank Dobson in the London mayoral election — which he won, running as an independent. He was readmitted to the party in 2004 when it couldn't face the prospect of losing a second election in a row to an outcast. How ironic that he should now be booted out of office at least in part as a result of the general malaise affecting Labour. That's not to minimise the effect of his accusing a Jewish journalist of acting like a Nazi, or of the stench of corruption coming from the London Development Agency, or of simple public boredom with the incumbent. But I do wonder who would be mayor today if Livingtone had remained independent — although, to his credit, he apparently doesn't.

I don't share the gloomy expectations of some regarding what Boris Johnson (right, with David Cameron) will do to the capital: he decided a couple of years ago to stop being a journalist and start being a politician. Not that I'm overjoyed at his being mayor, either. But politics is always a choice between the lesser of various evils. On that score, I'm rather sickened that the BNP now has a seat on the London Assembly.

In Reading, where I live, the council slipped out of Labour's control (to NOC) for the first time in eleven years. It's been one of those elections. If you want to know how I feel about that, well, it's a secret ballot :)