It's two weeks since I last blogged. My only excuse is fighting an election campaign. Not your usual Town Hall tussle. This is the Labour eight against the Guildhall (club, line and sinker). You can read about it here. Barring unforeseen hitches, we will be fielding eight candidates in six wards enabling over 50% of the total electorate of 21,332 to choose who represents them in a contested election. Tomorrow is just the deadline for nominations. If there are contests (as we hope) in at least the six wards (out of 25) in which we are standing, then voting for 41 out of 100 seats on Common Council will take place on Monday 16 March. Among the hot topics are the state of social housing and was Brown bonkers to bail out the bankers? On the latter subject (sort of) I was quoted in the Guardian here. It read as though I was blaming Common Council for the recession, triggered as it was by systemic banking failures. I was simply trying to draw attention to the dual role played by leading City figures who act as ambassadors for London as a world financial centre, and also run the local authority known as the City of London on behalf of local residents and businesses.
Our Manifesto says:
Mismanagement of financial institutions has put people’s savings at risk. Labour members of Common Council would maintain a proper balance between the interests of residents and developers.
In short, we don't think our Prime Minister was bonkers to bail out the bankers. We hope our modest campaign will give the wider electorate an opportunity to appreciate the far greater catastrophe in terms of lost savings, pensions and jobs that would have followed if Brown had not been decisive and intervened back in October last year.