The Thamesmead Grump

THE THAMESMEAD GRUMP 

GUIDE TO THE 

MAYOR OF LONDON ELECTIONS

This Thursday, the people of London will be deciding on who is to run their city for the next 5 years. Most of them will stay at home and not bother to vote of course, but for those of you who are interested, here is a short description of each Mayoral candidate.

Zac Goldsmith (Conservative). Zac Goldsmith belongs to the same party that wants to abolish the NHS, the BBC and privatise our education services. As an ex-Etonian oik and Son of one of the richest men who ever lived, he is well placed to understand the problems of poverty which affects so many Londoners. His seeming association with controversial figures such as the Islamic cleric Suliman Gani has done nothing to enhance his reputation however. Can't fault his green credentials though. Once editor in chief of "The Ecologist" magazine and supporter of more environmental controls, his position has sometimes put him at odds with right wing Tories. I wonder how he would have got on with Bexley Council.

Sadiq Khan (Labour). Sadiq Khan has the dubious honour of being the only Mayoral candidate to be subjected to death threats by Islamic extremists for supporting same sex marriage and challenging religious extremism.. This according to the Daily Mail makes him a "darling" of Jihadists. They haven't threatened to kill the BNP candidate so that must mean they don't like him. His main selling point is that he isn't the Tory. He has claimed that he will tackle the Tory housing crisis but doesn't explain why he didn't solve the previous Labour one.

The no-hopers.

Caroline Pidgeon (Lib Dem). As a keen bird watcher, I will always have a soft spot for anyone called Pidgeon. She makes pretty much the same promises as the other candidates with regard to improving the lot of Londoners and like them, seems a bit light on how she would achieve this. No Liberal Democrat candidate is ever going to be Mayor of London so I suppose that defies the adage that politicians are only interested in power.

David Furness (British National Party). Not to be confused with David Furnish, Husband of Elton John. The BNP is pretty much a non existent force now that most of their members have decamped to UKIP. At the last count, they were down to their last few hundred. His message is pretty much the same as it has always been, which is that all the ills which presently befall our society will vanish like the morning mist if we deport all this immigrants that Enoch Powell brought over in the 1950s. He bleats on a lot about Islam but then, all the nutters do that. He also claims to support traditional Christian ideals although he doesn't mention if this includes burning witches.

Lee Harris (Independent). According to the official pamphlet that came through our door the other day, Lee Harris is the nominated candidate for CISTA. Me neither, I had to look it up. I still don't know what it stands for but apparently they want to legalise drugs. That makes him the obvious candidate for many Thamesmead and Abbey Wood residents but not, I suspect, for their dealers. He is the person to vote for now that Screaming Lord Sutch is dead.

Sophie Walker (Women's Equality Party). God give me strength.

George Galloway (Independent). George Galloway - that's it really. Nothing much else to say.

Peter Whittle (UK Independence Party). Not that much different from the British National Party which spawned it and whose members they now claim as their own, their policies are similar to the three main parties with a side order of bigotry. That is to say, everything will be better once we get rid of the nig-nogs. UKIP are one of the few parties to officially support Britain's exit from the EU along with the BNP, Respect and the Monster Raving Loony Party. As the (I believe) only openly gay candidate, many UKIP supporters will be having a serious clash of conscience on Thursday.

Paul Golding (Britain First). As this is a completely unbiased report, I will not let my personal views get in the way of me presenting a balanced description of each candidate. Paul Golding is an odious piece of shit. He is so vile that even other Nazis won't have anything to do with him. An ex member of both the National Front and the BNP, he helped set up his own party along with a few of his cronies including convicted paedophile John Broomfield and Jim Dowson who has suspicious links with Northern Irish terrorist group the UVF. He claims to support British troops but he has been running stalls selling merchandise he claims to be for injured soldiers but is keeping the money himself. He also uses images of murdered soldier Lee Rigby in party propaganda even though the family have asked him not to. Last year, he and other party activists were harassing young Royal British Legion poppy sellers, claiming that they were protecting them from harassment.

Sian Berry (Green Party).  Sian Berry believes in "The Power of Good Ideas". She also believes in low carbon, non nuclear energy (a contradiction in terms). She is also a unilateral nuclear disarmer and supports anti GMO loonies but is surprisingly ambiguous about the existence of Unicorns. She wants us to upcycle our junk. I think I might start with this pamphlet.