THE THAMESMEAD GRUMP.
AN APOLOGY
In my review of candidates for the Mayor of London election last Sunday, I neglected to mention two of the them. I didn't make any mention of Ankit Love (One Love Party) or Prince Zylinski (Independent).
This was an inexcusable oversight on my part and was caused by the omission of any manifesto published by either of them in the "Guide to the Candidates" pamphlet sent to me by the Returning Officer.
Ankit Love, self proclaimed Emperor of Jammu and Kashmir, he has called on British military personnel to remove David Cameron and replace him with himself as the senior Minister of the Crown in order to enforce legislation to ban pollution. He also wants to reunite India and Pakistan, (not particularly a London issue) and legalise cannabis.
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| Prince John Zylinski (The Guardian) |
Prince John Zylinski, who was intending to give the Polish community in London a voice. He also planned to challenge Nigel Farage to a sword fight in Hyde park, a challenge Nigel sensibly declined. This guy has form; his Father once dispatched a squadron of invading Nazi soldiers with his sword while serving in the Polish army in 1939.
As Ankit Love only polled 4941 votes and Prince Zylinski 13,202, I feel part way responsible for their poor result. I can only promise that I will make it up to them next time. (I really hope both of them stand again).
Meanwhile,
back in the real world.
I can't think of any other city in the world where the people can so easily spot a "wrong'un". Running up to the election itself, we were bombarded with racist propaganda aimed at Sadiq Khan; not only from the usual suspects, UKIP, BNP, etc., but also from the Tory party.
To be fair, I don't think Zak Goldsmith's heart was really in the racist campaign, I rather suspect he might actually be a decent bloke, but one thing that Londoners really don't like is having an outsider trying to come between them.
Sadiq Khan may be the Son of a Pakistani immigrant, he may be a Muslim, but at the bottom of it, he's a Londoner and that counts for something to other Londoners. The Tories using race as an election strategy is nothing new of course. Those of us with long political memories will recall the general election of 1964 where, in the West Midlands constituency of Smethwick, the local branch of the Tory party successfully managed to buck the national swing to Labour and unseat the sitting Labour MP Patrick Gordon Walker using the slogan "if you want a nigger for a neighbour, vote Labour".
Officially, Tory head office denied that it was anything to do with them but they were certainly aware that it was being used by activists in the campaign and did nothing to stop it.
London is not the West Midlands however and the campaign here backfired spectacularly.
What better way of sticking two fingers (the traditional London salute) up at the extremists on all sides than to elect a Muslim Mayor. It won't stop the extremists bleating on still of course. Islamic extremists will still be claiming the Sadiq Khan isn't a proper Muslim because he doesn't think that women who disobey their Husbands should be stoned to death, and the master race will still be claiming that now he is Mayor, he is going to introduce Sharia law on London buses.
You all now know what London really thinks of you.
NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT.
Farthings were still in circulation when I was a small child but you could never spend them because shopkeepers couldn't be bothered with them. When the Farthing was abolished in 1960 it would be worth just over 5p in today's money.
That being the case, you would think that most people would be glad to see the back of them, the 2p piece as well. There is even a good argument for getting rid of the 5p when you consider it is now worth less than the unloved Farthing. I suspect that most of the resistance comes from those retailers who are incapable of setting any price for any of their products that doesn't end in 99p. A quick trawl through the Argos catalogue shows that they have almost nothing where the price doesn't end in 99p, or at least something ending with a 9, even really expensive items. One TV set costs £1849.99p.
They are not the only retailers doing this and by abolishing the 1p piece, they would no longer be able to claim that £1849.99p is much less than £1850.
THE THAMESMEAD GRUMP QUIZ.
I had hoped that my quiz would give readers an opportunity to test their brain skills but as I haven't had a single response from either of them, I don't think I will bother any more.
THE VIKING SEA.
In case you missed it, here is the Viking Sea on it's way down the river after it's naming ceremony at Greenwich.
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