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Support: Ken Livingstone with Labour members and candidate Mike Katz, fourth from left |
Ken predicts Brown will bring by-election victory for Labour
In exclusive interview Mayor says PM’s values will win over Iraq war critics
WHEN Tony Blair came to Camden just days before last year’s council elections, he thought he was boosting Labour’s campaign during turbulent times. A landslide defeat followed and Labour was turfed out of the Town Hall.
Ken Livingstone’s latest visit to Camden was also aimed at bolstering an election campaign but the Mayor of London is clearly seen as a safer pair of hands than the former Prime Minister.
In an exclusive interview with the New Journal, Mr Livingstone said that a return to old-fashioned Labour values under Gordon Brown would win voters back.
The big test of that prediction comes in Camden in one week when residents go to the polls in the crunch Haverstock by-election.
It is one of the first by-elections to be held under Mr Brown’s new regime and Labour members are trying to use it to start a fightback against the Lib Dem and Conservative coalition which seized power at the Town Hall last May.
It has now become critical for Labour to defend a seat previously held by alderman Roy Shaw against a stiff challenge from the Lib Dems. Defeat would indicate the party has made little headway in its attempts to claw back support.
Mr Livingstone, a former Camden councillor, weighed in with a package of promises, vowing to:
* Defend against any moves to withdraw the Freedom Pass.
* Help fund round-the-clock policing on estates hit by youth gangs.
* Fight any cuts to services and care home provision for the elderly.
* Protect scenic views of London from Hampstead Heath from the intrusion of skyscrapers.
* Take another look at unpopular plans to extend the 393 bus route through back streets in Kentish Town.
His pledges have been dismissed as “by-election bluster” by cynics, who see Mr Livingstone’s intervention as a direct attempt to unsettle the Lib-Dem campaign headed by candidate Matt Sanders.
Mr Livingstone said the Town Hall’s new ruling coalition had shown it had a “nasty streak”. At the risk of being patronising to residents, he believed voters would realise they had made “a terrible mistake” by unseating Labour.
He added: “A lot of Labour people like myself who were very upset about the war and some of the decisions of the last 10 years have been quite encouraged by the start Gordon Brown has made.
“It seems to be traditional Labour values coming through and I think people will start responding to them. Certainly, people who protested against Labour in the borough elections last year I think must realise they made a terrible mistake. They have seen local services devastated.”
Mr Livingstone was at the Queen’s Crescent Community Centre to meet candidate Mike Katz and other party members.
While Conservatives insist they are running a serious campaign by putting up former councillor Peter Horne in Haverstock, the winner is almost certain to come from either Labour or the Lib Dems, who share the other two council seats in the ward.
On his promise to safeguard free travel for the elderly, Mr Livingstone said: “I am absolutely clear that while I live and breathe it’s going to be retained.”
Asked about journalist Sir Simon Jenkins’ claim in last week’s New Journal that his planning policies would lead to the London skyline looking like the tower-filled skyline of Kuala Lumpur, Mr Livingstone said: “The London plan is that there should be a cluster of tall buildings around Liverpool Street and Canary Wharf and over a big station you can have a tower.
“You can’t have one in the middle of Primrose Hill – it’s contrary to planning laws.”
He added: “I have just specified corridors where nothing can be built to protect the view.”
On Camden Council’s spending plans which have seen council tax frozen, with the help of cuts in services, Mr Livingstone said: “If you are dealing with a Liberal-controlled council out in Sutton and Richmond, they are often very progressive and doing things I agree with. But the ones in the inner cities seem to have a quite nasty streak in them, going for the most vulnerable people, cutting facilities for the elderly, young people or ethnic minorities.”
The Haverstock by-election is on July 12. |
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