Trial by Jeory

Earlier today, as I sat through David Cameron’s speech, I received two emails. The first urged me to come along to what was being billed as a “hustings” tonight for the Tower Hamlets mayoral election on October 21. And the second also made my heart sink. (I’ll deal with that in a separate post.)

After five days of Birmingham and Tories, I wasn’t sure I had the energy for the Tower Hamlets version of politics, but I shouldn’t have worried. The event described as a hustings was anything but. The organisers were Telco Citizens; it was held at St Mary’s and St Michael Roman Catholic Church in Stepney; and the audience – made up of Telco’s constituent groups including students from Queen Mary University, various churches, the East London Mosque and the Islamic Forum of Europe – numbered about 300, possibly more.

These Telco events are deliberately tame affairs. The candidates are invited onto the stage, or as it was tonight, the pulpit, and asked by a Telco member whether they agree with a Telco demand. The candidates are even briefed beforehand on what these demands are. So in answer to tonight’s five questions (will you as mayor meet with Telco twice a year; will you encourage employers to adopt the living wage; will you support subsidising criminal record checks; will you deliver 1,000 work experience placements in the council and other public organisations; and will you support the development of community land trusts as a way of boosting social housing), not one candidate uttered the word ‘no’.

As a way of strong-arming candidates into commitments, it was fabulous; as a spectacle for those of us who have grown use to Tower Hamlets tub-thumping, it was a touch too grown up.

However, each candidate was given a couple of minutes to say why they wanted to be mayor – and that’s when it became more interesting. Helal Abbas is many things, but a public speaker he is not. I’ve seen him many times on various council committees and his questioning is among the best at the town hall, but he’s never going to be one to raise the roar of a crowd. And so it was tonight. Abbas did not want an elected mayoral. system and his argument seemed to be that because the borough has two Labour MPs, there was also a need for a Labour mayor.

Lutfur Rahman, meanwhile, was a revelation. When he was town hall leader, he often struggled for coherence in his council chamber speeches and regularly came across as somewhat plastic and nervous. Now that the Labour shackles have been removed, he seems to have found a voice and real fire in his belly. Tonight, he actually bellowed and shouted at his audience – and his supporters, including many in the IFE section, clapped and cheered. Perhaps he’s been watching George Galloway videos.

While the style may have been good, the substance was disingenuous at best. He said that as council leader, he had “delivered” on housing, that he had delivered 1,500 affordable homes. “What Labour failed to do in 13 years, I did in two years,” he said. Puzzlingly, he even claimed credit for the changes that have yet to fully happen (and which were developed well before his leadership) on the Ocean estate. He also claimed the saving of the Bancroft History Library and Archives in 2008 was his work, when in fact he was the one who proposed selling off the building and he only changed his mind after a campaign spearheaded by the East London Advertiser, as detailed on this hugely popular Downing Street petition here. And he then claimed the credit for developing plans to save Poplar Baths, when in fact those plans were drawn up, practically single-handedly by deputy council leader Joshua Peck. I know politicians have a tendency to re-write history, but come on….

And then something miraculous happened outside the church: Lutfur spoke to me. I asked him whether he’d had any media training and he said, “No, I’m just an East End boy, I really care.” I invited him to write a piece for this blog and he has agreed and I should have it by the end of the week. In return, he invited me to have dinner with him “after this campaign is over”.

What about during the campaign, I asked? No, he said. Detailed questions are what he wants to avoid, right now.

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Busy doing my day job yesterday, I missed this statement from Ken Livingstone on the Socialist Unity site. In it he confirms what he told me last Saturday – that Abbas supporters should put Lutfur Rahman second on their ballot papers for the mayoral election on October 21. He says this is the way to block a Tory win, which, given that the election will be the morning after Chancellor George Osborne reveals the full horror of his spending review, is an unlikely event in any case.

However, Labour’s top brass will be privately seething about Ken’s statement. In Manchester, he said people should “vote for the Labour candidate”; in the more sober environment of Socialist Unity, he stops short of actually encouraging everyone to vote for Abbas. His words contrast sharply with those of his fellow NEC member Oona King, who actually lives in the borough. I reported them here; here they are again:

“This is the most important election in a long time because we all know what we are facing and every single one of us has to make sure we redouble our efforts to get Abbas elected.”

Labour’s London bosses have already shown what they think of Ken’s statement. Some six hours after he filed his article warning against expelling people from the party for campaigning for Lutfur, 11 party members were given the boot as reported here and here.

Regional party boss Ken Clark will surely want Livingstone to be more unequivocal. Will Livingstone urge Lutfur supporters to switch to Abbas and place him first?

Here’s Ken’s statement in full:

by Ken Livingstone

People have asked me for my view about the Mayoral election in Tower Hamlets.

The reality is that the Labour vote is going to be divided between the candidate imposed by the NEC Helal Abbas and Lutfur Rahman, the candidate chosen by Tower Hamlets party members, who is now standing as an independent.

I do not want to see the Tories able to exploit this situation. That is the last thing we need. As the London Labour party’s email to members this week points out, the Conservatives have already won seats on the council.

We need to ensure that once this election is over the local community in Tower Hamlets can unite around whoever is Mayor in order to get the best for the borough.

Given the electoral system in this contest the position is clear: all those voting for Helal Abbas or Lutfur Rahman must use their second preference votes for the other to ensure there is no Tory or LibDem win in Tower Hamlets.

I hope both Helal Abbas and Lutfur Rahman will ask their supporters to use their second preferences for each other to demonstrate that it is possible for politics in this borough to move forward following the election.

It is the same approach that my Labour Mayoral campaign and the Green party approached the 2008 Mayoral election.

A united Tower Hamlets ought to be the objective of everyone – we should not allow how Labour’s NEC has handled this to divert us from this objective.

Labour’s NEC behaved in a way that breached all rules of fairness and justice. It also means that the candidate who came second in Labour’s selection, John Biggs with his reputation for competence and honesty, has been treated badly. I will be arguing on the NEC that the party must now work hard to ensure that the crisis is not deepened.

As with my election as an independent in 2000, there must be no wave of expulsions of those who have campaigned for Lutfur Rahman’s candidacy. I want to see the door left open for those councillors who have resigned the party whip to return so that whoever is elected can be sure that there is a strong Labour group that will work with the Mayor to ensure the needs of Tower Hamlets comes first and we reunite the local party once the dust has settled.

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A Labour spokesman has tonight confirmed to me that 11 party members, including eight councillors, have been expelled. He would not confirm names but they are thought to include the following councillors who I named in this post last week: Ohid Ahmed, Alibor Choudhury, Oliur Rahman, Rania Khan, Lutfa Begum, Rabina Khan, Aminur Khan and Shelina Aktar.

The spokesman said: “Eleven members of the Tower Hamlets Labour party have automatically expelled themselves because of their actions in clearly supporting candidates who are standing against us. The 11 include eight councillors. Anyone who campaigns against the party will receive the same action.”

Separately, a Labour source said there was deep unease over the position of Ken Livingstone who told me at the party conference in Manchester last week that the treatment of Lutfur Rahman had been “disgraceful” and urged voters to place him second on the ballot paper.

The source said that was the wrong attitude and added: “People have to realise that you’re either with us or against us in this. I’m not happy about what Ken said.”

More later

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