John Biggs delivered a far more generous victory speech last night to the Tower Hamlets First brigade than they perhaps deserved.
It wasn’t what he said precisely but the tone he used. I suppose it’s easy and better to be magnanimous in victory than to be crowing and churlish but he congratulated Rabina Khan for her campaign (who, by the way, didn’t reciprocate in her speech – she forgot to say well done and instead focused on the ‘me, me’ parts) and he promised to recognise the fact she polled so many votes. She won almost 26,000 votes on the first round, 1,500, or less than 2 per cent, behind John.
John Biggs making his winning speech, a year late, better late than never. Mayor Biggs pic.twitter.com/d72FkzyxNQ
— Tarik (@Tarikahmedkhan) June 12, 2015
He said we shouldn’t forget that “a lot of bad things have happened” but that we should now move on.
He said he would hold office as a Labour mayor but in also praising Peter Golds he hinted at possible cooperation to come.
Peter, in his speech, struck a more wary tone. He said John won by “borrowing” votes from the other parties. As he said this, John raised a somewhat surprised eyebrow, but given the comments on this blog and on Twitter during the past couple of days, as well as the feedback John’s opponents were getting on the doorstep, I think Peter was doing no more than stating the bleeding obvious.
Peter polled 5,940 votes, or 8.7 per cent of the first round total. This was almost the same as Chris Wilford achieved last year in percentage terms (he got 7,173 votes in total) but far below the 20 per cent the Tories achieved only last month in the general election for the borough’s two constituencies.
And in second preference votes, there were a huge number of Tories who put Labour second yesterday.
For sure, this was an election in which Labour found friends in other parties.
I know that had John won last year he’d been planning to create an administration reflective of the rainbow nature of his support. It would be very surprising were that not the case this time.
The Government commissioners (who like almost all senior council officers will have been relieved by the result) will surely leave once they see functional politics at play again.
This is why Peter was right in his speech at the ExCeL centre to warn about the consequences for THF of last night’s defeat. Where do their band of jokers go now? Labour and the Tories will need to watch their backs when it comes to future candidate selection for councillors. More about them in a future post.
But more immediately, John now has to create an administration. He has already appointed three deputy mayors in Rachael Saunders, Shiria Khatun and Sirajul Islam, but there will be others wanting some reward. It was noticeable that Abdal Ullah, no longer a councillor, was the man who escorted John into the count last night.
There’s now a cabinet and other appointments to be be made. Some in his Labour group will have to bide their time. Will John take a Sir Robin Wales approach and dish out special responsibility allowances like confetti?
And how will he thank the Tories and in particular Peter Golds? Not so long ago, I suggested he’d make an excellent council Speaker. I think he’d love wearing the civic chains and ensuing order in the council chamber. Offering that role to him for a year would seem a wise choice. After that, I’d put him in charge of transparency and anti-corruption: a mini-Eric Pickles.
And then there’s Rabina. Could John offer her something? Would he? Would she accept? A role to encourage more women into politics? It would certainly create a split in the group of 17 “independents”. Or would she prefer to lead their group as Opposition leader. If the latter, she will need to formally join them and then take on Oli Rahman who has assumed that role.
And there is some talk about Rabina’s team examining a possible election petition against John’s win but how serious that is and on what grounds, I’m not sure.
I took some videos of this morning’s speeches and I will publish them once they’ve finished uploading in two hours’ time…
Lastly, congratulations to Labour’s Sabina Akhtar for winning in Stepney and to Andy Erlam and the other petitioners. Andy polled 1,768 votes yesterday – less than 3% – but his fans are of a far, far higher number than that.
Meanwhile, here are some photos of last night’s fun.
Trial by Jeory 
Election Petition? Well a bit exaggerated, but certainly the unauthorised third party pro-Labour “Unity Task Force Newsletter” (1 page in Bengali, 3 in English, and some reprinting of Trial by Jeory articles about the “curry king”) that came to many whitechapel and shadwell homes was below the belt campaigning. A bit reminiscent of Rahman’s methods. My bet is that a lot of the local business elites responsible for that shameful leaflet (all Rahman backers in 2010) will now wish to continue unduly influencing TH politics, perhaps even on a grander scale by promoting their minions into the Labour party locally. Their newsletter already made clear they expect concessions Those who were behind the times and stuck with loser Khan during the mayoral campaign are likely to follow suit, once they see that the council chamber remnants of what was once the might force of THF are now a dead end for this business aspirations. I’m not politically partisan for any of the big parties, but only a vote for Andy Erlam would have really changed tower hamlets, none of the others deserved any second preference vote, least of all the cuts-loving mini-Eric Pickles as you put it.
I would like to see Biggs petition for a referendum on whether Tower Hamlets should have a Mayor. The vote won’t be fore the next election + Labour’s original stand was not to have a Mayor for the council + Biggs may want to move on by then. So nothing lost + a lot to gain by having a professional executive, over that of the previous corrupt one…
Can’t do that four another four years under the law..
Don’t worry there is a group of us who want to collect signatures and trigger a referendum. We just need to clarify the rules and timescales, etc, then we will start.
Do you currently have a mailing list to keep supporters informed ?
CC.
My only worry is that Biggs really does not appreciate how much he owes his Mayoralty to Conservatives who backed him on first, or more likely second vote.
…..and the fact that it didn’t rain!
It strikes me that ALL the parties need to put a lot more effort into addressing constituency issues and being an effective local party at the grassroots – then choose your future candidates for Councillor based on who does best at getting problems solved
I’ve met more than a few Labour Councillors who have been a complete waste of space irrespective of their own opinion about how important they were.
Labour needs to ditch the self-important ones and mobilise those who work hard on grass roots issues. Future Councillors need to EARN any upgrade in status
Peter Golds either needs to be Speaker or Chair of Overview and Scrutiny. I rather suspect he’d prefer the latter!
I think he’d prefer the former.
I personally know 2 conservatives who gave their first vote to Biggs just because they couldn’t stand the idea of Rabina winning. I myself gave him my second vote that would otherwise go elsewhere………….
I recon the number of those “borrowed” votes is much bigger than anyone would dare to think.
I awoke to a Rabina-free zone 🙂
“given the comments on this blog and on Twitter during the past couple of days, as well as the feedback John’s opponents were getting on the doorstep, I think Peter was doing no more than stating the bleeding obvious”
Good to see Ted reverting to his traditional role as tory cheer leader and spokesman for the racist nut jobs on his comment thread.
In the decade of covering tower hamlets politics I’ve been called anti-Labour, pro-respect, anti-Tory, pro-labour, anti-respect, pro-lib dem and Tory cheerleader.
Job done really.
Rah Rah! 😉
Goodness knows who Spikey is – but Spikey by temperament as well as by name is the way that particular comment comes across! 🙂
Can you name these nut jobs spikey? Probably not as you sound like a Trot who has got the whole thing badly wrong.
No Ted. The job has not yet been done. You have one task left, become a cheerleader for the Rahman & mob 😉
Oh, but I wrote this in my last Trial by Jeory column for the East London Advertiser in October 2008:
Shame it failed to develop into a genuine ‘Lets Serve the Public’ philosophy.
National political party allegiances always seen to cause local government deterioration. None seem to understand its really about serving the public, non-politically, and putting a happy smile on everyone’s face.
Politicians egos, their lust for absolute power, the inevitable back-stabbing and the shadowy influence from their national party headquarters spoils and defaces the dream of simply serving the public with pride and humanity for all.
Putting local people’s interests first is never achieved because of national political party pressure and government intervention.
Democracy ?
😦
How on earth did Tower Hamlets manage to lose two excellent Chief Executives – Martin Smith and then Kevan Collins – or Sir Kevan Collins as he should now be known?
For me it was when people of that calibre leave that I knew for certain there was something deeply unpleasant and corrupt going on in the Mayor’s Office.
I like to think that one or the other or both have been answering questions from the Met. Police of late in relation to what they know of the corrupt behaviour of the late and unlamented ex Mayor. I can think of at least one issue which has yet to make newspaper headlines about which one of the above can help the police with their inquiries.
A real pity that the band of four, who brought Lutfur to trial, didn’t receive acknowledgement or thanks.
Rabina Khan should be marginalised and isolated – there should be no place for a single community mindset within the leadership of this borough. She is a living definition of everything that was so wrong for years – starting from her denial regarding fraud, corruption, mismanagement, dodgy expenses and finishing with the way she was only ever interested in one community and their needs.
John Biggs should never forget what he owes to the Petitioners and Peter Golds. He should be reminding himself every single day of his mayorship.
Labour must have some robust and structured safeguard against inside infiltration by sympathisers of Rahman. It is slightly uncomfortable when Biggs says he picks up Islam as his deputy mainly because he represents Bengali community, it is slightly uncomfortable to see him being surrounded by Bengali crowd. We must never forget that it was Labour that invented Rahman and then lost control of him. We must not forget about block voting stories and secret meetings between Biggs and Rahman’s strategists.
This might be the start of a new, better, truly “magical” Tower Hamlets but Biggs must think about the borough as one big community working together and abandon the tactic of using Bengali community as a tool for election wins and Tories as rivals. Including Peter Golds in the plan of a long term improvement action plan would be the best sign of a new era.
I think a nice BIG photo of the Petitioners in his office might be a suitable reminder to both him and all the other people he has to speak with that sometimes the ordinary men and women bite back if you push them too far.
And to the few brave staff who spoke out!
I’d agree with the conclusion that Labour were elected with votes that went to the Tories in the last election.
Given the closeness of the vote now, that necessarily means that it is highly likely that Rahman was elected with a majority of the true vote (if we take this election now to not have had incidents of malpractice). To explain further – Tories voted Tory in the Rahman election, Labour’s majority now is based on these Tories switching; if they hadn’t switched, Biggs would have lost.
And so what happened with Rahman, was that some wrong votes for him were used to unseat him – EVEN though he was still received majority support of the LEGITIMATE votes when he was elected.
A state coup, in other words.
As us communists know, democracy is but a veneer.
Another theory being touted by Bengali hacks I spoke to last night is that the Mawrey verdict not only brought unwanted shame and so either caused Lutfurites to abstain or switch, but also acted as a deterrent to those who had been engaged in vote fraud.
I think there’s a lot of truth in what Ted says
I have no doubt whatsoever that the ex Mayor’s behaviour was felt by many to have brought shame on their community. People really don’t like being shamed.
I also gather a number of the polling stations had very large posters highlighting the fact that engaging in electoral fraud was a criminal offence e.g. personation carried a £5,000 fine
You can’t beat a little bit of education in the facts of life!
Whatever – at some point they lost over 10k votes to
* disengagement
* fear of conviction / fines / prison
* shame re behaviour of the ex Mayor et al
* male beliefs that women should stay out of politics and not shriek or whine
* female beliefs that Rabina was the antithesis of a role model
What would have been much more interesting was if Rabina had run a genuinely independent campaign with no sight nor sound of the ex Mayor. I think he’s electoral poison and effectively lost her a LOT of votes.
Absolute BS! Conservative voters gave Labour their second preference votes (second) in the last election as well.
I don’t know where you think John Biggs’ hefty 6,500 votes came from in that election! The bulk of course came from Conservative voters.
Another way of looking at it is that a number of normally middle of the road voters voted for Labour and Conservative as one way of balancing their vote and making sure it went to the real contenders rather than the UKIPs and LibDems and Greens.
Let’s get it right – so long as the ex Mayor engaged in an illegal and corrupt practices he forfeited ALL votes and his Mayoralty.
At no point was he ever elected fairly
I don’t know why this very simple point is completely lost on some people.
Regardless of votes switching from Tory to Lab (and ignoring the fact that was always possible in two votes system) what you fail to mention is Tower Hamlets First seem to have mislaid 10,000 votes since last year. Rather careless, no?
Agreed!
I noted this last night on the previous post – plus see my response to Ted’s comment above.
I think the 10,000 votes only existed on paper at the last election and they disappeared with the added scrutiny at this election.
Southpawpunch AKA Marc Francis, you have lost and you should resign your seat.
We will probably never know exactly how many postal votes were stolen, or otherwise harvested. How many electors intimidated into voting for THF by Lutfur’s heavies? How many electors failed to go to the polling stations because of the nasty atmosphere? How many Muslim voters were induced to vote THF by their Imams? How overnight the majority against Conservative candidate Gloria Thienel suddenly leapt from 4 to 204 between the first count and the recount? Lets not forget that this Mayoral Election was called because Rahman and the first of his cronies were found guilty of corruption and electoral fraud. How many more by-elections will we have to endure when the same basic facts are applied to other former THF councillors? To attempt to defend Rahman’s election as somehow “legitimate” is just not credible.
The 10,000 extra voters are on holiday in Bangladesh and are now dead (permanently). ~_~
Don’t be silly !
They are not dead. They are merely holidaying and planning to return at the next election 🙂
V Day for the people of TH:
13 months of lies and corruption ended last night as John Biggs was duly elected mayor of Tower Hamlets. Firstly it was not a close victory it was a landslide victory. John managed to sweep more than 5,000 2nd pref votes whilst Rabina only had over 600. People clearly have John a mandate this shows that people of this borough were fed up of Lutfurs lies and attempts to manipulate residents. The season of oppression is over and the time for clean and fair politics has officially started.
But I give Rabina my full respects as she worked tremendously hard to secure a victory however she was not what the people wanted and was not strong enough to take on a borough like Tower Hamlets. As I mentioned before the only members of the dismantled Tower Hamlets First party that were real threats to John was Ohid (Former DM) or Abjol (Respect) and if one of them stood they could of won this election marginally.
I am sure this will mark the end of Lutfur and him and his corruption will remain a distant memory for the people of this borough and we can move forward. After all the real reason Lutfur put up a weak candidate was to ensure if she won he would still be in control (unofficially of course).
I wonder if Lutfur will be stupid enough to stand in the next election?
THL
Watch ITN London Tonight, all of Lutfurs cronies are pulling the victim card.
I’m surprised you think John Biggs would give jobs out to Rabina and Goulds. Why would he, when he doesn’t have enough jobs to give to Labour people? He doesn’t owe the Tories anything. And Rabina is just arrogant. Ted’s description of her speech being “me me me” is exactly how she comes across to me. She would never have got to be a councillor in the first place if it wasn’t for the Labour party, but you’ll never see her accept that.
Actually it was Respect, unless I’m wrong, that kick started her career of corruption.
John owes the Tories a lot I think a lot of Tories switched to Labour for this election, I certainly met quite a few who gave Labour 1st pref when I was knocking up on election day in Limehouse.
However more than this John owes the Peter Golds and Tories because of the Petition. Peter made an ENORMOUS contribution. He worked tirelessly and was a very credible witness as well as providing a lot of invaluable ‘in court’ support to Francis our barrister.
John owes his mayoralty to the Petition.
You say there are not ‘enough jobs for Labour people’?
Following the logic that the Petition delivered the victory lets see who the brave councillors are who CREATED the opportunity for John’s mayoralty:
Khales Uddin Ahmed – worked tirelessly
Abdul Mukit
Danny Hassell
Claire Harrison
Rajib Ahmed
Sirajul Islam
Sabina Aktar (newly elected)
Those are the people who have put themselves in the firing line. Those are the people without whom John would not be sitting in the Mayor’s chair at all.
Debbie,
You carelessly omitted the person who make it all happen. Without his involvement Biggs would not be mayor ………….
Lutfur Rahman, Esquire
Video of last night
Peter Golds certainly deserves a reward – a knighthood from the Tory PM would fit the bill nicely.
Yes, I agree. 🙂
That was fast! A well deserved award.
https://trialbyjeory.com/2015/06/12/peter-golds-made-a-cbe-in-queens-birthday-honours-list/
So Her Majesty the Queen must read this blog too. Ted you must be chuffed.
No chance. Rabina Khan’s claiming she won, Ali claims its a right wing conspiracy, the very same people who committed intimidation last time are now claiming g victimisation. I’m glad I left last year.
No mention here of the man who first stood up to corruption and deserves to be recognised. I speak of course of Helal Abbas Uddin. Personally vilified by the Lutfur Rahman paid for Ken Livingstone edited London Bangla as wife beater, his family threatened by phone calls and abandoned by the Labour Party when the Crown Prosecution Service dropped the criminal case against London Bangla he soldiered on and won.
Twelve years ago as leader of the council he instituted the first investigation into financial corruption which resulted in three people going to prison and the then Livingstone lackey Kumar Murshid avoiding jail but being finished in politics, something that His Newtness repaid by campaigning for Rahman in defiance of the Labour Party.
Let’s here three silent cheers for him as he stood up when others were keeping their heads down.
Offering a deal to Rabina of any of the ex-THF mob would be a betrayal of the trust voters put in John to clean up the Borough.
Exactly. They will now be queuing up to join Labour.
I.E. “Business as Usual”. It must not happen.
Jay Kay, yes it would be a betrayal and a pointless one as the independents are singularly lacking in talent. My take is that most of them will lose their seats at the next election, possibly all, even if further legal action isn’t taken against them.
The events of the last few days should be seen, I believe, in the context of those that began in 2003 with the first big anti war demonstration when the far left saw the turnout and thought that they had found a substitute for the white working class, the proles, who had so let the revolutionary leadership down by refusing to perform the role that Marxists had allotted to them.
The time has come for an analysis of how Respect blossomed on the back of ambitious young Asian wannabee politicos in various parts of the country who basically told the left what they wanted to hear in terms of the formation of a mass based party to the left of Labour and then abandoned the whole project when they no longer needed it.
I don’t know about the machinations of how the parties came about.
However I certainly agree with your first para i.e. that most will lose their seats at the next election – witness the Stepney result.
There is a lot of difference between:
1) respecting the people who voted for an alternative perspective – and earning their trust – and
2) respecting the politicians that community voted for in the past – on the strength of a party ticket. Some of them have behaved in ways which bring the office of Councillor into disrepute. That’s not all of them but it’s certainly some of them.
Besides which we don’t know what will be the outcome of the Met. Police investigations into what has happened in the past re. corruption etc
Of one thing I am certain – the Met. Police would not dare to come back this time saying there isn’t a problem given the findings of the Election Court and the extent to which the Register has had to be purged etc etc
The only question is whose names are going to be named when they finally finish off digging properly into the mess of the last few years.
“And there is some talk about Rabina’s team examining a possible election petition against John’s win”
Can these people never accept that they are wrong, and beaten? Or is it that they can’t accept the loss of face that losing entails?
Is there any further news of Rahman’s appeal against Mawrey’s verdict? That’s one I’d really like to see go ahead; zero chance of success but another pile of money thrown up the wall.
What about Galloway’s appeal against his defeat at the last general election? He’s another idiot with an over-inflated self-worth and ego.
Nasty, nasty, nasty. Well done Biggs. Here’s to TH politics developing into something less foetid (although I don’t hold my hopes up on that one.)
Tim.
Galloway is out of time on his appeal against his election result. Besides which he was as usual mouthing off and was never intending to do it.
If Rabina and her husband want to bankrupt themselves then so be it.
They can ‘examine’ all they like. If in the unlikely event of any petition ever getting to Court, I’m sure there will be much hilarity at a petition bought by Councillors who have been elected by corrupt and illegal practices, led by an ex-Mayor, who undeniably is part of Rabina’s ‘team,’ who has been found guilty of election fraud and kicked out of office.
Oh how simply marvellous; another Tower Hamlets election petition 🙂
Can’t wait to read all the sleazy allegations including Biggs, Golds and the other rabble unfairly creating conditions that were not conducive to more election fraud.
Another likely election petition challenge is one person only one vote, this time. Everyone knows one person one vote is always detrimental to THF campaigns and to the numerous Ghosts that flock to Tower Hamlets every election keen to volunteer their help to THF campaign.
Curious Cat
Gor, Ted, you can either be thick or a Labour stooge.
Peter Golds, Speaker? That obviously takes him off into a non-political role and a captive patsy of the Labour majority for 12 months, while Labour (from whom Lutfur, Alibor & Co came from) quietly cart off the dead bodies for a year, unseen by the keen eye of the only real opposition councillor – Labour having been an absolutely useless craven opposition to Lutfur for five hard years.
It might be nice for Labour to play the same old games but it only proves John Biggs is Lutfur Rahman with a white face and less corruption.
I may be thick but I also talk to the right people so am more likely to be a bit informed than you, son.
I’ve got to agree with Ted – Golds would be a great speaker: he’s well respected, clearly cares about LBTH and he’s been subjected to enough abuse in the council chamber to give him an insight into how to deal with any rowdy behaviour.
Of course, whether Golds wants that position or an appointment under Biggs is another question….
After what happened with the Lib Dems in the General Election, there is a real risk that you could be seen as betraying the voters and not standing up for your party line.
I guess, though, we will have to see what happens.
Judging by the ridiculous comments being made by Rabina and the likes of Shahed Ali and Oliur Rahman on twitter and facebook, I’m sensing that the ex-THF Councillors, elected by corrupt and illegal practices, are in no mood to accept any deals even in the unlikely event any are offered.
You’re wise to “warn about the consequences for THF of last night’s defeat. Where do their band of jokers go now? Labour and the Tories will need to watch their backs when it comes to future candidate selection for councillors.”
Several Conservative candidates for Newham Council on 22 May 2014 were Labour members not six months earlier. Most resigned from Labour early in 2014. One escaped due to confusion about his name and then tried to become a Labour by-election candidate. Labour expelled him before the Conservatives did.