In the wake of Michael Gove’s call for schools to teach ‘British values’ the mayor was invited onto Radio 5 to discuss the matter with Shelagh Fogarty.
This is what he had to say:
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Random election facts
25 May
- Largest number of votes cast (ward): Little Ilford
- Highest turnout (ward): East Ham North – 51.97%
- Lowest turnout (ward): Beckton – 31.8%
- Highest personal vote: Farah Nazeer (Labour, Little Ilford) – 2,997
- Lowest vote (all): Moriamo Sadiq (Christian Peoples Alliance, East Ham North) – 68
- Lowest vote for an elected candidate: Anthony McAlmont (Labour, Royal Docks) – 1,201
- Highest vote for a losing candidate: Ilyas Sharif (Conservative, East Ham North) – 1,547
- Beckton had the closest contest, with just 680 votes in it
- The Conservatives finished in second place in 16 wards; UKIP were runners-up in 3 wards – Canning Town North, Canning Town South and Custom House – while the Green party finished behind Labour in Forest Gate North
In 2010 Labour not only won all 60 seats but had the top 60 candidates ranked by personal vote: no losing candidate in one ward got more votes than a winning candidate in another. That’s not the case this time. The 60 most popular candidates includes 3 Tories – Ilyas Sharif (East Ham North), Ashfaq Ahmed (Green St East) and Durai Kannan (East Ham North). In fact 7 unsuccessful Conservatives polled more votes than Anthony McAlmont, Labour’s lowest ranking candidate.
Ultimately this is meaningless, as the election is fought across 20 wards with varying electorates and turnouts. But it does point to the underlying absurdity of our current electoral system.
Four more years
23 May
Newham Labour is celebrating another four years for Sir Robin, despite a big drop in his personal vote compared to 2010.
The Conservatives’ Respect-a-like campaign brought them an extra 2% share, but at considerable cost to their credibility. Tory HQ is said to be investigating their candidate selections and election leaflets.
UKIP’s 3rd place is less alarming than it appears. They were a long, long way back and 6% of the vote is less than their London-wide average. Newham again proves it is blessedly resistant to the far right.
Jane Lithgow of the Greens will be as pleased with her 4% as Lois Austin will be disappointed with TUSC’s 2%.
It looks like the end of the road for the Christian Peoples Alliance. From 4th place to last and two-thirds of their vote vanished. They won’t be missed.
Talking of losers: the Liberal Democrats. Once upon a time they got people elected to the council; now they trail in 6th place with fewer votes than Kamran Malik.
| Candidate | Party | 2014 | 2010 | Change | |||
| Sir Robin Wales | Labour | 47,095 | 61.2% | 64,748 | 68.0% | -17,653 | -6.8% |
| Stefan Mrozinski | Conservative | 13,976 | 18.2% | 15,330 | 16.1% | -1,354 | 2.1% |
| David Mears | UKIP | 4,960 | 6.4% | ||||
| Jane Lithgow | Green | 3,055 | 4.0% | ||||
| Kamran Malik | Communities United | 2,796 | 3.6% | 6,607 | 6.9% | -3,811 | -3.3% |
| David Thorpe | Liberal Democrat | 1,757 | 2.3% | ||||
| Lois Austin | TUSC | 1,708 | 2.2% | ||||
| Alex Ocan Latim | Christian PA | 1,625 | 2.1% | 6,503 | 6.8% | -4,878 | -4.7% |
| Turnout | 76,972 | 40.60% | 95,194 | 50.40% | -18,222 | -9.8% | |
Tube strike
5 Feb
Hat tip to @RooftopJaxx for pointing me at tubesign.herokuapp.com where I made the sign.
FOI updates
16 Jul
Last month I submitted two freedom of information requests to Newham. These have now been answered and both responses were surprising, albeit in different ways.
The first request asked about the costs associated with the council’s YouTube monitoring unit. I wanted to know how many ‘law enforcement officers’ had been involved, how much money had been spent and what officers spent their time doing. I also wanted to know what metrics would be used to measure whether or not the money invested had been spent wisely.
Not unreasonable questions and ones you would have thought Newham had ready answers to. But no. The reply I got was – in almost every respect – deficient. To say that
two members of staff are involved but this equated to zero full time equivalents as the work was not undertaken on a full time basis
is simply idiotic. And stating that
no metrics will be used to evaluate [this project], as the successful outcome of removal of the videos is self evident
is patronising and lazy. If it were self-evident I wouldn’t be asking, would I?
I am surprised the reply passed through internal quality assurance checks before being sent out. Needless to say, I have requested a review and some supplementary information. This has not yet been acknowledged.
The second request asked, straightforwardly, how much the Labour party paid to use space at Newham Dockside for Ed Miliband’s big speech on social security reform. This was a party political event, not a civic one, so it was fair to assume that the council would charge for the use of its facilities. The answer I got was not at all what I expected.
Newham said they didn’t charge Labour anything because the event took place in
a non-chargeable public space within the building.
Read that again. I did. Just to make sure I hadn’t got it wrong the first time.
There’s a part of Building 1000 that is public space, which the council will not charge you for using if you want to hold an event. Even a party political event.
If that’s genuinely the policy, then fair enough. But has Newham really thought through the potential consequences of that?
I can imagine that next April, ahead of the local elections, any number of people might want somewhere to launch their campaign to be mayor. Or their party’s manifesto. Where better than the very building they hope to be elected to occupy a month later? And they can have it for free!
And the council has put itself in the position where it will be almost impossible to say no.
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