Hiatus

Sadly, at the moment it’s not possible for me regularly to update this site. I would strongly recommend that anyone who finds themselves on this page while looking for close scrutiny of the actions of the London Mayor to take a look at the sterling work being done by BorisWatch.co.uk. In the meantime, Boris, even if we’re not writing about you, we’re still watching you.

The first forensic results are in

Boris’ Forensic Audit Panel has released an interim report on effectiveness and value-for-money in the LDA and GLA. I suggested when they were formed that their job would be to find just enough dirt on Ken to make Boris seem like a white knight in comparison, but from this release it seems that they’re taking a slightly more subtle approach. There are two parts to this: the official interim report, and then the panel comments to the press about the report. A quick summary of both:

In the report it is claimed that “the London Development Agency has been historically an organisation where success was measured by money out rather than objectively observed results”, and that the structure and relationship between the GLA and LDA was poorly understood and poorly managed, leading to money being squandered. This of course (and it is acknowledged in the report), all follows on from Andrew Gilligan’s dednunciation of, and subsequent war with, Ken Livingstone over allegations that the former Mayor was diverting LDA funding to his friends. Nicely summarised here. But although this is the sexy scandalous bit, they have to concede in the report that although Ken’s advisers may have pressured the LDA into making decisions about who to give grants to, “it appears that they would have been within their rights to do so. They are employed to help the Mayor achieve his objectives and the LDA is charged with delivering on those objectives.”

Thus the interim report doesn’t really conclude very much of interest. They claim that the LDA wasn’t very well managed and that some money was wasted, but they don’t really come up with anything nasty against the former Mayor.

In the press, however, it’s a different story.

For starters, Patience Wheatcroft, head of the panel, has let it be known that she is “somewhat horrified” by the results of her findings. And the Times is running a story entitled Boris uncovers Ken’s ‘wasted millions’. All this is to be expected – the panel claims to be uncovering an inefficient regime that wasted tax-payers’ money, and although (or perhaps because) they don’t have hard facts and conclusions yet, this being only an interim report, they are spinning what they do have as much as possible. But the really sneaky bit is this: The Sunday Mirror online is running a story entitled ‘Reduce Boris’s powers’. They’ve managed to get a quote from Wheatcroft claiming that “We are looking at things which could be a potential curb on the powers of the Mayor.”

Shock horror! The panel has found that Ken Livingstone expanded then abused his powers by diverting millions to his own terrible ends. They even call the Forensic Audit panel an “anti-corruption panel”.

Now compare this to the report itself, which didn’t find anything inappropriate about the behaviour of the Mayor and his aides. All it did was criticise the efficiency and effectiveness of the LDA and GLA grant-giving process. There was nothing in the report to support the idea that the Mayor’s powers need curbing.

As far as I can tell, this all means that Boris and his chums are still scared of Ken. They want to criticise and damn him, but don’t have any actual dirt. So rather than risk his wrath by insinuating anything too mean in an official document, they keep their interim report bland, and simply use it to express “concern” (the word is used five times in three pages”, but then let slip little digs at him to all any any journalists who care to listen.

It’s rather pathetic really.

As to the extent to which money was wasted by an inefficient and perhaps incompetent LDA, we can’t be sure yet. Ken Livingstone is quoted in the Times as saying “The fact that even a Tory-dominated panel keeps repeatedly coming back to such a small number of projects which allegedly failed and which represents such a tiny fraction of the LDA’s budget actually shows the organisation’s overall success.” Which is one way of looking at it. I fully expect the panel’s final report, which should come in about a month, to have some actual findings based on solid evidence, and I would imagine that it won’t reflect very well on Ken Livingstone’s mayoralty at all. But whether we’ll be able to find the evidence and facts amidst all the bluster in the press is another story, if this interim report is anything to go by.

Recycling

Just a quick note on Boris’ announcement that he is going to chair the London Waste and Recycling Board. It should be pointed out that the £60m they’re shouting about is to be spread over the course of 3 years, so we’re only talking £20m a year. Not a huge point, but worth being aware of.

Also, in the press release they claim that “The former Mayor refused an offer to Chair this Board.” Two points about this, gleaned from lwarb.co.uk (you have to give them an email address to access the whole site). First, the role requires 4 days a month of work. Given that Boris seems keen to spend at large parts of his mayorship on holiday (see previous post), losing another 4 days would cut his time spent actually mayoring to dangerously low levels. Second, since the job description of Chair of the Board includes the requirement to  maintain “open dialogue” with the Mayor anyway, having the Mayor actually chair the thingdoesn’t necessarily add all that much value. So there’s no real reason to chide Ken for refusing to run it.

And I’d like clarification on the following sentence from the press release:

In addition, the Mayor now aims to direct up to £24 million of London Development Agency funds, being used to improve waste management in the capital, to complement the work of the Board.

It seems to me like the natural reading of this is that £24m which is currently being used to improve waste management is going to be directed to complement the work of the Board. That work is, largely, to improve waste management. In that case, the £24m isn’t going to be spent any differently. An alternative reading is that £24m will be redirected to being used to improve waste management, and this will complement the Board’s work. But if that’s the case, where is the money coming from?

Can someone clarify?

Other blogs

The point of this blog is to keep track of what Boris does, and make a hell of a lot of noise as and when he (a) screws up, and (b) goes back on his promises. But needless to say I’m not the only one doing this. My blog is, and will continue to be, suffused with personal (doubtless prejudiced) opinion, and facts drawn from the interweb whose truth I cannot guarantee. For alternative perspectives, some less obviously biased than my own, the avid Boris watcher is encouraged to visit the following sites:

Boriswatch.com – It describes Boris Johnson as ‘the mutt’s nads’. Infer from that what you will.

Boriswatch.co.uk – This site ’started as an act of frustration, at the loss to apparent personality politics, and the accusation that somehow young people are to blame.’

Boriswatchers.blogspot.com – This is a publicly editable blog, with all the possibilities and pitfalls that entails.

Bozzawatch.blogspot.com – Has a bunch of polls, and updates often.

Let me know of any more that focus on or around the Mayor.

Introducing a man called Boris

Let me be clear. I do not hate Boris Johnson. He has done nothing, yet, to deserve my hatred.

But I do not trust him.

He’s a man with a reputation for buffoonery and public gaffes. His experience of running a large administrations is seemingly limited to running the Spectator. And now he’s in charge of London.

He needs keeping an eye on.

Here’s the Boris story so far (taken from here and here).

• He was sacked from the Times for “falsifying a quotation from his godfather Colin Lucas“, but at least he admitted his idiocy after the event.
• In 1995 a phone conversation was recorded in which he promised to supply the address of journalist Stuart Collier to school friend Darius Guppy explicitly so that Guppy could have Collier beaten up for finding out too much about his attempted insurance fraud.
• In 2004 he managed to offend the entire city of Liverpool by criticising the mourning of Ken Bigley, a contractor murdered in Iraq, and then blaming them for the Hillsborough disaster. He apologised, but only after the then Tory leader Michael Howard ordered him to.
• He was later sacked by Michael Howard from the Tory front bench for allegedly concealing the truth about an affair.
• In 2005, following the 7th July bombings, he wrote that, to non-Muslim readers of the Koran, “Islamophobia … seems a natural reaction”, in an article in the Spectator.
• In 2006 he suggested in a Telegraph article that Papua New Guinea was a country of cannibals, and when asked to apologise the best he could manage was the sarky:

“I meant no insult to the people of Papua New Guinea who I’m sure lead lives of blameless bourgeois domesticity in common with the rest of us.”

• A rotund figure himself, he allegedly dismissed Jamie Oliver’s (admittedly unsuccessful) efforts to get school children eating better meals, apparently saying:

“If I was in charge I would get rid of Jamie Oliver and tell people to eat what they like”

• Rod Liddle has allegedly accused Johnson of being prone to refer to black Africans, in private conversation, as “piccaninnies” – a term that he used in a 2002 Telegraph article, albeit in a sarcastic context.
• In April he said of Portsmouth that it was:

“…one of the most depressed towns in southern England, a place that is arguably too full of drugs, obesity, underachievement and Labour MPs”

Now, none of these are reasons to hate the man, or even to suppose him to be unfit for the job. We might even agree with some of his opinions. But I worry about having someone who’s quite so prepared to make public gaffes like that run my city. Ken was no model of tact, certainly, but that’s no reason to condone the practice of saying really stupid things to a wide audience.

Then there’s the figurehead issue. Everyone equates the words “Boris” with “Buffoon”. And this man is to be the face stamped onto the front of London. Two YouTube videos to demonstrate what I mean:

So this is the man who is to run London for the next four years.

In the next post, Boris’ manifesto. Let’s keep track of what he said he would do, and compare it to what he does do.

If you come across this blog and have anything to add, put it in a comment below.

In the meantime, Boris – we’re watching you.