Call Sign February 2008 - Page 32 - KEN LIVINGSTONE ON C4 DISPATCHES PROGRAMME

Did you see Channel 4’s Dispatches programme last week? I did because although I don’t like blood sports, there’s nothing so enjoyable for an old Tory like me as watching two acknowledged lefties, Martin Bright the political editor of the New Statesman and Mayor Ken, locked in mortal combat. Bright won’t be voting for Ken, as he told us right at the start the show. But what did he actually tell us? Not much to be honest. Ken Livingstone apparently likes a drink, treats the London Assembly with contempt, employs a bunch of hard left wingers who want to overthrow world capitalism, gives money to dodgy organisations that don’t seem to keep accounts and can’t actually tell you where the money’s gone and spends more time in Venezuela than he does in Harrow or Hackney. Now tell me something I don’t know! Ken likes a drink and bears defecate in woods. He always has and I’m sorry he obviously now feels the need for a dram at ten in the morning. That’s a bad sign. When I was a Minister, I virtually gave up drink because the only person who thinks you’re better when you speak is you, and you never know when some nosey journalist is going to stick a microphone under your nose. His lefty connections are genuinely worrying. John Ross, his economic advisor, Redmond O’Neill, his transport advisor and Simon Fletcher who looks after his private office were all members of a group called Socialist Action, which is on the real fringe of mad lefty politics. The mayor of the most aggressively capitalist city in the world absolutely relies on three men who used to do their plotting in a room over a pub in typical	*With the advance publicity on Channel 4’s Dispatches program on Ken Livingstone, Call Sign* asked former Minister of Transport for London, Steve Norris, to review it for us… KEN LIVINGSTONE ON C4 DISPATCHES PROGRAMME**
	Ken Livingstone: Likes a drink and treats the London Assembly with contempt? student style, but now meet over the water cooler in City Hall since Ken is obligingly paying them six-figure salaries for their pains. What is their real agenda now? Have their politics changed one iota? I doubt it. The London development Agency has been a shambles for years. This is a city with one of the worst unemployment rates in the country and a massive skills gap, but the LDA throws money around like a drunken sailor on everything from St Patrick’s Day parades to politically correct knowledge schools without impacting on that one iota. And where there is rank inefficiency, lack of accountability and control, there is always the risk that money is misused. The recent Evening Standard investigation by its excellent reporter Andrew Gilligan, has uncovered a real hornet’s nest at the LDA and in my view, Livingstone only has himself to blame. The truth is that Ken Livingstone has never really been interested in making London a better city. He is obsessed instead with using the	Former Minister of Transport for London, Steve Norris, reviews the programme position and the huge power that goes with the job of Mayor, to pursue a political agenda at home and abroad that has more to do with anti-American globalisation than how to run the PCO, TfL or the Metropolitan Police Authority. He has always been like this. He has not changed since he did exactly the same at the GLC where he had more policy on the IRA and Nicaragua than on education - where the ILEA was ranked as one of the worst education authorities in Europe. A lot of cab drivers ask me how he ever got elected? The answer’s simple. Because six out of ten Londoners who could vote, didn’t. They could not be bothered to get off their fat bottoms and stroll down to the polling booth. You get what you deserve when you elect politicians, and particularly when you let other people do the job for you. Maybe after Dispatches, a few more Londoners might decide enough is enough and do something about it on May 2nd… Steve Norris

NEW WCHCD CABGUIDE COURSE

What did the Romans ever do for us?
Not just a quote from Monty Python’s classic film The Life of Brian. Do you know what they really did during the formative years of this great city

Why is London here?
How has it developed over its 2000 year history? How did our capital city evolve from the Roman port of Londinium into the world’s most important financial centre and one of its greatest tourist attractions?
Once you’ve got the answers to these and many more questions, why not tell others – and actually get paid to do it!
The Worshipful Company of Hackney Carriage Drivers, Spring Cabguide Course starts on Monday 25^th February. It will equip you with sufficient knowledge to conduct an informative and entertaining guided taxi tour of all the major places of interest (and some lesser known ones) in central London.

Topics covered include:-
History and development of the City of London
and Westminster
Architectural London
London’s oddities
The story of the River Thames, its docks, and their joint impact on London as a trading giant
Palaces, Royalty & Pageantry
Prisons, Asylums & Hospitals. How they helped

Worshipful Company of Hackney Carriage Drivers

shape London
Cab Trade history
Customer care and ideas for a tour
   The course is fully accredited by City University and co-ordinated by Graham Woodhouse – a licensed London taxi driver and Qualified City of London Guide Lecturer. All successful candidates receive the Qualified Taxi Guide badge (pictured) along with the City University Accreditation Statement.
   I did the course some years ago and loved it. It can be beneficial in various ways – as a possible source of extra income and by waking up the sleeping ‘grey matter’ by expanding upon your KoL and supplying you with new skills.
   For enrolment or further details, please contact the course co-ordinator:-

Graham Woodhouse - Tel: 07968 791 117 email: info@cabguide.com

Jim Rainbird (T25)
WCHCD Lower Warden

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