For London — the most culturally diverse of western capitals and the beating heart of global business, fashion and culture — there is much at stake in the mayoral elections to be held this week. The city’s eight and a half million residents have high expectations from their first citizen. At the very least, he or she is expected to stand above the tangle of identities and interests that constitute the city while improving the quality and safety of everyday life for all. London will then remain the magnet that it is — both for international commerce and investment, and for the lucrative tourist trade that now attracts around 17 million people a year.
The candidates In addition to their considerable powers, London mayors have become brand ambassadors for the city. Both Ken Livingstone and current Mayor Boris Johnson, each of whom have had two stints on the job after direct elections to the post were introduced in 2000, present highly contrasting but larger-than-life figures. ‘Red Ken’, as the outspoken Mr. Livingstone was called for his socialist leanings, made his mark by improving city services and protecting them from the worst excesses of Thatcherist privatisation. He won the 2012 Olympic bid for London in 2005, only to rush back the next day upon hearing of the 7/7 terrorist bombings. His management of that crisis was widely praised.
Mr. Johnson’s image as a bumbling but loveable sport who will even cut a surprise caper on a zip wire twenty feet above the ground is an artifice that the ambitious politician has carefully created. His eight-year stewardship of the city, including the successful Olympics London hosted in 2012, and his leadership of the Brexit campaign while in office will well serve his prime ministerial ambitions.
Mayoral finances are not to be scoffed at either. The mayoral office is responsible for an annual budget of around £17 billion to be used, among other things, to run transport, police and fire services, build affordable homes and promote London’s economy.
Although the two most likely successors to the post lack the public appeal of either Mr. Livingstone or Mr. Johnson, they typify the class and ethnic diversity of a city that three or four decades ago offered fairer opportunities than it does today. The Labour Party candidate is Sadiq Khan, a 45-year-old human rights lawyer and parliamentarian of Pakistani-origin, the proud son of a bus driver and seamstress mother who grew up with his seven siblings on a Tooting council estate. The Conservative candidate, Zac Goldsmith, by contrast, is the Etonian son of the billionaire, the late James Goldsmith, and grew up in leafy Richmond. Ten more candidates are in the race, including the charismatic but controversial leader of the left-leaning Respect Party, George Galloway.
With an average London home today costing in excess of half a million pounds — a major source of worry and concern for young Londoners — it is not surprising that both candidates have put the housing crisis centre-stage in their campaign pitches, although each offers slightly different solutions. According to an Ipsos Mori poll held in October last year, over half of Londoners (54 per cent) chose housing as among the most important issues facing the capital, an increase of 17 percentage points over 2013. It overtook transport and the economy as the most cited issue.
Both candidates have pledged to build 50,000 new homes a year needed to meet escalating demands of a growing population that is expected to reach 10 million by 2030.
A YouGov poll taken two weeks ahead of the May 5 election showed Mr. Khan 20 points ahead of Mr. Goldsmith, a clear endorsement of Mr. Khan’s aggressive and inclusive campaigning.
Political messaging Not surprisingly, it is the political messaging behind the manifestos that has overtaken the campaign. Mr. Goldsmith and his two prominent Conservative Party campaigners, Boris Johnson and David Cameron, chose the bogey of religious extremism to malign Mr. Khan by alleging that he had shared platforms with radical Islamic preachers in the past. The tactic failed to wash. Indeed, Mr. Khan met the charge with a renewed commitment to crack down on extremism and its threat to London. In doing so, he also scored a political point against his radical Islamic critics by proving that unlike Paris or Brussels, the two European cities that have suffered recent terror attacks, London might well have a Muslim mayor.
Meanwhile Mr. Goldsmith’s efforts to win the hearts and minds of the capital’s immigrant population — which was three million in 2011, according to British census data, and is projected to reach five million by 2031 — by some divisive campaigning, backfired. A leaflet distributed to the homes of British-Indians warned that Labour would tax family heirlooms including jewellery, and reminded them that Mr. Khan did not attend Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Wembley bash during his visit to the U.K. last year. Many voters found the leaflet and its provocative message offensive and patronising.
For Mr. Khan it would appear the threat to his campaign comes from within the Labour Party and not from the opposition ranks. In the sharply divided party, Mr. Khan is a moderate Blairite who is not wildly supportive of the socialist, Jeremy Corbyn. The recent row over allegations of anti-Semitism within the Labour party have come in handy not just for the political opponents of Labour, but for the anti-Corbyn faction within the party, with which Mr. Khan is aligned. With just four days to go for the election, Mr. Khan has said that his chances of pulling off a victory have been jeopardised by the allegedly anti-Semitic remarks of Mr. Livingstone, which he claims may cost him tens of thousands of Jewish votes in the city. This section could vote against him, or decide not to vote at all. Either way it is Mr. Khan who stands to lose.
parvathi.menon@thehindu.co.in
