For those who haven't yet seen the outcome, Brian Paddick has been selected
as the Liberal Democrat nominee for Mayor.

A reminder of his transport pledge from his two page manifesto:

* Hold down fares, to be financed by "scrapping Boris Johnson's vanity
projects"
* Maintain the bus fare subsidy
* A clean-air zone for central London with action on high-polluting
vehicles
* Hand over some TfL land for affordable new homes

The full figures, for those interested, we

First round
Brian Paddick 1,289 (42%)
Mike Tuffrey 1,232 (40%)
Brian Haley 316 (10%)
Lembit Opik 252 (8%)
Total valid votes: 3,089

Second round
Brian Paddick 1,567 (51%)
Mike Tuffrey 1,476 (49%)
Majority: 91 (2%)

So the Liberal Democrats, like Labour, have decided to make it easy for Boris Johnson to be re-elected. I am an early and severe critic of Boris but I will vote for him because he is at least tolerable. I am sure there are many other Londoners who will vote likewise for the same reason.

"Paul Corfield" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 3 Sep 2011 01:27:32 +0100, "Tim Roll-Pickering"
wrote:

For those who haven't yet seen the outcome, Brian Paddick has been
selected
as the Liberal Democrat nominee for Mayor.

A shame because he'll get squashed out of the way by Ken and Boris.

While Mr Tuffrey may have less of a profile than Mr Paddick I think he
would have placed both of the other candidates under a lot of scrutiny
about policy and delivery which is what is actually needed. We're not
holding a beauty parade

You may not be, but the majority of the electorate are

tim

Paul Corfield wrote:

While Mr Tuffrey may have less of a profile than Mr Paddick I think he
would have placed both of the other candidates under a lot of scrutiny
about policy and delivery which is what is actually needed. We're not
holding a beauty parade - it's an election where clear plans, good
ideas and proper scrutiny of delivery against their previously
declared commitments is required.

I'm afraid elected Mayors are not turning out quite the way people expected
(and hoped?) - I think the expectation was that the posts would attract new
talent, especially from industry, who would be interested in running for a
direct executive post but not in the street level work that councillors do
which is a pre-requisite to being a council leader. Unfortunately the UK
party system doesn't operate in such a way that such outsiders can dip in to
electoral politics. Ironically Paddick in 2008 is the nearest to a US style
candidate that any of the parties on the GLA have yet fielded and both he
and the Lib Dems found the experience an unhappy one (he says he's learnt
from the experience and certainly he's more experienced in Lib Dem
campaigning now).

The other problem is that elected Mayors are not seen as a stepping stone to
higher things because it's hard to know if one can return to the Commons, so
the ambitious are not drawn to the post (okay Lembit stood but... he's
Lembit). Here it will take time and precedents to change that to show the
talent can easily jump between venues.

I dread to think what will happen if we ever get regional government -
whatever one may think of special advisors going into safe Westminster seats
they do have political knowledge and talent but are unlikely to stand for
regional assemblies. Anyone fancy a chamber full of county councillors who
fancy a nice sinecure?

Months of political jamboree is going to be tedious in the extreme.
Recent skirmishes between Ken and Boris "supporters" fill me with
dread.

If you think Boris's supporters hate Livingstone, you should hear some of
the attitudes held about him in certain London Labour Parties.

In article ,
(Tim Roll-Pickering) wrote:

Paul Corfield wrote:

While Mr Tuffrey may have less of a profile than Mr Paddick I think he
would have placed both of the other candidates under a lot of scrutiny
about policy and delivery which is what is actually needed. We're not
holding a beauty parade - it's an election where clear plans, good
ideas and proper scrutiny of delivery against their previously
declared commitments is required.

I'm afraid elected Mayors are not turning out quite the way people
expected (and hoped?) - I think the expectation was that the posts
would attract new talent, especially from industry, who would be
interested in running for a direct executive post but not in the
street level work that councillors do which is a pre-requisite to
being a council leader. Unfortunately the UK party system doesn't
operate in such a way that such outsiders can dip in to electoral
politics. Ironically Paddick in 2008 is the nearest to a US style
candidate that any of the parties on the GLA have yet fielded and
both he and the Lib Dems found the experience an unhappy one (he says
he's learnt from the experience and certainly he's more experienced
in Lib Dem campaigning now).

The other problem is that elected Mayors are not seen as a stepping
stone to higher things because it's hard to know if one can return to
the Commons, so the ambitious are not drawn to the post (okay Lembit
stood but... he's Lembit). Here it will take time and precedents to
change that to show the talent can easily jump between venues.

I dread to think what will happen if we ever get regional government
- whatever one may think of special advisors going into safe
Westminster seats they do have political knowledge and talent but are
unlikely to stand for regional assemblies. Anyone fancy a chamber
full of county councillors who fancy a nice sinecure?

Months of political jamboree is going to be tedious in the extreme.
Recent skirmishes between Ken and Boris "supporters" fill me with
dread.

If you think Boris's supporters hate Livingstone, you should hear
some of the attitudes held about him in certain London Labour
Parties.

Don't be quite so dismissive about councillors. Many MPs once had that role
and some in all parties are very good. My present MP was a County Councillor
until 2009. I'm sure he'll go far.

Some ex-councillor MPs may only make mediocre backbenchers but I wouldn't
accuse any of the former members of my council (Cambridge City) of that.
There are currently two and another two (both former council leaders)
retired in 2010.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

wrote:

I dread to think what will happen if we ever get regional government
- whatever one may think of special advisors going into safe
Westminster seats they do have political knowledge and talent but are
unlikely to stand for regional assemblies. Anyone fancy a chamber
full of county councillors who fancy a nice sinecure?

Don't be quite so dismissive about councillors. Many MPs once had that
role
and some in all parties are very good. My present MP was a County
Councillor
until 2009. I'm sure he'll go far.

There are good ones who are drawn to Westminster and good ones who are
unlikely to ever stand for it but the question I raised is would they be
drawn to devolved assemblies? It's a question that needs to be addressed
seriously (albeit rather OT for this newsgroup) before new bodies and
elections are held. When the London Mayoral referendum was held back in 1998
the party introducing it took the official line of "we are discussing
creating the post, not who will be our candidate for it" which in hindsight
has proved a mess because nobody was really stopping to ask just whether or
not the culture was there that would produce the kind of candidates
envisaged.

And then there are the devolved Parliaments and Assemblies, where a common
complaint is that the non-nationalist parties are generally sending their
high profile best talent to Westminster and, with some individual
exceptions, Holyrood and Cardiff Bay are left with B-list talent (or C-list
when they suffer a reversal that replaces a load of constituency members
with listers). English regional assemblies would be even less attractive.

In article ,
(Tim Roll-Pickering) wrote:

wrote:

I dread to think what will happen if we ever get regional government
- whatever one may think of special advisors going into safe
Westminster seats they do have political knowledge and talent but are
unlikely to stand for regional assemblies. Anyone fancy a chamber
full of county councillors who fancy a nice sinecure?

Don't be quite so dismissive about councillors. Many MPs once had that
role and some in all parties are very good. My present MP was a County
Councillor until 2009. I'm sure he'll go far.

There are good ones who are drawn to Westminster and good ones who
are unlikely to ever stand for it but the question I raised is would
they be drawn to devolved assemblies? It's a question that needs to
be addressed seriously (albeit rather OT for this newsgroup) before
new bodies and elections are held. When the London Mayoral referendum
was held back in 1998 the party introducing it took the official line
of "we are discussing creating the post, not who will be our
candidate for it" which in hindsight has proved a mess because nobody
was really stopping to ask just whether or not the culture was there
that would produce the kind of candidates envisaged.

And then there are the devolved Parliaments and Assemblies, where a
common complaint is that the non-nationalist parties are generally
sending their high profile best talent to Westminster and, with some
individual exceptions, Holyrood and Cardiff Bay are left with B-list
talent (or C-list when they suffer a reversal that replaces a load of
constituency members with listers). English regional assemblies would
be even less attractive.

I know what you mean about Holyrood and Cardiff. Labour got it right in 1999
when Donald Dewar forsook the UK Cabinet for Scottish First Minister. It was
tragic that he then died.

My views on London are coloured by a deep dislike of concentrating so much
in one pair of hands. It's a system seriously vulnerable to corruption and
not suitable for the UK.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

On Sat, Sep 03, 2011 at 05:20:02PM +0100, Tim Roll-Pickering wrote:

The other problem is that elected Mayors are not seen as a stepping stone to
higher things because it's hard to know if one can return to the Commons, so
the ambitious are not drawn to the post

Johnson isn't ambitious?

--
David Cantrell | Hero of the Information Age

Please stop rolling your Jargon Dice and explain the problem
you are having to me in plain English, using small words.
-- John Hardin, in the Monastery

David Cantrell wrote:

The other problem is that elected Mayors are not seen as a stepping stone
to
higher things because it's hard to know if one can return to the Commons,
so
the ambitious are not drawn to the post

Johnson isn't ambitious?

He has ambitions but he was also somewhat drafted rather than initially
seeking it - and there were signs his Commons career was stalling back in
2007. Furthermore many Conservatives seriously doubted Livingstone could be
defeated in 2008. Runing Boris for the Mayoralty was a gamble that paid off
for the party at the tiny cost of subsequently losing him from the Commons
but for Boris it's removed him from the main centre political attention
without a clear route for returning.

People talk of Boris as a potential future Conservative leader but they
forget that it's difficult to make a successful return to the Commons and
obtain the top prizes, and especially so in the short run. The last major
party leader to have had an interrupted parliamentary career was Michael
Foot (who was out between 1955 and 1960) and he obtain the Labour leadership
20 years after he returned. The last Conservative leader was Sir Alec
Douglas-Home - leaving aside his transfer from the Lords to the Commons he
had lost his seat in the 1945 election before regaining it in 1950, but
again that was over 13 years before he obtained the leadership (and at
several stages he had astounding luck in his career). The last Liberal
leader was Sir Herbert Samuel who lost his seat in the 1918 election then
had a career outside party politics before returning to the Liberal battle
and the Commons in 1929 and becoming the leader of the main party in the
1931 splits. The most recent other case is Roy Jenkins coming back from
Europe and forming the SDP but their failure is a deterrant to anyone else
trying the route of a new party.

And of course there are the failures - both Michael Portillo and Malcolm
Rifkind fell in the 1997 general election and so were absent from the
subsequent leadership election. Each eventually got back to the Commons but
by the time the leadership came up they found their original political bases
had moved on. Conservative MPs still retain a lot of power in the leadership
election and it's questionable whether a returned Johnson would have
sufficient support to make it to the final two and thus go to the full
membership.

If Boris is re-elected in 2012 then his term won't expire until 2016 and to
get back into the Commons he would either have to wait until a general
election in 2020 (thanks to the fixed terms legislation) or win a
by-election. But if the Conservatives are still in power after 2015, which
many seem to expect, then being the government candidate in a by-election is
a risky strategy, especially if it seems the candidate wants to go straight
to the top. However if he waits until 2020 then it's likely that by then
Cameron will have already stepped down and a new leader will have been
elected so Boris would have missed his chance. The only other possibility is
if he could contest the leadership as a non-MP - I forget if the rules are
explicit on this point, but it's a very risky strategy.

The main Westminster style country where this happens a lot is Canada, where
party leaderships at both federal and provincial/territorial level are often
contested by non-MPs, with former MPs, MPs from the other level, Mayors of
big cities, private businessmen, union leaders and others often standing.
There is also a partially observed covention in Canada that if a leader
doesn't have a seat then another MP will resign and the leader will stand in
the by-election without opposition from the other parties. (It's not always
observed and can sometimes go wrong - John Tory in Ontario is the most
prominent recent case.) Some leaders don't have a by-election and instead
fight a seat in the main election, even if they've already been appointed
Prime Minister/Premier - John Turner in 1984 is the most prominent federal
case.

Over in Australia this practice may take off if a current experiment works -
in the state of Queensland the Liberal National Party is going into next
year's election led by Campbell Newman, who has just finished as Mayor of
Brisbane and is leading from outside the state legislature. Brisbane is
Australia's largest local authority (most of what we think of as the big
Australian cities are collections of multiple local authorities - Brisbane
is the only case of a super city authority taking effect) and the Mayor is
directly elected, so this could be one to watch for Boris's chances.

In article ,
(Tim Roll-Pickering) wrote:

David Cantrell wrote:

The other problem is that elected Mayors are not seen as a stepping
stone to higher things because it's hard to know if one can return to
the Commons, so the ambitious are not drawn to the post

Johnson isn't ambitious?

He has ambitions but he was also somewhat drafted rather than
initially seeking it - and there were signs his Commons career was
stalling back in 2007. Furthermore many Conservatives seriously
doubted Livingstone could be defeated in 2008. Runing Boris for the
Mayoralty was a gamble that paid off for the party at the tiny cost
of subsequently losing him from the Commons but for Boris it's
removed him from the main centre political attention without a clear
route for returning.

People talk of Boris as a potential future Conservative leader but
they forget that it's difficult to make a successful return to the
Commons and obtain the top prizes, and especially so in the short
run. The last major party leader to have had an interrupted
parliamentary career was Michael Foot (who was out between 1955 and
1960) and he obtain the Labour leadership 20 years after he returned.
The last Conservative leader was Sir Alec Douglas-Home - leaving
aside his transfer from the Lords to the Commons he had lost his seat
in the 1945 election before regaining it in 1950, but again that was
over 13 years before he obtained the leadership (and at several
stages he had astounding luck in his career). The last Liberal leader
was Sir Herbert Samuel who lost his seat in the 1918 election then
had a career outside party politics before returning to the Liberal
battle and the Commons in 1929 and becoming the leader of the main
party in the 1931 splits. The most recent other case is Roy Jenkins
coming back from Europe and forming the SDP but their failure is a
deterrant to anyone else trying the route of a new party.

And of course there are the failures - both Michael Portillo and
Malcolm Rifkind fell in the 1997 general election and so were absent
from the subsequent leadership election. Each eventually got back to
the Commons but by the time the leadership came up they found their
original political bases had moved on. Conservative MPs still retain
a lot of power in the leadership election and it's questionable
whether a returned Johnson would have sufficient support to make it
to the final two and thus go to the full membership.

If Boris is re-elected in 2012 then his term won't expire until 2016
and to get back into the Commons he would either have to wait until a
general election in 2020 (thanks to the fixed terms legislation) or
win a by-election. But if the Conservatives are still in power after
2015, which many seem to expect, then being the government candidate
in a by-election is a risky strategy, especially if it seems the
candidate wants to go straight to the top. However if he waits until
2020 then it's likely that by then Cameron will have already stepped
down and a new leader will have been elected so Boris would have
missed his chance. The only other possibility is if he could contest
the leadership as a non-MP - I forget if the rules are explicit on
this point, but it's a very risky strategy.

The main Westminster style country where this happens a lot is
Canada, where party leaderships at both federal and
provincial/territorial level are often contested by non-MPs, with
former MPs, MPs from the other level, Mayors of big cities, private
businessmen, union leaders and others often standing. There is also a
partially observed covention in Canada that if a leader doesn't have
a seat then another MP will resign and the leader will stand in the
by-election without opposition from the other parties. (It's not
always observed and can sometimes go wrong - John Tory in Ontario is
the most prominent recent case.) Some leaders don't have a
by-election and instead fight a seat in the main election, even if
they've already been appointed Prime Minister/Premier - John Turner
in 1984 is the most prominent federal case.

Over in Australia this practice may take off if a current experiment
works - in the state of Queensland the Liberal National Party is
going into next year's election led by Campbell Newman, who has just
finished as Mayor of Brisbane and is leading from outside the state
legislature. Brisbane is Australia's largest local authority (most of
what we think of as the big Australian cities are collections of
multiple local authorities - Brisbane is the only case of a super
city authority taking effect) and the Mayor is directly elected, so
this could be one to watch for Boris's chances.

You've forgotten the main example of interrupted career followed by
ministerial success, Winston Churchill. But he broke so many "rules" that he
is probably the exception that proves most of them.

--
Colin Rosenstiel