Oh dear. Not many ways to spin this one, I’m afraid, although he tries hard:
London Mayor Boris Johnson has reneged on a pre-election promise that only hotels and restaurants paying a ‘London living wage’ would be promoted by Visit London ahead of the 2012 Olympics.
Open and shut case - he promised it, he claimed he hadn’t, he was shown video footage of him promising it, so he comes out with this one, the tone of which sounds awfully familiar:
During my election campaign, I supported a list of proposals on the living wage that included this idea. However, further work in this area has made it clear that a positive approach of partnership with business to promote the London living wage is more appropriate, and likely to be more effective in achieving the key goal of the wider implementation of the living wage.
Naturally this one has done the rounds, but Douglas Johnson nails it:
The Mayor made that pledge, you may recall, at the London Citizens’ hustings while under intense abuse from the audience for his original opposition to the minimum wage. Who wouldn’t say a few shallow words at the start of the evening to silence the hecklers for the night?
In fact, the employers (who are delighted) have a point here - forcing everyone to up their wages in the middle of a recession probably isn’t good for either employers or employees, some of whom would find themselves with no job. Boris is evidently hoist by a rash election campaign promise, however. We’ve learned a couple of things from this sorry episode:
- Some promises Boris made during the election are worthless
- Boris breaks his promises if enough pressure is brought to bear
- When Boris talks about ‘positive partnership with business’ he’s actually saying ‘I’ll do what they tell me’.
Where have we heard that line before, the one about replacing rigid committment to a course of action with a softer, rounder, gentler, less confrontational ‘partnership’?
Was it Oyster PAYG on National Rail, where Ken’s £20m offer to fund equipment in 2007 magically became £40m under Boris in 2008?:
Transport for London chiefs have told the new Mayor that his less confrontational approach is already paying dividends with train firms and will as a result rapidly speed up the spread of the system.
or was it working with the boroughs?
If elected as Mayor, I will be committed to working in partnership with the boroughs to build a better London
Either way, I think we can conclude that when Boris talks about ‘partnerships’ and being ‘less confrontational’ he actually means ’smiling and bending over’. Useful to remember when the patrons of the 507 and 521 bus go on the warpath next July.
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He also pledged to support London Citizens’ call for an amnesty for illegal immigrants at the same hustings but has since gone rather quiet on the issue, which has hardly gone away given the plight of the Zimbabweans refused asylum.
That would presumably put him in direct opposition to the Home Office, whom he now finds he needs to work with - after all they control the police he needs for his anti-crime whiffle.
It would, but he did pledge his support, didn’t he? Unless you’re suggesting he only did so in order to create the handy impression of distance between him and the BNP, who were offering him tacit support. That and he wouldn’t have wanted to be seen to be at odds with Livingstone/Paddick/Berry’s support for it at the event.
It wouldn’t be the only time in the campaign that he said something that had the effect of disarming the opposition. That he then reneges on it proves that, er, he *only* said it to disarm the opposition…