London Mayor

[StillThePrettiest 3]

just remember: FIRST thing you want to do is get an oyster card

[Eli the Barrowboy 16]

It was also interesting that the BNP has won its first seat in the assembly. I don't really know anything about the party so can't comment at all on that one.

Not being a Londoner I can't comment on Ken/Boris.

I can however say that the fact the BNP got a seat (on this or any other assembly) is a very, very, very sad reflection on London or any society. If you really don't know anything about them they are in fact a racist, facist bunch of bully boys who want a white separatist Britain - white power, ain't no black in the Union Jack, etc.

These guys are proud of the fact that the British went out and conquered the world ... and are now complaining when everyone follows them back home. Unbelievable.

R

[General Cornwalls 0]

I don't think the BNP getting seats is a sad reflection on any society. I think rather, it's a sad reflection on the politicians from other parties that a BNP candidate is a more attractive option. There is, in my view, something radically wrong with British politics.

Let me give you an example of where Britain is beginning to fall apart...

When I was a computer programmer, I found an advert by a company that wished to hire a contract programmer. I applied and was rejected. Subsequently I discovered that they had got somebody in Ukraine to do the work for pennies. This is, of course, against British law. The law is that if there's a native that can do the job then they must be employed rather than somebody from another country. I brought this to the attention of my MP because if it happened to me then this kind of thing must be rampant. Indeed it is - look at the Chinese cockle pickers of Morecombe Bay for example. Rather than paying the legal minimum wage to locals who would happily do the work, they bring in illegal immigrants.

It is this lack of observance of the employment laws and the perception that refugees are receiving better treatment than locals that makes the BNP seem more reasonable than the existing parties. In fact I even visited the BNP website and had a look at their policies. It was all quite interesting and very different from the main parties. Essentially, I read it as a party that wants to try to make Britain better for the natives. I don't think they're bothering with the send all the immigrants home stuff any more. I can't honestly say I'm all that bothered anyway. I found British politics were so dirty and the candidates so slimy that in the last elections I registered a protest vote by voting for Miss Whiplash and Captain Beany.

[SMB x2 0]

Not going to enter a politics debate, but as I notice a Have I Got News For You youtube linked earlier, I'd just like to say that, were I a Londoner, I'd have voted for Brian Blessed. If he was running for Mayor, ahem.

Stu

[Mags 112]

Not going to enter a politics debate, but as I notice a Have I Got News For You youtube linked earlier, I'd just like to say that, were I a Londoner, I'd have voted for Brian Blessed. If he was running for Mayor, ahem.

Stu

As long as he was wearing his costume from Flash Gordon.

[greeneyedgirlfl 0]

Not going to enter a politics debate, but as I notice a Have I Got News For You youtube linked earlier, I'd just like to say that, were I a Londoner, I'd have voted for Brian Blessed. If he was running for Mayor, ahem.

Stu

As long as he was wearing his costume from Flash Gordon.

[Eli the Barrowboy 16]

General Cornwalls,

You see it as a sad reflection on the politicians from other parties that a BNP candidate is a more attractive option. Well, no one put a gun to the 5.3% of Londoners who voted BNP in the mayoral election.

I understand your frustration about jobs going to the Ukraine etc. Today in Belfast, 50 FT100 Index companies are coming to Belfast from the USA to relocate "American" jobs to Northern Ireland because people here work cheaper and don't demand stuff like pensions and health care. So it's not just British companies who are at it.

You have to remember it's not Britain PLC that, rather than paying the legal minimum wage to locals, bring in illegal immigrants - it's corrupt employers. And I dispute your rosy view that there are "locals who would happily do the work" ... From my office window I can see 14, count 'em, 14 young men and women drinking in the park in the sunshine at 10.30am. This morning I got a coffee on my way to work at 8.30 - served by an Eastern European. I stopped in to get cigarettes - served by an Eastern European. When I got out to get lunch - I'll most likely get served by an Eastern European. Number of Eastern Europeans drinking in the park - 0. Number of locals - 14. And if there were no Eastern Europeans in Belfast I can bet my house there would still be 14 locals drinking in the park.

I agree mainstream politics in the UK is slimy but show me a country where they aren't? As for the BNP, for those of you who are interested ... the slime runneth over.

"Membership of the British National Party is open to those of British or kindred European ethnic descent." So, white people essentially.

Nick Griffin - BNP Leader ...

On Islam - "a wicked and vicious faith".

On the Holocaust, or "the Holohoax" as he call(ed)s it - "There is no doubt that hundreds, probably thousands of Jews were shot to death in Eastern Europe, because they were rightly or wrongly seen as communists or potential partisan supporters. That was awful. But this nonsense about gas chambers is exposed as a total lie."

On Muslims - He recently said on Newsnight that muslim immigrants were to blame for the country's hard drugs problems.

BNP youth leader Mark Collett - "I'd never say this on camera, the Jews have been thrown out of every country including England. It's not just persecution. There's no smoke without fire."

Scott McLean - The party's deputy chairman - Was shown on the TV documentary "Nazi Hate Rock" making Hitler salutes at a white-supremacist cross-burning ceremony where intensely racist songs were sung and jokes made about Auschwitz.

7 July London bombings - The BNP released leaflets featuring images of the bombed Route 30 bus and the slogan "Maybe now it's time to start listening to the BNP".

On homosexuality - It "should not be promoted or encouraged".

Any way, that's my two cents ...

R

[VisaJourneyLady 33]

On Oyster - I don't think an Oyster card is that much harder to get than Octopus from HK, I have both, and registered neither, took less than 2 mins to get both. I agree that the HK metro is amazing, but have you ever seen a building site in China or Hong Kong? the price of labour there is incomparable to here. It's very cheap to constantly have people cleaning the station, keeping the lines moving and generallly giving a good service.

On the BNP - Eli, I couldn't have put it better myself.

General C - the law which you refer to protecting 'your job' only applies if the person comes to the UK on a visa that is issued is specifically for them to do 'your job'. That is, if someone from outside of the EU is sponsored by a British company to work for them. Isn't it far more likely that 'your job' was outsourced perfectly legally to a country with a much lower cost of living, and therefore was actually a well paying job for the computer programmer concerned?

[Trompe le Monde 1,107]

yeah - but labor is not cheap in NYC or Tokyo and they both cost $2 or less for a journey comparable to Victoria-Piccadilly sans Oyster (or last I used both, anyway). I know it's not that hard, but it seems counter-intuitive to put an obstacle like that into using public transport - my main objection is the lines to get one instead of getting out of a machine (unless that's changed), which at the major stations and heathrow are terrible) or to gouge people. It's like when they stopped taking cash on the night bus and put those machines on oxford street which were often broken. Just a couple strange glitches in what I think was overall a good transport policy.

I think 2 of the biggest obstacles for improving the tube are its age adn the unions. I certainly think London Transport workers should get a living wage, but tube drivers seem to make about 10k more than teachers, police officers or nurses in London when they start out which doesn't seem right somehow.

[StillThePrettiest 3]

I don't think the high prices for non-Oyster tickets are for any other reason than to push as many people as possible to go over to Oyster... they've been making Oyster more and more attractive while the other options get worse and worse; if the vast majority of the users are on the cheap system I hardly think you can call it gouging

and admittedly it's a different thing if you're there for a shorter time, but I just don't get the queue complaints either... I got an Oyster card, set it up with auto-top up, and never had to think about it again; NEVER stood in line, never had any hassles... if I wanted a travelcard added I went to my local newsagent and waited two minutes

[greeneyedgirlfl 0]

I would like to have an efficient public transport system...period...

[Eli the Barrowboy 16]

I would like to have an efficient public transport system...period...

That runs 24/7.

[StillThePrettiest 3]

oh, I know what you mean... back here in Sydney I can hardly believe how ####### it is compared to what I'm used to in London; I feel stranded all the time

[VisaJourneyLady 33]

I agree about the tube unions. It's just that they can hold up the whole city by striking, so they have a very powerful bargaining positon. Ken tried to get them to stay open longer on the weekends, but the best deal he could strike was that they would also open an hour later in the morning.

lets see what Boris will manage...