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Mayor Boris sure to be an unmitigated disaster
• LONDON didn’t deserve to lose Ken and for voters to have shown anger with the Labour government by rejecting Ken Livingstone in favour of Boris Johnson will be an unmitigated disaster for Londoners.
It would be a step too far to take away our Freedom Pass, though the planned further extension of use before 9am will surely be abandoned.
No doubt under-18s will suffer the loss of their bus pass.
Instead of creating decent leisure space and youth clubs for teenagers we will see them even more criminalised for being on the streets.
While we may all hate bendy buses the congestion charge made a huge difference to the time taken travelling around London. It was quite obvious Boris Johnson totally underestimated the cost of replacing bendy buses and reintroducing conductors.
Perhaps, most of all, the plan to provide Londoners with much-needed affordable housing will be dumped in favour of handing out money to private developers; the Tories are not famous for being lovers of council housing.
No doubt David Cameron is in the process of moving his team into City Hall to take over the running of London. It would be too dangerous to leave it in the hands of the new Mayor.
GEORGE DURACK
Annette Thomas
Islington Pensioners’ Forum
• THE Tories’ victory in London will mean a great deal of change, not least in the area of housing provision in the capital.
It is bad news for Islington families that Boris Johnson has promised to drop Ken Livingstone’s 50 per cent affordable target, which forces developers to ensure at least half of all new housing in the capital is for rent or shared ownership by local people.
Week after week, councillors see families at their advice surgeries, often with three or four children in a one-bedroom flat. We know the knock-on effects of overcrowding are poor health, low educational achievement and high levels of unemployment.
Islington must now stand up for local people and ensure it does not leave local families in overcrowded accommodation, like Tory borough Wandsworth, where only 11 per cent of all new-build properties were for rent or shared ownership.
These elections showed that London politics is now a straight battle between Labour and the Tories – all the other parties are irrelevant.
Islington Labour is on the side of families facing overcrowding and will fight the Tories to ensure that when we take control of the council in the next few years we will still be able to build the social housing that local people so desperately need.
CLLR CATHERINE WEST
Leader, Islington Labour Group
• CAN I thank the people of Islington who voted on Thursday in the London mayoral and Assembly elections? It was good to see people turning out to vote in such high numbers; a tribute to local democracy.
Can I also congratulate Islington resident Boris Johnson on winning the mayoralty and Jennette Arnold, elected Islington Assembly representative.
It was great to see our candidate, Alex Ellis, doubling the Conservative share of the vote in Islington, and the Lib Dems slipping into fourth place behind the Green Party in the party vote.
Islington is fast becoming a two-horse race between Labour and a modern, compassionate Conservative Party. Islington will finally have a real choice in the next local elections in 2010.
RICHARD BUNTING
Deputy chairman, Islington Conservatives
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