"I can hardly condemn UKIP as a bunch of boss-eyed, foam-flecked Euro hysterics, when I have been sometimes not far short of boss-eyed, foam-flecked hysteria myself."
I went along to the People's Question Time this week in Hammersmith Town Hall, mostly to see what Boris Johnson had to say for himself. I genuinely went with an open mind. I am not one to stick up for toffs but I do not begrudge someone because they have had a privileged upbringing. In fact, in a way it is good that we have so many upper class mummy's boys in government because unlike other countries, specifically in the developing world, they did not vie for a government post in order to get rich because obviously they are already stinking rich.
Bo Jo started with quoting dubious statistics about crime falling 25% and crime on transport falling 33%; oh clearly Boris if those figures are true there must be a direct correlation between an astounding fall in crime to your mayoralty! The first question that was posed to Boris was 'Would you feel safe walking in any street of London?' The non-Londoner replied 'yes' to which there was a burst of laughter amongst the audience.
My blood began boiling the more and more as I thought about all the robberies that occur in East Acton alone every day. A place which is mostly populated with pensioners. The lovely guys who took my phone http://musingsfromaneet.blogspot.com/2012/02/where-for-art-thou-i-phone.html (amongst the hundreds of women they have probably robbed,) took a woman's handbag outside the station and when she would not let go, smacked her around the face with their moped helmet. Pregnant women have had their phones alongside clumps of hair ripped out of their heads outside Hammersmith Hospital. The 60+ owner of my local laundrette got robbed on Du Cane Road whilst fetching something from her car. Boys as young as 12 tried to snatch the handbag of my friend's mum; a 4'11" Chinese lady. A gaggle of teens including a girl not too subtly asked my dad for 'the time'. Some years ago my mum was pushed to the floor and her bag taken, which had her late mother's diamond earrings in them. Basically there is almost no resident of East Acton that I know that has not been robbed in the area where they have grown up. Lest I forget that the police did not even turn up when I called them because understandably a Monday afternoon is way too busy a time for them to attend to a woman newly robbed, I thought these were third world problems...
If robberies occur in this tiny area every single day, you would think that there would be police ready to catch the thieves, and if not for the pure reasoning of catching everyday muggers and protecting the people who pay their wages, some inevitably must have links to bigger criminals they wish to catch. But no, what they actually do is a put a minuscule sign on the lamp post outside East Acton station (ironically I took a picture of the sign a week before my phone was snatched.) saying something like 'Beware of muggers' with a picture of a boy on a bike with a Scream mask on. Why not put a scarecrow there? A teddy? A banana maybe? They would all have been equally effective at deterring these criminals who have been cowering in their high tops since Boris Johnson became mayor.
Other gems Bo Jo dropped were 'Ken Livingstone spent thousands of pounds going to see FIDEL CASTRO (said slowly for effect)' and scoffed. When the election campaign was going on I agreed that too much money was wasted in Whitehall but Bo Jo has managed to spend MORE than Ken Livingstone. He attacked Ken's intentions to get subsidised 'but not even that subsidised' oil from Venezuela 'one of the poorest countries in Latin America'. Yes I'm sure your heart bleeds for the developing countries whose oil this country plunders, especially when the subsidy is only so-so.
A woman who was a business owner in Shepherds Bush, alongside other business owners asked Bo Jo to stop its 'redevelopment' aka letting investors run amok so Shepherds Bush can look like a generic piece of city crap. His response was 'I can't talk about it as the councillors are here'. The three 'C' words cahoots, capitalism and corruption springs to mind. After being given some more chances to speak on this issue, he did not and many people walked out. His reaction was unconcerned at best.
The blonde haired buffoon perfectly demonstrated not only that class doesn't mean you have class by scoffing and interrupting everyone he disagreed with, he did that politician pretend slick thing and answered questions with vague statements instead of his actual policies. 'Of course I don't agree with corporations not paying their taxes...' Yeah Boris keeps it real, describing his £250,000 he is paid by the Telegraph annually as 'chicken feed'. London please...
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