Speaking to Hagley Road to Ladywood, legendary human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell has his say on the London elections, Ken Livingstone vs Boris Johnson, celebrity culture, and George Galloway's recent nonsense.


PT: Ken’s personal life is totally irrelevant. It’s no one else’s business. The same goes for Boris Johnson’s extra-marital affairs and Brian Paddick’s same-sex partner. Judge the candidates on their integrity and their policies.
As a critic of Ken Livingstone over his courting of al-Qaradawi, do you actually support him in the mayoral election?

PT: I will give my first preference to Sian Berry, the Green Party candidate. She is the most progressive, with the best policies on housing, transport, jobs, crime, equal opportunities and the environment. Moreover, she is not sectarian. Sian is open, inclusive, fair, honest, accessible and democratic. In addition, it would be brilliant to have a woman Mayor - and someone young to lead what is a youthful city.
My second preference will go to Ken Livingstone. Boris Johnson would be a big mistake. He is clownish, disorganised, not well informed, has little grasp of policy detail and is on record as saying some very bigoted things about various minority communities.
Based on existing polls, Ken is the only candidate who can stop Boris. In any case, Ken's policies as Mayor have been mostly positive and benefited Londoners. All in all, he has been a good Mayor. He should be judged in the round. Despite his flaws and policy misjudgements (such his fondness for high-rise office blocks, closeness to big business, promotion of bendy buses etc), he is way better than Boris.
I don't hold personal grudges. I would never base my voting intentions on what bad things Ken may have done to me personally (he unjustly denounced me as an Islamophobe in 2004 because I criticised the fundamentalist cleric, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi). The interests of all Londoners must come first.
I do, however, hope that Ken will listen to the valid criticisms that I and other friends and allies have made and, if he is re-elected, that he will reform his administration to end the favouritism, personal vendettas, sectarianism, control freakery and unsavory alliances that have sometimes characterised City Hall.
Opinion polls suggest Boris Johnson's ahead. Is this the official signal for the country's swing to the right that many analysts have forecast? Given that in terms of policies, instead, polls suggest a majority of pro-Ken views, how can someone become Mayor of London purely for the jokes they tell?
PT: A victory for Boris would be a big boost for the Tories. It might give them momentum to win the next general election. Mind you, although I don’t want the Conservatives back in power, Labour doesn’t deserve to win either. Gordon Brown is pursuing Tony Blair’s disastrous policies and piling on disasters of his own: the Iraq war, abolition of the 10p rate of tax for low earners, ID cards, expanded nuclear power, post office closures, the renewal of Trident nuclear missiles and plans to extend the detention of terror suspects to 42 days. These are reactionary policies. That’s why I no longer support Labour. I am backing the Greens and standing as their parliamentary candidate for Oxford East at the next general election. (continues...)