Paul Corfield wrote:
On Wed, 18 Jun 2008 03:40:24 +0100, "John Rowland"
wrote:

Paul Corfield wrote:
http://tinyurl.com/6qlw8f
I saw that article today. I thought it was so very generous of Mr
Gilligan, the Evening Standard and Associated Newspapers to believe
that they had been elected and they had any say in what TfL spends
its money on. Strangely I don't recall seeing them as candidates on
my ballot paper.
A curious argument, Paul, since not only do you believe the media should be
banned from having opinions, you also believe the man who actually won the
election should be banned from having opinions.

Where have I used the word "banned"?

It's worth noting in this respect that Gilligan is far from just a hack,
he's also previously worked for Boris Johnson at the Spectator and
contributed to the daft Policy Exchange 'thinktank' report on
Routemaster/bendy buses in 2005 along with a number of influential
right-wingers (it was authored by PX's Research Director Dean Godson,
who has the amazing distinction of being sacked from the Telegraph for
being too pro-Israel and has impeccable US/neocon credentials).
Gilligan's acted as a pure conduit for right-wing Tories seeking to
slash services before, too, so what he says probably reflects thinking
somewhere in the GLA now.

A substantial proportion of Boris' appointments come straight from
Policy Exchange, and it's not too much of a stretch to say that the next
four years in London are the testbed for their ideology, which isn't yet
totally dominant in the Conservatives, although it has powerful
champions. If the Routemaster/bendy report reflects the quality of
their transport thinking we really are screwed (I note Boris is not
planning to scrap the Class 378 and reintroduce a modern Class 501,
however).

Tom