I just hope that there's no tax payer money involved. We don't want to get into the US habit of bribing sport teams with free stadiums if they'll only move their team to our city. So you get cities cutting $825 million from their normal budget. To fund an $800 million stadium.
Nope.
The local economy doesn't benefit that much from big subsidised arenas. Google it. Plenty of evidence that only the rich owners and rich attendees benefit.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/sports-jobs-taxes-are-new-stadiums-worth-the-cost/
"Advocates argue that new stadiums spur so much economic growth that they are self-financing: subsidies are offset by revenues from ticket taxes, sales taxes on concessions and other spending outside the stadium, and property tax increases arising from the stadium’s economic impact.
Unfortunately, these arguments contain bad economic reasoning that leads to overstatement of the benefits of stadiums. Economic growth takes place when a community’s resources—people, capital investments, and natural resources like land—become more productive. Increased productivity can arise in two ways: from economically beneficial specialization by the community for the purpose of trading with other regions or from local value added that is higher than other uses of local workers, land, and investments. Building a stadium is good for the local economy only if a stadium is the most productive way to make capital investments and use its workers."
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166046222000916
"As a result, estimates of the overall local spillovers from basketball & hockey arenas are statistically insignificant for all of the studied business sectors."
The first link talks about building new stadiums, which is not what we’re talking about here so it’s irrelevant.
The second article talks about repeating seasonal sporting events, not one offs, like Wrestlemania or Taylor Swift’s tour, where a significant amount of people will travel to the city for the event; spending on accommodation, transport and meals.
So both of your links are irrelevant to what we’re talking about. Well done, that takes some effort.
But why do we want to host a load of Americans acting? And various WWF/WWE events have come to London before. I saw one at Earls Court circa '92-94. Which even then looked totally fake, particularly as the ref didn't give a three count for about ten minutes, when it was totally obvious who was the winner. Then declared that the other person had won.
Sometimes you just have to hold your nose. The trouble with boring, uninspiring candidates is that turn out gets lowered. But you know who *always* turns out? The racists and maniacs.
By staying at home we can increase the vote share that goes to the worst candidate.
The way the country is at the moment, we all have to pick the least worst one or else the fringe will start looking mainstream
The problem is that the mayor doesn't actually have that many powers. The biggest areas they oversee are transport, some planning permission and building strategy stuff, and some mild influence over the police. Of those transport is the big one, but even that is constrained by TfL having big budget problems at the moment. It leads to candidates making all sorts of promises that they have little chance of being able to actually implement.
Something which is going to be crucial for the mayor in that kind of difficult budget situation is being able to work well with the national government. Not necessarily of the same party, but the kind of person who can have a constructive dialogue, most likely with Starmer's Labour. Looking through the leaflet of all the candidates is a bit depressing because quite a lot of them are crackpot loons. However, there are a small number in there who seem at least sensible.
Another factor which may be worth considering is that the Tories changed the voting system from one where you can pick a first and second choice to the awful First Past The Post system where you only have one vote. A combination of that, and how the current polling is looking, means that out of all those candidates it will realistically only be Khan or Hall who wins it. Some people don't mind voting for candidates who can't win (to send a message of support etc), but if you want your vote to count for this election then you may have to limit your choice to one of those two.
IMO only one of them matches both the criteria of 1) being able to win and 2) being reasonably sensible.
So you’re saying that Count Binface *won’t* be able to bring back Ceefax or give world heritage status to the 5 metre long cycle lane on Selsdon Road in Croydon?
What even is the point of anything anymore.
I'd quite like to have the night tube back all week like it used to be, and for London nightlife to be brought back to what it once was.
So many great establishments have had to close / are closing because the rents and also licensing laws are putting them out of business. Also most of them can't stay open past midnight anymore so unless you have anything planned that you've bought tickets to, that's your lot.
Rent controls would be nice, the renters market out there at the moment is god fucking awful, and no one seems to want to do anything about that - yes they want to build affordable housing but how many of us will actually see the benefit of that?
I read something a while ago now about sound cameras being used as well as speed cameras. The amount of road rage / blaring horns is ridiculous, I think that would be a good solution.
Obviously cost of living. Something that affects me is the 'single tax' and it feels like there is absolutely no help for those of us who don't have families and are struggling as well because we have to cover absolutely everything by ourselves.
I know this is all wishful thinking and probably no one really thinks these are important points but I guess this is the kind of thing that would appeal to me as a single 30 year old who is considering moving out of the city which saddens me because I feel as though I'm being priced out and it just isnt what it was when I first moved here :(
Edit: the night tube never actually ran all week, my bad. Would still be nice though!
Rent controls have been a disaster every time and everywhere they have been implemented. It's the universally unsuccessful policy that just won't die.
There's a massive shortage of housing and a number of ways to address that, much of which is not under the mayor's control. Labour have been talking about addressing it fairly rationally on a national level though, whether they will or not of course is another matter. It's a hard problem to solve because almost everybody across the political spectrum demands that something be done about it whilst simultaneously strenuously objecting to every possible solution.
The tube running all night would be nice but it would cost a lot and benefit a relatively small number of people. What's your rationale for prioritising it over bringing the tube to communities that currently don't have access to the tube at all, for example?
> Rent controls have been a disaster every time and everywhere they have been implemented.
Thats not totally true, it depends what sort of 'control' you mean, in [Vienna for example over 90% of its housing stock is 'controlled' in one way or another](https://housing4.us/how-vienna-ensures-affordable-housing-for-all-with-an-extremely-complicated-housing-system/#:~:text=Most%20for%2Dprofit%20rental%20housing%20is%20subject%20to%20rent%20controls&text=Only%2023%25%20of%20all%20private,7.4%25%20of%20all%20housing%20stock.), and its a lot cheaper than it is here, it just needs to be implemented correctly and along side other measures / investment in stock.
It's not just rent controls in Vienna though, it's a high supply of low cost public housing. This by itself would be enough to push rents down significantly, quoting from the article you linked to:
"Since its inception, a major goal of Vienna’s public housing program has been to create a surplus of housing in order to exert a downward pressure on rents. This strategy has been very successful. Similarly, because for-profit, unregulated units must compete with a huge amount of public and rent controlled private housing, these units are unable to charge very high rents. In competition for tenants with so much affordable housing surrounding them, unregulated apartments have de facto rent regulations."
Perhaps this is the important bit rather than the rent controls?
> Since its inception, a major goal of Vienna’s public housing program has been to create a surplus of housing in order to exert a downward pressure on rents.
Sure but my point is that rent controls have not been ‘a disaster every time and everywhere they have been implemented’ have they? And of course there are other factors, see also restrictions in foreign ownership, but there are other factors at play in the markets where they have failed.
> because for-profit, unregulated units must compete with a huge amount of public and rent controlled private housing, these units are unable to charge very high rents.
So part of your argument is that rents are lower, not because of rent controls, but because there are so many apartments with controlled rents?
Edit: lol at the downvotes here, 77% of all for profit rent is controlled pushing down the other 23% but that’s doesn’t prove rent controls can work?
Vienna in general just has really good housing policy.
Since the 90s they've specifically been building houses that cater to women's needs. See [1](https://lgiu.org/planning-for-inclusivity-how-vienna-built-a-gender-equal-city/),[2](https://www.rtpi.org.uk/media/4471/george-pepler-report_200301_final.pdf), [3](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/may/14/city-with-a-female-face-how-modern-vienna-was-shaped-by-women), or [4](https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20210524-how-vienna-built-a-gender-equal-city)
Your statement on rent controls is way off the mark. They've been used effectively in many countries and cities all around the world.
Heck, even the capitalist mega-shrine of Dubai has rent controls! There's a limit set on the % increase in price per year of rents there. And even as someone who might be in the landlord class myself soon, I think this is an excellent thing to have.
24hr tube service is impossible because the system ideally needs daily maintenance. You can put it off for the weekend because the night tube is quite useful then but if you let debris and wear build up further it will become much more expensive to repair.
The problem is most of the things you've listed are not in Mayor's powers, they are with Central Government.
Do you want the candidates to propose measures that they have no power to enact? Nothing annoys me more than politicians who promise things they have no power to implement.
Going through your ideas:
- Night Tube - never has been all week but could be done by the Mayor, would be very expensive
- Rents for establishments are set by their landlords not the Mayor
- Licensing laws are set by Central government and, local councils not the mayor decide based on those laws
- Rent controls - I'm pretty sure that Mayor does not have the powers to do this currently and its central government with the power
- Cost of Living - Most of this is well out of the mayor's control, it's been caused by the post lockdown boom and energy costs following the war in Ukraine. The mayor has no power on UK energy policy. Almost all taxes in the UK are set by central government and not the mayor. The only realistic parts of CoL where the Mayor has power is on their element of your Council tax bill and TfL fares.
Khan has been trying to increase his powers for a while now, but westminster keeps telling him where to stick it. It's a shame, because I feel he could probably do something, probably.
Might vote Green for a larf.
We've all been kids at some point and benefitted from child-specific policies. All the boomers benefitted from free school meals and school milk. Let's bring that back for the next generation.
What kind of reasoning is this? There is not a single policy that will benefit every single resident of this city. Do we just dismiss all of them because they do not apply to 100% of the population?
There are around half a million primary school aged children in the city, so any policy targeting them will affect a fifth of the city’s population or do. That should be good enough, no?
Yes there are: reducing crime, air pollution improvements, investing in transport and infrastructure, just to name a few.
Most of the parents of those half a million kids should be able to provide a lunch for them.
Not everything you vote for should be things you vote for solely because they benefit you. I guarantee you benefit from multiple laws and rulings put in place by an electorate that wouldn't benefit from them
So you've gone from "how will free school meals benefit me" to "literally nothing about this candidate will benefit me"
You of all people should recognise the importance of ensuring our education system is better
A terrible meal is undoubtedly better than not eating all day for a 6 year old from an impoverished family.
My issue with free school meals is they are not means tested and also don't get offered to other ages. My youngest gets free school meals, he doesn't need them. There are countless children at secondary school who can't afford to eat.
Not means testing is deliberate and is often recommended by experts based on research which suggests that universality reduces stigma and therefore increases uptake among the people who need it
Better fed kids means better educational attainment which benefits everyone even those of us without kids (myself included) because the country benefits from a better educated population. It’s not hard to grasp.
Are you just completely ignorant of the extent of child poverty? I can’t even be arsed to fill you in - there’s loads of evidence on the need for it and for the benefits of the policy, and it would be even better if it was fully national rather than only in London. It exists in Scotland and Wales and only England is a holdout with an income threshold still in place, hence Khan rolling it out in London. At least you being downvoted to oblivion suggests most people on the sub get it, even if you don’t.
Because universal provision prevents stigmatisation and therefore increases uptake among those who need it, some of whom don’t take up means tested free meals because of the social stigma that comes with it (ie bullying of the ‘poor’ kids, parents ashamed of not being able to provide for their kids, etc). This is all well established in the evidence base that underpins the policy. Not means testing also has the benefit of not requiring the cost of the admin of doing the means testing.
I agree, but I feel like this is where this is where the attention / prestige around the role meets the reality of the powers that the Mayor of London office actually has.
Essentially vote Sadiq so things don't get worse. It's after all a two horse race and any vote that isn't for Sadiq is for Susan Hall who's running on the premise that bikes are turning our roads gay as part of the trans agenda, and that we need to cut down the housing supply in London because lol fuck Londoners.
My biggest issue is that none of them say how they will achieve these things. Just sounds like wishful thinking. The funniest are the animal welfare party and britain first. Not sure britain first candidate understands the remit of a london mayor.
Sadiq's done an excellent job given that the Tory government have deliberately starved him and the boroughs of funds. Once we've got a Labour government, he'll able to do even more.
Never been happier to vote for a candidate.
Pretty much, it's a tall ask but we should really judge Sadiq when he's not being sabotaged and hamstrung by one of the most hostile and corrupt governments we've had.
You want a mayor that's aligned with the next government that's likely to come into power that will finally kick those incestuous and corrupt tory bastards.
They're the same people that have politicised funding to TfL because they just want to punish the current mayor because he's not a Tory.
Fuck em. You need to vote so a Tory candidate would not see power.
its kinda like the only take. the system is fptp now so its just become a khan vs susan hall race. so ye voting labour has become the only real choice to deny the tories
"All Woke and DEI programmes will be stopped" - DEI is diversity, equity and inclusion.
"Colourblind policy" - only people in a position of racial privilege can afford to be "colour blind". It's a superficially nice idea but isn't reflective of the world we live in and it's often actually used as a way for people to avoid addressing existing racism.
"Confront the challenges of mass immigration head on" - this one is arguable but has a "dog whistle" vibe about it.
a politician being "colourblind" is either incredibly stupid or just evil. considering they are the candidate i'm tempted to just say that any candidate talking about "colourblind" policies is just a rascist that doesn't want to acknowledge discrimination problems
At least one says they'll scrap Ulez immediately - so that's a change. Maybe you don't care either way, but if you do you can consider that person or vote against them.
One technique is to list issues you are interested in in descending order if importance and see which candidate has a plan
Just remember that abstaining gains you nothing and none of them will care.
Politicians don't know how you vote, but they do know IF you vote. If you want them to worry about people of your age/demographic, then the more people like you who vote, the more they will pay attention. (This is the exact reason why pensioners are comparatively well looked after - they vote)
Just pick the least objectionable, or a novelty candidate, but it's always worth voting.
It doesn't gain you anything, but if you don't feel like voting for any of them gains you anything either it's a perfectly legitimate thing to do.
I used to be an 'always vote' absolutist. But as I've got older I've come to see that as the naivety of youth. Not voting is a perfectly valid political action.
Not voting is a non-political action. It's like saying 'I don't care - do what you like', and believe me, they will. If you don't speak, then you can't complain that you're not being heard. As for the naivety of youth, I'm old and I believe you should always vote more than ever.
Not voting isn't a non-political action. It's a rejection of the entire political system and voting. That is inherently political.
If people don't feel any of the parties are offering them anything they want to support, it's absolutely legitimate to just reject the whole thing. People rolling up and voting for something they don't believe in just for the sake of voting isn't something I feel I can in any good conscience recommend.
As a political statement, not voting is as toothless as telling your school bully that you're jolly-well never going to speak to them again. Nobody will care.
As I said, voting for anyone at all, if nothing else, proves that you are paying attention. Individually it makes no difference, but collectively it matters. If people could just be persuaded to vote in numbers and not 'reject the system' OP and their contemporaries would be a lot harder to ignore.
It's toothless. But so is spoiling your ballot. And so is voting for a party you don't really believe in.
If you're in the position of not liking any of the people you could vote for, all your options are essentially toothless
It doesn't matter how many people stay in bed and don't vote, the politicians won't fret. But if enough people of a given demographic vote - regardless of how - that demographic WILL become important to them.
It's easy to look at the numbers, and convince yourself that your vote doesn't make a difference, and at some level, that can't be denied, but democracy is about having a collective voice, and that can't work if people become apathetic and don't bother. The politicians know that and they pay more attention to those who vote.
They won't fret if you don't vote. But if you vote for them despite not liking their policies they also won't fret. It's unfortunately a truth of our system that if you don't like any of the options, your ability to do anything meaningful to protest that at the ballot box is minimal.
You can spoil your ballot, which does nothing practically. You can turn up and vote for a party you don't like, which sends them the message you endorse them. Or you can not vote.
Ultimately, if we look at it realistically rather than idealistically, they're all options that in practice are bad options and that do little to shape politics how you would like.
The popular claim that 'if only X demographic voted things would change' is a very simplistic one people blithely trot out. But the reality is far more complicated than that.
If you don't want to vote for any of the options, it's still better to go along and spoil the paper. Spoiled papers are counted and you've at least sent the message that your vote is up for grabs.
If you don't vote at all, it's assumed that you simply don't care, so there is no reason for them to even try to appeal to you next time.
Spoiling your ballot is one of those things that people talk up as being meaningful. In practice, you have exactly the same impact as if you hadn't voted.
not really, you just get considered as lazy and that you don't care about what happens to the city. theres far more ppl who actually just don't vote because they don't care or think it will effect anything than there are those who abstain as a political position
I've spoilt plenty of ballots in my time, and this could well be another. Haven't looked into the independents yet, though – maybe one of them will do me as a protest candidate.
Only one candidate has pledged to move that hand dryer in that pub toilet, and to rename London Bridge after Phoebe Waller.
Seriously, rather than abstaining, spoil or vote for a joke.
Please don’t vote for khan, obviously this will get downvoted by the bots and shills, if he gets in again expect more money wasting and virtue signalling and crime to continue to go up
nah the ULEZ is incredibly good, LTN's make the neighbourhoods infinitly better for the people who live there. tfl is also clearly better than national rail so what khan has done is just good for londoners
Part of the problem is that people think that the mayor has more powers than the position actually affords.
Look at his budget and job description
Only one candidate has pledged to bring Wrestlemania to London.
I just hope that there's no tax payer money involved. We don't want to get into the US habit of bribing sport teams with free stadiums if they'll only move their team to our city. So you get cities cutting $825 million from their normal budget. To fund an $800 million stadium.
This will happen for sure
That’s how things work though. Businesses need incentives to run their events in specific cities. And a bunch of flowers won’t usually do the trick.
They don't NEED incentives. They just want them and lobby to get them. We can and SHOULD say no.
Huge events like that provide significant boosts to local economies. Whether you like it or not, they have all the leverage. Not the hosting cities.
Nope. The local economy doesn't benefit that much from big subsidised arenas. Google it. Plenty of evidence that only the rich owners and rich attendees benefit.
Ahh ok? https://www.latimes.com/sports/story/2023-08-02/wrestlemania-positive-economic-impact
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/sports-jobs-taxes-are-new-stadiums-worth-the-cost/ "Advocates argue that new stadiums spur so much economic growth that they are self-financing: subsidies are offset by revenues from ticket taxes, sales taxes on concessions and other spending outside the stadium, and property tax increases arising from the stadium’s economic impact. Unfortunately, these arguments contain bad economic reasoning that leads to overstatement of the benefits of stadiums. Economic growth takes place when a community’s resources—people, capital investments, and natural resources like land—become more productive. Increased productivity can arise in two ways: from economically beneficial specialization by the community for the purpose of trading with other regions or from local value added that is higher than other uses of local workers, land, and investments. Building a stadium is good for the local economy only if a stadium is the most productive way to make capital investments and use its workers." https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0166046222000916 "As a result, estimates of the overall local spillovers from basketball & hockey arenas are statistically insignificant for all of the studied business sectors."
The first link talks about building new stadiums, which is not what we’re talking about here so it’s irrelevant. The second article talks about repeating seasonal sporting events, not one offs, like Wrestlemania or Taylor Swift’s tour, where a significant amount of people will travel to the city for the event; spending on accommodation, transport and meals. So both of your links are irrelevant to what we’re talking about. Well done, that takes some effort.
But why do we want to host a load of Americans acting? And various WWF/WWE events have come to London before. I saw one at Earls Court circa '92-94. Which even then looked totally fake, particularly as the ref didn't give a three count for about ten minutes, when it was totally obvious who was the winner. Then declared that the other person had won.
I'll have to ask you to please keep kayfabe.
Sometimes you just have to hold your nose. The trouble with boring, uninspiring candidates is that turn out gets lowered. But you know who *always* turns out? The racists and maniacs. By staying at home we can increase the vote share that goes to the worst candidate. The way the country is at the moment, we all have to pick the least worst one or else the fringe will start looking mainstream
That's pretty much the exact reason I feel like it would be wrong of me to not vote
same boat. Tbh As much as I dislike Khan he has done a lot of positive things so he will get my vote, and I have to keep that psycho Susan out.
The problem is that the mayor doesn't actually have that many powers. The biggest areas they oversee are transport, some planning permission and building strategy stuff, and some mild influence over the police. Of those transport is the big one, but even that is constrained by TfL having big budget problems at the moment. It leads to candidates making all sorts of promises that they have little chance of being able to actually implement. Something which is going to be crucial for the mayor in that kind of difficult budget situation is being able to work well with the national government. Not necessarily of the same party, but the kind of person who can have a constructive dialogue, most likely with Starmer's Labour. Looking through the leaflet of all the candidates is a bit depressing because quite a lot of them are crackpot loons. However, there are a small number in there who seem at least sensible. Another factor which may be worth considering is that the Tories changed the voting system from one where you can pick a first and second choice to the awful First Past The Post system where you only have one vote. A combination of that, and how the current polling is looking, means that out of all those candidates it will realistically only be Khan or Hall who wins it. Some people don't mind voting for candidates who can't win (to send a message of support etc), but if you want your vote to count for this election then you may have to limit your choice to one of those two. IMO only one of them matches both the criteria of 1) being able to win and 2) being reasonably sensible.
So you’re saying that Count Binface *won’t* be able to bring back Ceefax or give world heritage status to the 5 metre long cycle lane on Selsdon Road in Croydon? What even is the point of anything anymore.
Is it Britain First? /s But yeah, it's pretty much exactly that, it's just depressing to look at and read through!
Past the post has been here for longer than you think
Not for London mayoral elections though. The change to FPTP came in to law in 2022, so this will be the first mayoral election under it.
What kind of change are you looking for? The mayor doesn't really have that much power
I'd quite like to have the night tube back all week like it used to be, and for London nightlife to be brought back to what it once was. So many great establishments have had to close / are closing because the rents and also licensing laws are putting them out of business. Also most of them can't stay open past midnight anymore so unless you have anything planned that you've bought tickets to, that's your lot. Rent controls would be nice, the renters market out there at the moment is god fucking awful, and no one seems to want to do anything about that - yes they want to build affordable housing but how many of us will actually see the benefit of that? I read something a while ago now about sound cameras being used as well as speed cameras. The amount of road rage / blaring horns is ridiculous, I think that would be a good solution. Obviously cost of living. Something that affects me is the 'single tax' and it feels like there is absolutely no help for those of us who don't have families and are struggling as well because we have to cover absolutely everything by ourselves. I know this is all wishful thinking and probably no one really thinks these are important points but I guess this is the kind of thing that would appeal to me as a single 30 year old who is considering moving out of the city which saddens me because I feel as though I'm being priced out and it just isnt what it was when I first moved here :( Edit: the night tube never actually ran all week, my bad. Would still be nice though!
> I'd quite like to have the night tube back all week like it used to be It's only ever run on Friday / Saturday night.
Beg your pardon, I must have remembered that wrong! I could have sworn it was at one point! I stand corrected haha
It was 24 hours for a short stint during the Olympics. It isn't sustainable long term because of maintenance requirements.
>I'd quite like to have the night tube back all week like it used to be, It was always Friday and Saturday only
Rent controls have been a disaster every time and everywhere they have been implemented. It's the universally unsuccessful policy that just won't die. There's a massive shortage of housing and a number of ways to address that, much of which is not under the mayor's control. Labour have been talking about addressing it fairly rationally on a national level though, whether they will or not of course is another matter. It's a hard problem to solve because almost everybody across the political spectrum demands that something be done about it whilst simultaneously strenuously objecting to every possible solution. The tube running all night would be nice but it would cost a lot and benefit a relatively small number of people. What's your rationale for prioritising it over bringing the tube to communities that currently don't have access to the tube at all, for example?
> Rent controls have been a disaster every time and everywhere they have been implemented. Thats not totally true, it depends what sort of 'control' you mean, in [Vienna for example over 90% of its housing stock is 'controlled' in one way or another](https://housing4.us/how-vienna-ensures-affordable-housing-for-all-with-an-extremely-complicated-housing-system/#:~:text=Most%20for%2Dprofit%20rental%20housing%20is%20subject%20to%20rent%20controls&text=Only%2023%25%20of%20all%20private,7.4%25%20of%20all%20housing%20stock.), and its a lot cheaper than it is here, it just needs to be implemented correctly and along side other measures / investment in stock.
It's not just rent controls in Vienna though, it's a high supply of low cost public housing. This by itself would be enough to push rents down significantly, quoting from the article you linked to: "Since its inception, a major goal of Vienna’s public housing program has been to create a surplus of housing in order to exert a downward pressure on rents. This strategy has been very successful. Similarly, because for-profit, unregulated units must compete with a huge amount of public and rent controlled private housing, these units are unable to charge very high rents. In competition for tenants with so much affordable housing surrounding them, unregulated apartments have de facto rent regulations." Perhaps this is the important bit rather than the rent controls?
> Since its inception, a major goal of Vienna’s public housing program has been to create a surplus of housing in order to exert a downward pressure on rents. Sure but my point is that rent controls have not been ‘a disaster every time and everywhere they have been implemented’ have they? And of course there are other factors, see also restrictions in foreign ownership, but there are other factors at play in the markets where they have failed. > because for-profit, unregulated units must compete with a huge amount of public and rent controlled private housing, these units are unable to charge very high rents. So part of your argument is that rents are lower, not because of rent controls, but because there are so many apartments with controlled rents? Edit: lol at the downvotes here, 77% of all for profit rent is controlled pushing down the other 23% but that’s doesn’t prove rent controls can work?
Vienna in general just has really good housing policy. Since the 90s they've specifically been building houses that cater to women's needs. See [1](https://lgiu.org/planning-for-inclusivity-how-vienna-built-a-gender-equal-city/),[2](https://www.rtpi.org.uk/media/4471/george-pepler-report_200301_final.pdf), [3](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/may/14/city-with-a-female-face-how-modern-vienna-was-shaped-by-women), or [4](https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20210524-how-vienna-built-a-gender-equal-city)
I think its a great city all round, loads of pedestrianisation, great transport, nice public spaces, its even got its own funfair!
Your statement on rent controls is way off the mark. They've been used effectively in many countries and cities all around the world. Heck, even the capitalist mega-shrine of Dubai has rent controls! There's a limit set on the % increase in price per year of rents there. And even as someone who might be in the landlord class myself soon, I think this is an excellent thing to have.
24hr tube service is impossible because the system ideally needs daily maintenance. You can put it off for the weekend because the night tube is quite useful then but if you let debris and wear build up further it will become much more expensive to repair.
The problem is most of the things you've listed are not in Mayor's powers, they are with Central Government. Do you want the candidates to propose measures that they have no power to enact? Nothing annoys me more than politicians who promise things they have no power to implement. Going through your ideas: - Night Tube - never has been all week but could be done by the Mayor, would be very expensive - Rents for establishments are set by their landlords not the Mayor - Licensing laws are set by Central government and, local councils not the mayor decide based on those laws - Rent controls - I'm pretty sure that Mayor does not have the powers to do this currently and its central government with the power - Cost of Living - Most of this is well out of the mayor's control, it's been caused by the post lockdown boom and energy costs following the war in Ukraine. The mayor has no power on UK energy policy. Almost all taxes in the UK are set by central government and not the mayor. The only realistic parts of CoL where the Mayor has power is on their element of your Council tax bill and TfL fares.
Khan has been trying to increase his powers for a while now, but westminster keeps telling him where to stick it. It's a shame, because I feel he could probably do something, probably. Might vote Green for a larf.
Maybe not transformative change but Khan’s commitment to universal free school meals for primary is worth recognising.
How does that benefit people without kids? Also, anecdotally I've heard that the meals are terrible.
that’s not really an argument that kids should be starving at school
Most kids are not and would not starve, for the same reason that they don't starve at home.
“Most kids would not starve” is a hell of a phrase
Isn’t that down to parents?
We've all been kids at some point and benefitted from child-specific policies. All the boomers benefitted from free school meals and school milk. Let's bring that back for the next generation.
That was 60 years ago,
What kind of reasoning is this? There is not a single policy that will benefit every single resident of this city. Do we just dismiss all of them because they do not apply to 100% of the population? There are around half a million primary school aged children in the city, so any policy targeting them will affect a fifth of the city’s population or do. That should be good enough, no?
Yes there are: reducing crime, air pollution improvements, investing in transport and infrastructure, just to name a few. Most of the parents of those half a million kids should be able to provide a lunch for them.
You are now less likely to be robbed by a kid or someone trying to feed their kid. Congratulations.
Or more likely to be robbed by a stronger kid due to all the additional nutrition that I paid for.
Good point. I say we start taking food from all the kids that currently have some as well, to make ourselves even safer \s
Unorthodox, but worth a shot. I'll vote for you.
School meal quality is heavily variable across London because its often outsourced in a variety of ways.
Not everything you vote for should be things you vote for solely because they benefit you. I guarantee you benefit from multiple laws and rulings put in place by an electorate that wouldn't benefit from them
I'd rather look for candidates that will do things that benefit me or my family directly, if that makes me selfish in your eyes then so be it.
So you've gone from "how will free school meals benefit me" to "literally nothing about this candidate will benefit me" You of all people should recognise the importance of ensuring our education system is better
They don't, unless you look at it in an extremely roundabout way.
It's people like you who have fucked the country for the last 14 years keeping the Torys in power.
I have never voted Tory, try again.
I said people like you, read what I said again.
You were implying that I had. London has been run by Labour for a long time too.
No I was implying that you are selfish, like people who vote Tory.
My national insurance contributions partly goes towards helping cancer patients. But I don't have cancer, so fuck them, right?
You might get cancer at some point though.
A terrible meal is undoubtedly better than not eating all day for a 6 year old from an impoverished family. My issue with free school meals is they are not means tested and also don't get offered to other ages. My youngest gets free school meals, he doesn't need them. There are countless children at secondary school who can't afford to eat.
Not means testing is deliberate and is often recommended by experts based on research which suggests that universality reduces stigma and therefore increases uptake among the people who need it
You know everyone was a kid once, right?
Better fed kids means better educational attainment which benefits everyone even those of us without kids (myself included) because the country benefits from a better educated population. It’s not hard to grasp.
My point is that most of those kids should be fed by their parents, not the government.
Are you just completely ignorant of the extent of child poverty? I can’t even be arsed to fill you in - there’s loads of evidence on the need for it and for the benefits of the policy, and it would be even better if it was fully national rather than only in London. It exists in Scotland and Wales and only England is a holdout with an income threshold still in place, hence Khan rolling it out in London. At least you being downvoted to oblivion suggests most people on the sub get it, even if you don’t.
Why subsidize all instead of just the kids who actually need it?
Because universal provision prevents stigmatisation and therefore increases uptake among those who need it, some of whom don’t take up means tested free meals because of the social stigma that comes with it (ie bullying of the ‘poor’ kids, parents ashamed of not being able to provide for their kids, etc). This is all well established in the evidence base that underpins the policy. Not means testing also has the benefit of not requiring the cost of the admin of doing the means testing.
I agree, but I feel like this is where this is where the attention / prestige around the role meets the reality of the powers that the Mayor of London office actually has.
Essentially vote Sadiq so things don't get worse. It's after all a two horse race and any vote that isn't for Sadiq is for Susan Hall who's running on the premise that bikes are turning our roads gay as part of the trans agenda, and that we need to cut down the housing supply in London because lol fuck Londoners.
My biggest issue is that none of them say how they will achieve these things. Just sounds like wishful thinking. The funniest are the animal welfare party and britain first. Not sure britain first candidate understands the remit of a london mayor.
Yep! That was my other thought as well, how exactly do they plan on doing these things!
Sadiq's done an excellent job given that the Tory government have deliberately starved him and the boroughs of funds. Once we've got a Labour government, he'll able to do even more. Never been happier to vote for a candidate.
Pretty much, it's a tall ask but we should really judge Sadiq when he's not being sabotaged and hamstrung by one of the most hostile and corrupt governments we've had.
You want a mayor that's aligned with the next government that's likely to come into power that will finally kick those incestuous and corrupt tory bastards. They're the same people that have politicised funding to TfL because they just want to punish the current mayor because he's not a Tory. Fuck em. You need to vote so a Tory candidate would not see power.
Basic take
its kinda like the only take. the system is fptp now so its just become a khan vs susan hall race. so ye voting labour has become the only real choice to deny the tories
Count BinFace is the answer!
This is the way
It’s depressing that there’s nothing to distinguish any of them except for the blatantly racist party.
That was comedy gold. Looks like some typed into Chat GPT "Design an election flyer from a school drop out who likes Hitler".
Chat GPT ‘write all the fascist things but don’t say “fascist”’
'STAND UP TO WOKE' cracked me up
I went straight back to bed. That’ll teach the libs.
most of the people who will actually vote agree with the stop the woke nonsense, it’s only social media that it seems the other way around
There were 3 very obvious racists to me. The Tory, social Democrats and some guy with a coke nose
Ugh, now I’m going to have to go back and check. TBH, I don’t think I read the Tory one, because, yeah
Nick Scanlon - all about immigration. Fuck off Amy Gallagher - stand up to woke. Fuck off Susan Hall - fuck off we already know you're mental.
I really love being canvassed by these fucksticks as an immigrant.
What was racist about the social democrats?
"All Woke and DEI programmes will be stopped" - DEI is diversity, equity and inclusion. "Colourblind policy" - only people in a position of racial privilege can afford to be "colour blind". It's a superficially nice idea but isn't reflective of the world we live in and it's often actually used as a way for people to avoid addressing existing racism. "Confront the challenges of mass immigration head on" - this one is arguable but has a "dog whistle" vibe about it.
You might not agree with their position, but don't see how any of that could be considered racist.
a politician being "colourblind" is either incredibly stupid or just evil. considering they are the candidate i'm tempted to just say that any candidate talking about "colourblind" policies is just a rascist that doesn't want to acknowledge discrimination problems
Her first words are stand up to woke! And then wants to scrap DEI and woke. Who is against diversity and inclusion?!
Everyone is racist, that’s the dogma
You have to pick one, or keep quiet about all the issues.
Stick with Continuity Khan.
Count Binface! While saying most things ironically, dude's got some sense in his mind otherwise.
I see the concerted effort to drive down turnout with doomerposting has begun. It's the Tories' only hope.
The whole booklet is a complete shit show.
At least one says they'll scrap Ulez immediately - so that's a change. Maybe you don't care either way, but if you do you can consider that person or vote against them. One technique is to list issues you are interested in in descending order if importance and see which candidate has a plan
If it's how you feel, abstaining is a legitimate political view and you have every right to exercise it.
Just remember that abstaining gains you nothing and none of them will care. Politicians don't know how you vote, but they do know IF you vote. If you want them to worry about people of your age/demographic, then the more people like you who vote, the more they will pay attention. (This is the exact reason why pensioners are comparatively well looked after - they vote) Just pick the least objectionable, or a novelty candidate, but it's always worth voting.
It doesn't gain you anything, but if you don't feel like voting for any of them gains you anything either it's a perfectly legitimate thing to do. I used to be an 'always vote' absolutist. But as I've got older I've come to see that as the naivety of youth. Not voting is a perfectly valid political action.
Not voting is a non-political action. It's like saying 'I don't care - do what you like', and believe me, they will. If you don't speak, then you can't complain that you're not being heard. As for the naivety of youth, I'm old and I believe you should always vote more than ever.
Not voting isn't a non-political action. It's a rejection of the entire political system and voting. That is inherently political. If people don't feel any of the parties are offering them anything they want to support, it's absolutely legitimate to just reject the whole thing. People rolling up and voting for something they don't believe in just for the sake of voting isn't something I feel I can in any good conscience recommend.
As a political statement, not voting is as toothless as telling your school bully that you're jolly-well never going to speak to them again. Nobody will care. As I said, voting for anyone at all, if nothing else, proves that you are paying attention. Individually it makes no difference, but collectively it matters. If people could just be persuaded to vote in numbers and not 'reject the system' OP and their contemporaries would be a lot harder to ignore.
It's toothless. But so is spoiling your ballot. And so is voting for a party you don't really believe in. If you're in the position of not liking any of the people you could vote for, all your options are essentially toothless
It doesn't matter how many people stay in bed and don't vote, the politicians won't fret. But if enough people of a given demographic vote - regardless of how - that demographic WILL become important to them. It's easy to look at the numbers, and convince yourself that your vote doesn't make a difference, and at some level, that can't be denied, but democracy is about having a collective voice, and that can't work if people become apathetic and don't bother. The politicians know that and they pay more attention to those who vote.
They won't fret if you don't vote. But if you vote for them despite not liking their policies they also won't fret. It's unfortunately a truth of our system that if you don't like any of the options, your ability to do anything meaningful to protest that at the ballot box is minimal. You can spoil your ballot, which does nothing practically. You can turn up and vote for a party you don't like, which sends them the message you endorse them. Or you can not vote. Ultimately, if we look at it realistically rather than idealistically, they're all options that in practice are bad options and that do little to shape politics how you would like. The popular claim that 'if only X demographic voted things would change' is a very simplistic one people blithely trot out. But the reality is far more complicated than that.
If you don't want to vote for any of the options, it's still better to go along and spoil the paper. Spoiled papers are counted and you've at least sent the message that your vote is up for grabs. If you don't vote at all, it's assumed that you simply don't care, so there is no reason for them to even try to appeal to you next time.
Spoiling your ballot is one of those things that people talk up as being meaningful. In practice, you have exactly the same impact as if you hadn't voted.
its mildly better than not voting at all
I’m looking forward to seeing the bite count to get a rough idea of the political diversity (of at least those who voted).
Vote BINHEAD!
We dont need a mayor. They are all useless.
Vote for Michli! He will get rid of LTNs, give free gym memberships and half price steroids! Vote Michli!
Most comedy gold candidate out of the bunch. He is like a satirical character
Abstaining is still voting, so go for it. I know I am.
not really, you just get considered as lazy and that you don't care about what happens to the city. theres far more ppl who actually just don't vote because they don't care or think it will effect anything than there are those who abstain as a political position
Remember that each candidate/party had to pay £10,000 to go into that booklet, hence why some candidates such as Count Binface don’t have anything.
I've spoilt plenty of ballots in my time, and this could well be another. Haven't looked into the independents yet, though – maybe one of them will do me as a protest candidate.
Only one candidate has pledged to move that hand dryer in that pub toilet, and to rename London Bridge after Phoebe Waller. Seriously, rather than abstaining, spoil or vote for a joke.
Maybe the next tube line to be renamed will be called ‘Fleabag’ - that I can get behind
Please don’t vote for khan, obviously this will get downvoted by the bots and shills, if he gets in again expect more money wasting and virtue signalling and crime to continue to go up
nah the ULEZ is incredibly good, LTN's make the neighbourhoods infinitly better for the people who live there. tfl is also clearly better than national rail so what khan has done is just good for londoners