Dog Whistle Politics Win Out in London?

Okay, life moves on. Boris is Mayor and is giving conciliating interviews and patting Ken on the back at today’s assembly meeting. However ....while at the risk of making this post sound like sour grapes, please always remember this is my blog, my view, my interpretation of events.

In January I posted on a speech that City & East Assembly member, John Biggs, gave to West Ham Labour Party GC. In this speech, John spoke about his fears that the Tories have resorted to “dog whistle politics” in their political campaigning for the London Assembly elections.

“Dog whistle” politics were perfected by conservative politicians in Australia who used “coded” language in political campaigning, which appears to mean one thing to the general population but in reality is directed and targeted to a specific audience. Like dog whistles which humans cannot hear but dogs can.

To be absolutely clear – what I think went on during the recent election was a deliberate and prolonged attempt by certain Tories supporters and the media to make malicious and sensational allegations against mainly black advisers to Ken Livingstone, in order to polarise white voters and frighten them into not voting for Labour (and therefore encouraging them to vote Tory).

Former adviser to Ken on Equalities (I assume soon also to be made redundant from the GLA) Jasper Lee may well have acted inappropriately with regard to his personal life. However, there is no evidence that he was ever corrupt. The drip, drip lies, innuendo, slurs and sensationalistic reporting were to my mind a deliberate attempt to plant racist messages in the mind of white London voters.

Okay, while I am personally convinced that “dog whistle” politics was practiced during this campaign, I do not think that this was the only reason for Ken’s defeat. There were a number of other reasons. But, let’s face it “dog whistle” stuff helped.

(Heard something? - Picture of "Little Miss Muffet" and her pups circa 1971-ish)