I'm announcing today my candidacy for the Conservative nomination for Mayor of London.
I believe I have the necessary skills, love of London and the requisite enthusiasm to do the job, and do it well. I recognise I am joining a crowded field, which includes several friends, but I do not think that any candidate has yet caught the public's imagination.
I may not have the name recognition of Steve Norris, the political connections of Nicholas Boles or the celebrity of Mike Read, but they are not what London needs. London needs someone who can take the fight to Ken Livingstone and beat him. I am encouraged that despite my previous stance of saying 'I would rather stick needles in my eyes than run for London mayor', my blog readers have consistently encouraged me to put my name forward. I do so now with humility. I shall, of course, immediately move back to London and leave behind the tranquil settings of Royal Tunbridge Wells. I shall 'be the change'.
Notes to editors: My campaign office will be based at 1 Avril Avenue, E17 and my campaign manager is Mitchell Andrews.
My campaign blog is up and running and can be found HERE.
62 comments:
Only a real fool wouldn't vote for you, Iain.
Poisson d'Avril!
Nicely done.
Oh, very funny! You're very quick off the mark for a blogger who only spends an hour a day blogging.
Just because West Ham won a game doesn't mean you should get carried away!
Cheers
Ted
You caught me out for 2 seconds!
That's a bit of a comedown.
I'd heard you were standing for leader of the labour party.
You just can't trust the pmos these days..
Oh Ian you had me until I checked out the website! Thanx 4 the laugh :)
Damn. I didn't believe it till you linked it. At which point, I was thoroughly exploded in my fault. Nasty.
Iain, that really took me back. Did you know I grew up in 1 Avril Ave. E17, just before the end o' the War?
I recall going to the end of the street, buying 500 gramms of whelks, coming back, and b****r me, I couldn't find the 'ase, could I, cos it 'ad been blown daan by a VD or summink.
An' me dear ol' mum was so plastered, she didn't get 'ome till after Suez.
Iain, you're a gent. 'Ave a pint 'a vodka on me mate.
As I'm in California where it is not April Fool's Day yet, you fooled me for a while ...
nicely done iain. just for a few seconds i believed it!
Following that nano-second of excitement, looks like it's back to the eye-pricking then!
Twat.
You really should run.
You couldn't be worse than any of the other candidates.
It's not that you don't have the name recognition of Norris - it's just that when it comes to nicknames, "Blogger Dale" can't hope to compete with "Shagger Norris"...
ooh good, I hope you will support St George's Day unlike that commie anti English twat livingstone. good luck.
1386 Farvardin 12 Yekshanbeh
And why not also run as First Minister of Scotland?
I'm sure that we arrange for Hearts to move out of Tynecastle thus making way for West Ham...
Nah - you should take up acting they're lloking for a witch in the new Old Vic production of the Crucible
I'd vote for you.
Only joking!
which includes several friends
not any longer...learn to use the prefix "former-" in all correspondence
As Chairman of Walthamstow Conservatives, I have checked the electoral register and can comnfirm there is no "Avril Avenue" in E17. There is a Mavis Road, a Horace Gardens and indeed a Dale Street, but saldy, no Avril!
John, you won't know this but I used to be involved iN Walthamstow Conservatives. I even stood for the council - in 1990 I think. I lived in Howard Road from 1988-94.
Love it! West Ham win a couple, and you go totally bonkers!!
Shame about the date, could confuse some people into thinking its just a bog standard April Fool, but we know better don't we?
Good news.
for an april fool.........
Good show! And good luck!
Good luck Iain.
On another note, why hasn't our so-called Prime Minister in waiting Gordon Brown said anything about the Iranian hostage situation.
Brown found time to talk at a group of ten year olds for a TV programme but, as usual, when there's a tricky situation he goes into hiding.
It's no wonder he's rapidly gaining the reputation as a coward.
Certainly not the type of person Britain needs as a leader.
Very droll - boom, boom. You'll be going on live at the hippodrome next with Tarby.
Brown's financial scam exposed:
The full horror of Chancellor's debt binge
.......as a taxpayer I'm genuinely worried: the more I pore over the Budget fine print, the more I feel that Brown is seriously damaging this nation's finances......
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/04/01/ccliam01.xml
boom and busted,
Anybody checked whether Brown was reading "The Pet Goat" with the kids? Perhaps George W. Bush lent him his copy....
Brown will almost certainly be Prime Minister. He almost certainly should not be.
ha ha you will tell us next gordon brown should be PM and blairs legacy is not iraq. my poor aching sides.
The first strategic error of your campaign was to make the announcement on April Fools Day.
Nobody will take it seriously now.
From today's article by Liam Halligan:
".....I worry that the Chancellor is heavily relying on our "future" to secure his "future". He is chalking up massive, multi-billion-pound liabilities, the vast majority of them hidden from the national accounts, which taxpayers will have to meet only once Brown has disappeared from the political scene, his prime ministerial ambitions fulfilled....."
So is Brown destroying the future financial security of Britain in order to "buy" his obsessive political ambitions?
And if so, why do we tolerate it? It's our future he's screwing up for God's sake!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2007/04/01/ccliam01.xml
Now what handle to give you ?
There's sh@gger norris
step forward blagger dale !!
Congratulations to my new Mayoral candidate. I understand that Harlow and district has just been made a borough of London.
Nulab vote increasing, green lung destroying, concrete smothered the last remaining section of the metro Green Belt separting Harlow and London on Friday.
So, if you need any canvassing done in NE Old Harlow and surrounds, Iain, I'd be delighted to help!
Auntie Flo'
lol, nicely done.
It would have been even funnier if Recess Monkey had announced Milliband's leadership bid!
Many a true word is spoken in jest....
Another welcome surprise is that Polly Toynbee has just announced the date of the next General Election. No really, this isn't a joke. Would Polly Toynbee get her facts wrong?
Pollyanna's column in Friday's Guardian states that Jimmy Brown can recover sufficient votes - er, sorry - can repair the NHS and meet his Mickey Mouse targets on reducing child poverty, before the next election.
As the poverty figures for 2006-7 (released 2008) will be just as awful as the, recently released, nightmare figures for 2005-6, Polly says it will take Brown until Spring 2009 - i.e March 2009 - to continue his budget aims and increase tax credits and the minimum wage sufficiently to win the election - which will quickly follow the wondrous announcement of March 2009 that Brown has virtually ended poverty.
If wages were higher, says Polly, the taxpayer would spend less on tax credits. However, typical of c £200,000 pa Guardian columnist Polly, she has neglected to cost in the huge taxpayer subsidy required to cover the reduction in growth and increased unemployment benefits resulting from the insolvency and redundancy fallout.
April Fool, Polly Toynbee!
Auntie Flo'
"It would have been even funnier if Recess Monkey had announced Milliband's leadership bid!"
Or given his past glories, perhaps informing us that the Millibandwagon had ground to halt because he was - er, dead....
One more Polly Toynbee quote to brighten this April morning.
"The IFS says that it will cost another £4 billion in tax credits to hit that [Brown's] vital 2010 [child poverty] target...by the next election, only two years away. The money has to be on the table so the IFS certifies the target will be met."
Then Polly adds the telling statement (capitalisation mine):
"That is necessary not only for a Labour victory, BUT IN CASE LABOUR DOESN'T WIN: if the money is promised then an incoming Conservative government dare not cut it."
Eh, Polly Toynbee, say that again:
"an incoming Conservative government" (Polly Toynbee)
Looks as though even Polly Toynbee's hedging her bets in view of the majority hatred of Mr Broon, then.
April Fool, Gordon Brown!
Auntie Flo'
Saw you on BBC news24 last night with the April fool's already in full swing!
We all know your influence is far greater at 18 Doughty Street than in the mayor's office anyway.
Iain Dale said...
I used to be involved iN Walthamstow Conservatives. I even stood for the council - in 1990 I think. I lived in Howard Road from 1988-94.
Then my grandparents probably voted for you - much to my, disgust, I was a Lib Dem in those days
John Moss said...
As Chairman of Walthamstow Conservatives, I have checked the electoral register and can comnfirm there is no "Avril Avenue" in E17
Sorry, John, you're wrong, I was born in Walthamstow at Thorpe Combe and lived at 1 Avril Avenue.
Auntie Flo'
1 Avril Ave, Walthamstow, is just off Billet Road, for anyone who can't place it.
Auntie Flo'
I would vote for you but the problem is I live in Linconshire.I do however have friends who live in London so I may yet be able to help.
DEINITELY YOU SHOULD STAND FOR LONDON MAYOR.
However, many a true word spoken in jest, Iain !!
Iain
Couldn't you be crowned King for a day,that would be much more interesting.
As far as I'm concerned you are the only one with name recognition, essential for a successful run, so go for it. I had heard of a Steve Norris, notorious for having propositioned HM, the Baroness and Madonna all in one day, but I'm sure it cant be the same person.
Manfarang,
Surely, QUEEN FOR A DAY!
(sorry Iain!)
Oh my god... it looks like some people really did truly fall for this one... I have to admit though that it is one of the best I have seen on the blogs this year.
There is an Avril Way, not Avenue. If you lived in Avril Avenue, then I'm sorry to say they've knocked it down.
I will of course now furiously exploit Dale connections. I wonder, did you know Mark Batchelor?
Amazing how many people you fooled Iain it can only be about three weeks ago that you were saying you would never do anything of the sort.
Perhaps I am more of an avid reader than most.
Yes, indeed I did know Mark Batchelor.
Well, that'll stop you going on about bloody football here then! Except in a sort of theoretical way.............. theoretically.
The sad thing is that the real choice will be between two notorious professional liars; Livingstone on the one hand, who spouts his bitterness towards terror-bombers when they strike and has private love-ins with them at his Mayoral suite and Norris, who came out with total lies on behalf of contractors when the Paddington crash happened for commercial reasons and has never retracted them, even though they distracted the media at a critical time for over a week. What a marvellous choice the voters of London have before them.
AM I THE ONLY PERSON TO THINK THAT POSTING AN APRIL FOOL ABOUT HIMSELF SUGGESTS THAT IAIN'S OPINION OF HIMSELF IF FAR, FAR HIGHER THAN ANYONE ELSE'S?
I MEAN, WHO CARES IF THIS IS TRUE.......
I think Dale was hoping for a rush of "oh please stand for real Iain!" but alas, no reaction. Oh well Iain, back to the blogging.
I laughed out loud when I saw the campaign website - best joke of the day
Anymous above x 2 - the trouble with the left is that have got no sense of humour or ability to alugh at themselves.
it's me, anon 2, again...call me james.
what makes u assume i am of the left?
other than that i dont think your jokes are funny.
funny as cancer
you claim "humour" as one of your four raisons d'etre, but i have yet to find any.
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