Nationally the share of the vote looked like this:

Tories 44%
Labour 24%

In London, with a socialist candidate the share of the vote looked like this:

Johnson 42%
Livingstone 36%

Grimmer mentions their candidate, Janet Oosthuysen, falling short of ousting the Lib Dems by 53 votes, they campaigned on a slogan of "Vote Labour - Get a Socialist".

I think there is a message here for the Labour Party and somewhere in it is the 'S' word.

The London Mayoral elections are just a few weeks away now, and things are looking pretty neck and neck between Ken Livingstone and Boris Johnson.

Here's Ken's official election broadcast:

I know a lot of socialists will be tempted to vote for Lindsey German, and possibly put Sian Berry from the Green Party as their second vote. I'd like to appeal to them to strongly consider backing Ken Livingstone, he is a socialist and he has been carrying out pro-environment policies in London, sure probably not as far as many of us would like. But there is a real danger of a Tory becoming Mayor of London, such an event would be a considerable setback.

Allow me to embed a few more YouTube videos:

And of course Boris, he may be able to get a few laughs but honestly what's he blabbering on about? Something about cutting funds to Marxists and anarchists, and worse still further destroying UK science which is in enough of a crisis right now and trying to draw a comparison between Ken Livingstone and DPRK's Dear Leader Kim Jong-il.

I think the Tory strategy here is very much to field the biggest nut they can find among their ranks to try and get some attention in the press.

More from Socialist Appeal on Boris Johnson.

From Venezuelanalysis.com:

The Venezuelan government made the agreement with London Mayor Ken Livingstone last February after Venezuelan President Chavez suggested the idea during a visit to London in 2006. The deal will provide London buses with a 20% discount on fuel from Venezuela. At the same time, London will open an office in Caracas to provide Venezuela with advice and technical expertise on tourism, public transport, urban-planning, and the protection of the environment, fields in which London is a world leader.

The discount will reduce the city's annual fuel bill of about £65 million ($138.4 million) by up to £14 million ($29.8 million), said a spokesman for the mayor. Those to benefit from the lower bus-fares will be single parents, long-term sick, disabled and others on income support.

"We want to target the very poorest Londoners," said Livingston to reporters. "From today, all Londoners on Income Support are eligible for half price travel on London buses. This will make it cheaper and easier for people to go about their lives and get the most out of London."

The mayor said that the reduced fares would offer savings of as much as £280 ($596) a year per person. And Livingston assured that Venezuela will benefit from the deal as well.

This is of course great news; Venezuela is the leading example of the people taking power into their own hands in the world today. Building connections with the workers throughout the rest of the world is essential.