Today the new Assembly met for the first time after the election with, mainly, the same old faces and the same old attitudes. While the Mayor had to look around for new post holders to replace his fallen soldiers the opposition parties reaffirmed their previous cooperation with a formal agreement […]
As thousands of public sector workers across London went on strike to defend their pensions, around 30,000 police officers also took to the streets against the cuts. Police officers are banned from taking strike action but a number of those we spoke to today raised the idea as a very real […]
After extremely poor turn out results across the country Labour leader Ed Miliband, to his credit, warned of a “crisis of politics” acknowledging politicians of all parties needed to win back people’s trust. Certainly the drop of 10% in turnout in London could partly be responsible for Livingstone’s loss last […]
The Green Party was the only party left jubilant as the results of the election became clear last night. While Labour returned an extra four Assembly Members, going from 8 to 12, they failed to seize the Mayoralty despite the poor performance of the conservatives across London and the country […]
Although the final results are yet to come out London Elects is running a continuuouus tally of the votes as they come in which indicate what the polls had long been predicting – that Livingstone will lsoe the Mayoralty but Labour will do very well in the Assembly elections. On […]
Defence Secretary Philip Hammond today told the Evening Standard that he is prepared to order an airliner to be shot down if the London Olympics are threatened. The security arrangements around the Olympics have been extremely controversial including extreme restrictions on protest and missiles sited on top of residential flats. The sabre rattling […]
For the first time in a London Mayoral election environmental issues have really come to the fore. Whether it’s the glorious cycle campaigners, cutting air pollution, or how to get our public transport eco-friendly we’ve seen these issues force themselves onto the candidates in no uncertain manner. It’s estimated that […]
May the first is here and, as always, it’s a good time to remember what May Day is all about. Richard Seymour has an excellent little history of May Day on Comment is Free where he looks at the roots of International Workers Day. Certainly in this country it’s not been […]
Residents of Central London have occasionally dreamed of having surface to air missiles in their blocks, or at least they would have dreamed this if the police helicopters had let them get some sleep. You will have already heard that six sites have been earmarked for to site surface to air […]
On Friday Tottenham Court Road was closed off for several hours after a man stormed into offices above Starbucks having strapped on a number of gas canisters. Michael Green was searching for “Abby” over a row about an HGV licence but when Abby told Green that “Abby” wasn’t in she […]
Never noticed this before. As strolling past Trafalgar Square I saw the statue of Charles the first....
Copyright © 2026 Big Smoke. All Rights Reserved.
Chat