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Mayor slams Johnson review of offices abroad
Pippa Crerar, Political Correspondent26 Mar 2008
Boris Johnson's record on business came under attack today as Ken Livingstone claimed the Tory had plans to shut down overseas Greater London Authority offices, horrifying the City.
The Mayor said the offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Delhi, Mumbai and Brussels were needed to attract investment and create jobs. Think London, the capital's inward investment agency, also has offices in New York and San Francisco.
Mr Livingstone is speaking at a hustings to be held by London's business community tonight. He will tell the London First event: "The greatest challenge facing London businesses is globalisation, and therefore maintaining London as the most international and diverse business city in the world.
"To meet this challenge London has to build its position not only in traditional markets, such as the US, but in the huge new markets of India and China. Nothing therefore more clearly symbolises the difference between myself and Boris Johnson for London businesses, and the future of our city, than my opening offices to promote London in the US, China and India and Boris Johnson's pledge to close down all offices promoting London abroad."
He added: "When I told one of London's leading businessmen that he had pledged to close down the offices promoting London abroad he thought it was a slur - until his jaw dropped as he realised it was serious."
Aides to the Tory candidate said he would review the offices' use before any final decision was made.
Mr Johnson said: "From day one I will review every office under a value-for-money programme. For too long this Mayor has concentrated on his ego and foreign policy and less on the concerns of Londoners and these offices are an example of this."
The Mayor says the offices, which cost a total of more than £1 million a year, work on issues including tourism, foreign students and film. He says each job created in London generates an average of £40,000, so the Shanghai office, for example, which costs about £130,000 a year to run, would pay for itself if it generated three jobs a year.
Reader views (15)
Having just received our household council tax bill, it is interesting to note that the borough we live in has been able to achieve a nil rise in council tax for the second year in succession, unlike the bite that the GLA takes. If all of KL's 'initiatives' are so successful, why is it necessary for employers to pay 'London allowances' to make it possible for essential workers such as teachers and nurses to survive in the city? Ken's toadying to big business provides no benefit whatever to the average worker - perks may 'trickle down' to those on huge GLA or TfL salaries, but they certainly don't go any further.
- Kiwi Expat, London, UK, 28/03/2008 13:06
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Of course Ken and his cronies want these offices abroad, this is so they can all go on jollies (at the taxpayers expense) to visit them.
- Tom, Watford UK, 27/03/2008 10:59
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Everyone should know that we have British Embassies in practically every decent sized country on this earth. Each and every one of them has a commercial department which can help exporters and looks for inward investment into the UK. What Ken is doing is a duplication of something that already exists. This is personal empire building, treating London as some sort of principality with King Ken on the throne. I would suggest that someone looks closely at who exactly is employed at these satellite offices as it's highly likely that some sort of Jasper clones are employed!
- Ken Johns, Chester, UK, 27/03/2008 08:02
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John Graham's comments look libellous / defamatory to me - check it out with your lawyers.
- Austen, London, 27/03/2008 07:53
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Great BIG extra gravy train for Ken's cronies-how about an office in Africa.Dr Livingstone I presume...
- Anna Moreno, Luxembourg, 27/03/2008 07:44
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Who supplies Livingstone with his figures? Weather they’re wrong or right, the timing is pants. Nearly everyone thinks £25 a day for a car is lunacy. Offices in China and India in the hope it will create three jobs here, brilliant. In the last couple of months his chances of being voted back in have gone from 60% to 33% (Betfair). Transport may be cheaper but it’s worse than ever to travel on.
GLA press release, “We will spend something like £500 million over the next decade on cycling... which means that thousands more cyclists can cycle in confidence.”
Does he not know how mad that sounds? Say there’s ten thousand more cyclists. Works out fifty thousand a cyclist. Any danger of spending £500m improving the roads, Ken? All those car drivers vote so do their families and friends. If he came over as sincere about green issues it wouldn’t be so bad but it’s his smugness. My way or the, excuse the pun, highway. If green issues were paramount in peoples concerns, the Green party would be taken seriously at elections. This isn’t China, when a noticeable amount of people think he’s wrong he can’t just spout his homemade stats, stamp his feet and say “ Don’t care, don’t care. I’m not going to change my mind.” Well he can and does and every day it shows on his face that he realises that it’s all gone horribly wrong.
- Shaun Hughes, London, England, 27/03/2008 00:04
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Ken Livingston attacking anyone on business is like Kate Moss criticizing Britney Spears for her drug use. Absolutely laughable. The only people to the left of Ken are either on horizontal display in Moscow or wearing re-elect Hugo Chavez lapel pins.
- Eric Magness, Costa Mesa, CA USA, 26/03/2008 22:28
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Even if the ludicrous claim that three jobs created, pays for the office in China, there is most likely a massaging of the stats to prove that the job wouldn't have occurred anyway.
More likely for any job created in London, the same office gives away ten and probably houses to go with them.
Rock on Boris!
- Frank H, London., 26/03/2008 17:55
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Having offices in foreign countries looks like a massive ego trip for The Mayor and his cronies and a nice branch line for the gravy train. If international businesses need this kind of support, what benefit do they actually bring to the London borough taxpayers? Using the Mayor's reasoning, each of us taxpayers should get a cash dividend for living in London instead of having to argue with employers that Londoners need special rates of pay and allowances to survive in Ken's paradise. London IS a wonderful and exciting place in terms of history and culture, but none of the things that make it wonderful can be attributed to a Mayor who has no sense of history and seems determined to destroy historic London and its skyline to curry favour with Big Business.
- Kiwi Expat, London, UK, 26/03/2008 16:28
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It is beyond laughable that Livingstone talks about business - I have personally generated hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of business by getting on a plane and going out looking for it with zero help from him. Give the FSB the money that he has taxed from me and we will generate more than he ever could- Livingstone knows nothing about business and is consistently proven as incompetent or corrupt and nothing more than a massive (increasing) tax burden
- John Graham, London, UK, 26/03/2008 15:28
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London received inward investment before this expensive network of offices was established. Close them down now and reduce our taxes.
- Stephen Jacques, London, UK, 26/03/2008 15:06
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What utter rubbish Tessa Jowell is spouting "the whole idea of parachuting in business executives to run City Hall is cynical and anti-democratic".
What about Ken Livingstone parachuting in all of his under qualified cronies from his days at the old GLC?
Now that is outrageous and Londoners have clearly suffered as a result.
Boris's idea of surrounding himself with experts is a great one,as each person will bring real business experience to improve London and try to salvage the damage TfL have done.
- Daniel Howard, London,UK, 26/03/2008 13:30
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"He says each job created in London generates an average of £40,000".
How exactly? Is that a 40 grand bribe to someone in the mayor's office?
- Sarah N., London, UK., 26/03/2008 13:28
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Desperate talk from a man who personally appointed Jasper the grasper and a host of other cronies.
Quite right Boris questions the value of overseas office.
Hey, he did not say he would close them, but merely to review them. "Ken" get your facts right !
The sooner Ken is out.. the better for Londoners and businesses. Ken's policies created an exodus of Londoners including me. God.. rid the man.
- Asw, Hong Kong, 26/03/2008 13:24
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Boris is right to look at shutting down these wastes of council tax. I am staggered that London needs to have offices in these far flung climes to manage inward investment. Let the City and big corporations worry about inward investment and the Mayor can get on with making the place easier to get around.
- Nobby Clark, Perth, UK, 26/03/2008 13:06
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