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This week in New York, Michael Bloomberg won a third term as mayor.
Here, the man who most Londoners would want to challenge Boris Johnson has put his foot in it.
On a trip to Manchester, Lord Sugar, now Gordon Brown's business adviser, claimed that only 15 per cent of businesses turned down for bank loans had anything to complain about. The rest were "moaners" who lived in "Disney World".
Said the multimillionaire star of The Apprentice: "I can honestly say a lot of the problems you hear from people who are moaning are from companies I wouldn't lend a penny to. They are bust and they don't need the bank -they need an insolvency practitioner."
Cue outrage from the Federation of Small Businesses and claims from opposition politicians that Sugar's comments highlighted the danger of bringing outsiders in to Whitehall.
There will be many in the business community, particularly at the exalted level at which Sugar operates, who will recognise some validity in his words.
He speaks as he finds and if that upsets some people, tough. Unfortunately, they may be the very ones you're supposed to be serving.
There is a widely held belief that business stars would make better ministers, that there should be more Alan Sugars in government.
Unfortunately, while a few have succeeded in both spheres - Lords Heseltine and Sainsbury are two - there are plenty of others who have failed. Indeed, the experience of the "Goats" drafted into Brown's "Government Of All The Talents" has not been happy.
Lord Myners, the City minister, had to weather a ferocious storm when he waved through Sir Fred Goodwin's £700,000-a-year pension.
In Myners's former City stamping ground, such a sum would not be seen as excessive; but in the country at large it did - something a seasoned politician would surely have realised.
Likewise, former CBI chief Lord Jones's time as trade minister was dogged by criticism.
He once told an audience of Middle Eastern entrepreneurs: "I'm half a bulimic - I eat a lot but I don't throw up."
He continued: "We don't care what colour you are, we don't care if we can't pronounce your names and we don't care where your money comes from. We just want you to invest in our country."
Ministers can't get away with making jokes about an eating disorder or references to not being able to say foreigners' names and he duly received a pasting.
Sugar, Myners, Jones and their fellow Goats ought to have consulted Archie Norman, the ex-Asda chief who, at the behest of William Hague, entered politics in 1997 as Tory MP for Tunbridge Wells.
In business, Norman had virtual hero status, hugely admired for growing Asda before he sold it to Wal-Mart. At Westminster, he was a disappointment.
Partly, it was Norman's timing - he joined just as the Tories were heading for the wilderness. But Norman also says he was "exasperated by the protocol and the lack of focus on achievement. People like me can't help that, and in the political world it's a disadvantage. I get up in the morning and ask myself: 'What am I going to do today to improve my organisation?'" In politics, he says, the question is much bigger: "How do I improve the lot of mankind?" And frustratingly, "the answer in Parliament is 'nothing'".
Norman did produce a new constitution for the Tories, created a more democratic structure and reformed Central Office.
But he left in 2005: "I was the first FTSE-100 chairman to sit in the House of Commons and I will almost certainly be the last."
Much of the problem was that his direct delivery - acceptable in business - frequently rubbed up his fellow MPs and party workers the wrong way. He was seen as arrogant, a clever-clogs.
"In business, if you don't like things, you change them," says Norman. "You change the product, change the team, even change the market you're in. But in politics, you're swept along on a big tide."
As Sugar is finding to his cost, what he can get away with on The Apprentice - the next series is being filmed now - and indeed, what viewers lap up, is not acceptable in government.
However, it might be for a mayor. In New York, Bloomberg has been a popular mayor (although he won the election only after spending a record $100 million on his campaign, 13 times more than his opponent).
But he is an independent, not tied to one political party, and he is pretty much master of all he surveys. In short, he's in a post that is not unlike running a large business corporation, which allows him to behave independently.
In London, a trend has been set for maverick, outspoken mayors - first Livingstone, now Johnson. When asked about the poll that placed him top to become mayor, Sugar said he found it "very flattering. I have no idea what the duties of the London mayor entail but in observing the past mayor Livingstone and Boris the current one, I am confident that it would be a walk in the park for me".
What stopped him putting his name forward, however, was "a major practical problem which is a conflict of interest that would exist between my various businesses and that of the business of London. It would be cannon fodder to the media every time one of my companies sneezed."
That would not have been insurmountable - and it did not prevent him from going into Westminster, which was the worst choice he could make.
For the best chance for any business person to make a mark in British politics lies across the river, in City Hall.
Reader views (5)
I watched the documentary about Lord Sugar.which demonstrated.not only his personality.but.just.as important.his.family .I admire SELF MADE business people like him .Watch Secret Millionaire Ch 4..for some interesting Backgrounds.
- Aliza, London, 06/11/2009 03:38
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Mjm Dartford, you hit the nail on the head, much as sugar does. The govt should be encouraging more businesses to operate in the real world (as they should themselves) the weaker ones should die off and the stronger ones survive. As a nation we think we should get a leg up in everything, and when things go wrong we should be bailed out. This mentality is producing inefficient, aimless companies. We've lost the ability to innovate because we've never been let outside our comfort zone. the more we molycoddle to more useless we become as a nation. The problem with Sugar is that his ideas are not sexy, he seems to base running his business on profit not ego. now isn't that a strange idea !
- George Philips, London, 05/11/2009 16:58
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Politicians have to be ultra-sensitive to their audience and take great care not to offend the majority. Business leaders know few such constraints. Businessmen are also unaccustomed to working within the framework of democracy as most companies are run on strictly hierarchical and dirigist lines - in some cases they resemble a feudal fiefdom. Criticism is not tolerated and free speech non-existent. It's a huge cultural chasm to bridge and, clearly, too wide for most business players.
- Peter Sykes, Knutsford, UK, 05/11/2009 14:35
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Don't forget that Alan Sugar may be financially successful but most of his fortune came from property not products and you don't have to be an entrepreneurial or organisational genius to make money on property.
- David Short, Tunis, Tunisia, 05/11/2009 14:18
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No Minister - why tycoons like Lord Sugar just can't cut it in politics… Actually I think your title for this article is backwards, it should read…
No Sir Alan – why unlike you Lord Sugar most politicians just can’t cut in the real world…
I am in favour of less waffle, and its hard not to agree with Sir Alan comments, I too think if a business is not generating an income, then banks should refuse finance to those businesses.
Sir Alan for Mayor of London and New York… lol
- Mjm, Dartford, UK, 05/11/2009 13:43
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