Boris urged to give up telegraph column

Ken calls on Boris to give up Telegraph column

Ken calls on Boris to give up Telegraph column

By politics.co.uk staff

Boris Johnson should give up his “£250,000” Daily Telegraph column and “focus on the day job”, Ken Livingstone has said.

Labour’s London mayoral candidate told the party conference in Manchester that he was intent on wrestling City Hall from Tory hands.

“Boris you’re not doing your day job. You’re telling Londoners to get on their bikes because of the tube strikes when you should be meeting the unions and sorting the tube strikes out,” he said.

“One of the unions hasn’t been on strike on the underground since 1926. You get paid £250,000 to write your Daily Telegraph column. Isn’t it about time that you dropped the Daily Telegraph and concentrated on Londoners’ daily commute to work?”

He added: “Fares under my administration will always be lower than they would’ve been had Johnson won another term,” he told the hall.

“Let’s make this election a referendum on the pessimism and cuts.”

Mr Livingstone also spoke about Ed Miliband’s leader’s speech yesterday, which he described as “breathtaking”.

The former mayor, 65, then joked that he was “happy to be part of the new generation of Labour”.