Well I could find no candidate to vote for. There was no local election in this area. I do know that a colleague who lives within the Greater London area, and who claims to be a life-long Labour supporter, voted for Johnson, on the basis that he believes that Livingstone was bought off by the bendy bus manufacturers.  Oh dear. How sad. Never mind.

Well, you're Welsh, aren't you?  I thought that's what all Welsh women wear.

I read Johnson's word at his election about Ken, and I thought they were generous and courteous.  OK so they may have been politician's smarm, but at least he bothered to say them.

And I have never known Ken be anything other than polite about opponents.

What really concerns me is the upsurge of support for the Conservative Party, per se, and one seat for an unspeakably vile party in Dagenham.

I have to disagree with you there Mary.  This revolt amongst the voters wasn't about some bloke being funny on the telly or David Cameron being reasonably attractive.

This was an electorate thoroughly dissillusioned regarding the War we were dragged into by TB, the successor to TB who was not elected by anyone, the removal of the 10p tax band making the poor even poorer at the expense of the rich, the total disregard for the working class of the country by a party which, traditionally, should support and care for them.  It's Champagne Socialism, oh, and TB (OK not now in office) spending £4m on his sixth property when first time buyers can't even get on the property ladder, the rapid inflation of food prices (OK, this is global) but when low earners have to pay more tax this really hits hard.  Add the Pension crisis, the rising Council Tax, the pay to have your rubbish collected and other stealth taxes.

No, the Labour party are out of touch.  They have no conception whatsover of the lives of the people it governs.

In Wales it's not so much a swing to the Tories but a swing to the Independents and the Lib Dems, which for the Valleys to reject Labour is quite amazing.

I agree with Don B that the party that dare not speak its name on here winning a seat sends a shudder down my spine.

P.S.  I apologise from diverting from my normal dippy blonde foodie Nigel Slater groupie persona in a black sack dress and 9" heels but this Government has really got me angry.

Blimey ariosto,

You are the one!  I was waiting for someone with passiion and fire to come back to me.  I think I may have to marry you for that    You have been warned!

I do find it amazing that not more people have posted about this shipwreck of a Government clinging onto the wreckage - bit like the the Hesparus innit, or are you all so Middle England with comfortable salaries/pensions that you really don't care about those who are poorer than you? 

Answers on a postcard please.

While I agree that general disgust with the so-called Labour party is the primary reason for the way this election went, in London I don't think the influence of the bendy bus can be underestimated.  They were (and are) an unmitigated disaster.  They kill cyclists, they can barely manoeuvre through London's streets, they take up all the room at the stops so that other buses drive past without stopping, they become (semi-)mobile saunas as soon as the sun comes out, there's usually no place to sit - plus everyone believes that Ken was bought by the manufacturers.  Never mind whether it's true, everyone believes it.  Boris was very clever to make that the central soundbite of his campaign.

God help us.

I'd concur with you absolutely.   I was taken to task further above for not being "Socialist" enough - but the policies of New Labour aren't socialist in the slightest.  Taxing the lowest paid?  Going to war to support RACIST warmongering??   Sorry, but STUFF THAT.  I will never vote for New Labour again.  When I wrote to my MP (Stephen Pound) to complain about his voting consistently for the Iraq War, I received a derisory and insulting reply.  In return I sent him a dogturd in a jiffybag.  Come the next General Election I plan paying to have copies of Pound's letter to me reprinted in the local newspapers in a campaign to get this scum kicked out of political life permanently.