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| Ken Livingstone joined the Labour Party in 1969 and became secretary of the Norwood Young Socialists. He was elected to Lambeth Council in 1971 and to the Greater London Council in 1973. In 1985 he was elected to Parliament as Labour member for Brent East and in the 1987 general election he retained the constituency for Labour. In November 1999 that he was defeated in a contest to select the Labour party's candidate in the election of the newly-created post of Mayor of London by Frank Dobson, the candidate favoured by Tony Blair. He responded by leaving the Labour party and standing as an independent, and in May 2O00 he was elected Mayor of London. | | Ken Livingstone joined the Labour Party in 1969 and became secretary of the Norwood Young Socialists. He was elected to Lambeth Council in 1971 and to the Greater London Council in 1973. In 1985 he was elected to Parliament as Labour member for Brent East and in the 1987 general election he retained the constituency for Labour. In November 1999 that he was defeated in a contest to select the Labour party's candidate in the election of the newly-created post of Mayor of London by Frank Dobson, the candidate favoured by Tony Blair. He responded by leaving the Labour party and standing as an independent, and in May 2000 he was elected Mayor of London. |
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| It appears that Ken Livingstone did not think much of the Houses of Parliament. In 1988 he said "Parliament is worse than I thought it would be; it's like working in the Natural History Museum, except not all the exhibits are 'stuffed'."
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| In 1989 Ken Livingstone said "Gerald Kaufman has crawled so far up the backside of NATO that only the soles of his feet are visible."
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| Always to the left of the Labour Party, Livingstone announced in November 1999 that he would stand in a contest to be Labour's candidate for London mayor.
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| Amid much controversy about how Labour Party HQ conducted their campaign in support of the Labour leadership's preferred candidate, Frank Dobson, Livingstone lost the selection battle in February 2000. Ken Livingstone actually won more votes than Dobson but was defeated in the complex electoral college system the Labour Party had adopted.
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| In February 2006, a disciplinary tribunal found Livingstone guilty of bringing his position into disrepute by likening a Jewish reporter, Oliver Finegold from the Evening Standard, to a concentration camp guard, and the Adjudication Panel suspended him from his mayoral duties for a month.
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| {|align="right" cellpadding="10" style="background-color:#FFFFCC; width:40%; border: 1px solid #aaa; margin:20px; font-size: 92%;"
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| |''"A person who calls for Gordon Brown to be sacked and whose economic politics do not stand up has a total disregard for sensible, mature politics. That person would be a disaster for Labour and a disaster for London."
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| ::Tony Blair, on Ken Livingstone, at a party meeting, 3rd December 1999<ref>''Findarticles.com'': '[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_19991204/ai_n14275182 Blair says Livingstone is backed by Trotskyists]'. 4th December 1999.</ref>
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| ''"I believe passionately - I may be wrong, but this is my genuine belief - that he would be a disaster for London... But at least, in a sense, he's not my responsibility any more."''
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| ::Tony Blair, on Ken Livingstone, ''The World Today'' radio programme, Australia, 7th March 2000<ref>''The World Today'': '[http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/stories/s108341.htm Red Kenny bucks Blair in London race]'. 7th March 2000.</ref>
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| ''"My prediction that he would be a disaster has turned out to be wrong and I think when that happens in politics you should just be open about it... If the facts change you should be big enough in politics to say your mind changes."''
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| ::Tony Blair, BBC London, 6th January 2004<ref>''BBC News'': '[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3370803.stm Livingstone back in from the cold]'. 6th January 2004.</ref>
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| ''"Why does he not split the job of mayor of London? The former Health Secretary [Frank Dobson] can run as his 'day-mayor' and the hon. Member for Brent, East [Ken Livingstone] can run as his 'night-mayor'."''
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| ::Conservative leader William Hague, during a House of Commons debate, 8th October 1999<ref>[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_19991008/ai_n14261462 Blair is a liar and hypocrite, says Hague'] 17th November 1999</ref>
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| ====Opposition to Ken Livingstone for Mayor of London====
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| Labour had pledged to reverse Margaret Thatcher's 1986 abolition of the Greater London Council (GLC) - the local government authority for London that was, at that time, held by the Labour Party. In 1999 the government created a new [[Greater London Authority]], which for the first time in the UK established a key role for a directly elected Mayor.<ref> [http://www.london.gov.uk/about.jsp London.gov.uk - About].</ref> To Blair's consternation, the first election in 2000 produced a win not for the official Labour candidate, but for 'Red' [[Ken Livingstone]], a rebellious left-wing Labour MP and former GLC leader who had pursued high profile policies that directly countered those of Thatcher's government.<ref>''BBC News:'' '[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/uk_politics/2000/london_mayor/736460.stm Ken Livingstone: Rebel mayor']. One of Livingstone's actions was to mount a giant, updated counter of London's rising unemployment figures on the roof of County Hall, opposite The Houses of Parliament.</ref> Livingstone had been nominated as Labour candidate for Mayor by local London Labour parties, but was unsympathetic to "New Labour" and regarded by Blair as a potential electoral liability for the party nationally.<ref>''BBC News:'' '[http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/528259.stm Blair in new attack on Livingstone]'. 19th November 1999</ref> Blair repeatedly predicted that Livingstone would be a "disaster" for London and unfavourably recalled Labour's more left-wing years (''see quotations, right''). Accordingly an [[electoral college]] weighted in favour of MPs over ordinary members rejected Livingstone's nomination; Livingstone refused to accept this and declared that he would stand as an independent candidate against the official Labour candidate, the Blair loyalist [[Frank Dobson]]. Livingstone was expelled from the Labour party, but won the election. As Mayor he proved successful and popular, and was re-elected in 2004 - standing as the official Labour candidate, having been re-admitted to the party shortly before.<ref> The ''Independent:'' '[http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/yasmin_alibhai_brown/article82553.ece Blair and Livingstone's marriage of convenience]' 15th December 2003.</ref>
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