Boris says awesome things...

Even though it doesn’t have much directly to do with Bozza, the General Election looms large.

According to that most reliable of political sources – the Daily Mirror – Gordon Brown has told Labour bosses to gear up for a snap election after a series of disastrous polls for the Tories. Six opinion polls have put the Tory lead over Labour at below 10 points – a shrinking margin which would leave Cameron short of a majority and mean a hung parliament.

There was another headache for Mr Cameron last night when bookies slashed the odds on an outright Tory victory. William Hill predicted that if the Tories under-achieved on polling day, Mr Cameron would face a swift challenge to his leadership from none other than, you’ve guessed it, London Mayor Boris Johnson.

The bookmakers have installed Bozza as the 5/1 second favourite to succeed David Cameron as leader of the Conservative Party behind, strangely, William Hague. With George Osborne as third favourite, it appears to be officially the case that the four poshest men in Britain are vying for the position.

The Mirror would have a field day.

We at Boriswatch HQ absolutely *love* these surveys.  You know the ones – they get a load of ‘average’ (ahem) British people and show them pictures of politicians to see if they recognise them.

Some of the results are as you”d expect.  Gordon Brown is the most recognised politician, with David Cameron in second place.  (There were still 19% of people that couldn’t match Gordo’s image with his name, though.)

Some of the other results, mind you, are hilarious.

For example, when shown a picture of Nick Clegg, 41% of people thought it was Peter Jones off of Dragon’s Den.  Only 27% actually spotted it was the Lib Dem leader.

One in three people thought that the leader of the BNP was Peter Griffin, the green-trousered anti-hero of TV animation Family Guy.  (Mind you, more people recognised Nick Griffin than Nick Clegg, which is either worrying or a sign to Clegg that he should spice up his policies a bit.)

And, more people recognised Celebrity Big Brother evictee Katia Ivanova than recognised secretary of state for Justice Jack Straw and home secretary Alan Johnson combined, with 61 per cent correctly identifying Ronnie Wood’s former flame compared to just 24 per cent and 18 per cent for the politicians respectively.

However, naturally, the ‘most popular’ of all our politicians was BoJo himself.  62% of respondents said they would like to go for a drink with our Bozza, compared to just 9% who’d like to go for a glass of 1945 Chateau Lafite pint with David Cameron.

Bozza has this week joined Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur and Wembley Stadium chiefs to lead London’s 2018 FIFA World Cup bid.

He has been appointed chair of London United, the group leading the capital’s contribution to the England 2018 Fifa World Cup bid.

Arsenal Football Club chief executive Ivan Gazidis, Tottenham Hotspur chairman Daniel Levy and Wembley Stadium managing director Roger Maslin have been unveiled as other members of the London United team, which is supported by England 2018 and London council representatives.

FA chairman Lord Triesman said: “We are delighted that the Mayor has decided to chair London United. It demonstrates that the bid has political support at the highest level and that London is fully committed to bringing the World Cup to England.”

Bozza responded with a quote he lifted directly from The Big Book Of Football Cliches.  He said: “I am delighted London is included as part of England’s bid to host the World Cup in 2018.  We have brought together a crack new team to build on the first stage of the bid and get that first goal in the back of the net.”

Game of two halves, innit?

I tell you what, he is a force for good, our Boris.

Not content with trying to make the lives of millions of Londoners better, and going around the world to promote the city with other Mayors and world leaders, Bozza is now representing the Earth by trying to negotiate with our deadliest enemy: the Daleks.

The Mayor has been meeting Davros this week.  According to the press release, “The Mayor has a packed schedule of speaking engagements and one to one meetings with business chiefs and influential policymakers” including, we understand, Davros, the leader of the Daleks, himself.

With the Doctor crashing towards Earth having recently regenerated, it has been up to Boris to try and negotiate a truce with this evil race.  We understand he will then attempt to come to a trade agreement with the Cybermen in ord…[Whoa, whoa, whoa.  I think you will find that Boris has been in 'a meeting in Davos', not 'meeting Davros' - Boriswatch Ed]

Oh.

He’s a scamp, old Bozza.

After his appearance in BBC’s flagship drama soap Eastenders last year, it seems he’s now trying out for another popular BBC show – Strictly Come Dancing.

This video – filmed at the City Hall Christmas bash – shows BoJo shaking his, er, BoJo on a particularly 80s inspired dancefloor.

It’s not his dancing that’s particularly worrying, but that of the other fella, whoever he may be.

Whilst it is pretty funny (and pretty embarrassing), there by the grace of God go any of us who have ever had too many mulled wines at a work Christmas party, eh?

Before you start, this is not us dumbing-down Boriswatch with the sort of lewd clap-trap more generally associated with the Daily Telegraph Daily Sport.

I should perhaps explain.  [Yes, that's a very good idea before I get a call from the lawyers - Boriswatch Ed]

Mr Spunky is married to Carrier Von Reichardt, also known as the Baroness. They are part of a group of 200 specially chosen individuals who have been assigned with the task of decorating 200 fibreglass elephants which will then descend on the parks, streets and squares of the capital in May, June and July.

Elephant Parade London (I’m not making this up) is aimed at highlighting the plight of the Indian elephant, whose population has reduced to just 30,000. The elephants will be auctioned at Sotheby’s once the exhibition is over. Other world famous designers who will be decorating an elephant (not a euphemism) include Marc Wuinn, Lulu Guinness and Diane von Furstenberg (no, me neither).

Boris supports the scheme, of course, as do Stephen Fry, Joanna Lumley and Michael Palin.  Naturally.

*lies down*

Whilst we absolutely salute Boris’ efforts to get more kids growing their own fruit and vegetables, we at Boriswatch HQ did chuckle this week at the array of prizes on offer for the ‘top food growing school’.

The ‘Capital Growth’ competition invites the city’s primary school children to grow their own fruit and vegetables. Bozza said the competition would provide children with a hands-on experience in “growing your own grub”.

“There is much top notch work taking place by green fingered teachers and pupils across the capital already, which I salute,” he said. “We want to help cultivate this growing appetite for locally grown food, reward the top performers and bring more schools into the Capital Growth fold.”

In order to do this, the top schools across a range of categories will win:

“a visit by a celebrity gardener, cash prizes of £500, plants and a wormery.”

A wormery and Alan Titchmarsh poking round your aubergines. That’s one of the least attractive prizes we’ve ever heard.

If there’s one thing you don’t EVER want your politicians to do, it’s try and get jiggy with the youth.  It never works, does it?

So today, when outlining his support for 2010’s Big Dance on Twitter, BoJo uttered:

“Join the fun in July & in the words of @ladygaga JUST DANCE!”?

We’d love to know if Bozza actually knows who Lady GaGa is…

The 2012 Olympics allows us a once in a generation chance to set targets and goals.  Inspired by the Olympic ideals we, and our children, can all pull in one direction to reach whatever challenges we set ourselves.  It’s a chance to really put the Great into Great Britain.

Boris knows this, and has this week set a huge challenge to all Londoners in time for the 2012 games.

We Are Going To Be A Plastic Bag Free City By 2012.

I know. Inspirational, isn’t it?

“If all U.K. shoppers cut out just one in five bags, it would save about 40,000 tons of CO2 equivalent greenhouse gases a year – equivalent to taking over 12,500 cars off the road for a year,” Bozza said. Shops are going to start offering more reusable bags and charge for standard plastic ones (I presume that means they won’t have their brand logo on the bag? I don’t see why I should pay to advertise a store by carrying their bag around…)

Apparently, we use an average of 220 plastic bags each, every year. So, why not let’s join together in this one common goal, link arms and say “Yes!” to the Mayor’s Olympic challenge. Sod the gold medals, eh?

There’s been an awful lot of knee-jerk reactions to the hot topic of ‘bankers bonuses’ over the last few months.

Whilst some of the bonuses seem excessive – particularly for senior personnel who took their bank to the brink of collapse – slashing bonuses for thousands of staff who have earned them fair and square does seem a little bit harsh.

And, thank heavens that someone understands this situation and can bring something of a level head and some common sense to this argument.  That person, of course, is the Mayor himself.

In a letter to Alistair Darling, Boris has asked for an urgent meeting to discuss how to reverse “the damage done to perceptions of London as a global financial centre” by the Chancellor’s introduction of a 50p income tax rate for top earners and a temporary 50% levy on banking bonuses over £25,000.

Bozza told Darling that “I believe that the Government’s current policy towards financial services is ill-judged. You have made unilateral changes to taxation that risk damaging London’s competitiveness and its status, alongside New York, as the world’s leading financial services centre.”

Boris also points out the pertinent statistic that the financial services sector provides around 8% of UK output and one in every seven pounds collected in tax. With thousands of staff at many major companies requesting relocation out of London these moves could significantly damage London’s reputation as the world’s leading financial services centre as well as actually reducing taxation income.

Perhaps, rather than jumping on the over-reactive Daily Mail bandwagon we should sit down and make some more rational decisions on this topic? It’s a blessed relief that at least someone can see the very sensible counter-argument to all this  ‘banker-bashing’.