On London Extra: Voter discontents

Labour gained seats in the capital but faces new challenges too. Plus Olympics stuff, transport strategy progress and much more

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I always become uneasy during London summers, worried about hot heads getting hotter and sweltering streets catching fire. My fears were realised on Wednesday night when the violent far-right response to the horror of Southport spread to Whitehall, with flares set off, Met officers attacked, an emergency worker hurt and over 100 people arrested.

The usual suspects - Nigel Farage, "Tommy Robinson", Andrew Tate and assorted fellow so-called patriots - had stirred in advance a cesspit of lies, conspiracy theories and malicious rumours, which included the outright falsehood that the Southport knife attack suspect was a Muslim asylum-seeker who had arrived in a small boat. 

I'm asking myself the question I recall Barack Obama once raising about Donald Trump, who is, of course, another expert at stirring up trouble - where does this end?

Like many others - including the Prime Minister - I have a bad feeling it isn't over yet, including in the capital. I'm hoping for the best and in the meantime trying to get a calm and measured grasp of what has been driving a variety of politics of discontent in London, expressed not through street thuggery but the ballot box. Which brings me to the first item in this week's On London Extra.


ELECTORAL DISCONTENTS       

Last week, I attended a post-general election briefing at the LSE which shed some revealing light - such a pleasant change from all the heat - on what lay behind London voters' substantial support for Independent candidates standing on pro-Gaza protest platforms, and also for Reform UK, the populist vehicle for Farage's gigantic gob and ego that gets touchy if described as "far right".