Who is mayor of london 2017

In , Mr Khan fought and retained the marginal seat of Tooting for Labour, one of five new ethnic minority MPs elected that year. Contemporaries on either side of the political divide remember being impressed by a "fiercely bright" and "persuasive" individual who was "impossible not to listen to". He combines that sharpness with what is often called his "cheeky chappy" demeanour. He is fond of calling people "mate" and has even done so on the floor of the Commons. Two months after he entered the Commons, he was thrust into the limelight by the 7 July bombings.

When Parliament met to discuss the attacks, he told MPs: "Today Londoners and the rest of the UK have even more reason to be proud of Londoners - proud of the way heroic Londoners of all faiths, races and backgrounds, victims, survivors and passers-by, acted on Thursday; proud of the way ordinary courageous Londoners carried on with their business and stopped the criminals disrupting our life.

In a Guardian interview , he recalled thinking: "I couldn't hide - and I don't mean this in an arrogant way, but there were so few articulate voices of reason from the British Muslim community. The intervention marked him out as one to watch, but his path to promotion was not altogether smooth.

Mr Khan wore his civil liberties credentials on his sleeve, challenging the government over ID cards and joining 48 other Labour rebels to vote against prime minister Tony Blair's plan to allow the detention of terror suspects without charge for up to 90 days. He later claimed party chiefs had penalised him by preventing him from visiting Pakistan in the wake of an earthquake there and did not want to give him an office with a sofa.

But the rebellion was not altogether to his disadvantage. Tony Blair was on his way out, and Mr Khan was able to position himself on the ascendant "soft left" of the Labour party alongside Ed Balls and Gordon Brown.

But you become street wise, you become savvy and you learn social skills - you learn about how to deal with people. When I get home I put the rubbish out and get my girls up to go to school. I'd rather roll up my sleeves and fight for all Londoners. When Gordon Brown took over at Number 10, Mr Khan was given his first job in government as a whip and then as communities minister, a move that created disquiet among some other MPs in the capital who had been around for longer.

A post at the Department for Transport followed in and he became the first Muslim in the Cabinet. This was at a time when there were only four Muslim MPs and he was often confused for international development minister Shahid Malik. He would go on to claim during the mayoral campaign that as transport minister he had "pushed" Crossrail through Parliament, but the Mayorwatch website has shown Mr Khan only took on responsibility for the project after the relevant bill had become law.

At the election, Mr Khan's own majority was squeezed to an uncomfortably small margin of just 2, votes and Labour was out of government for the first time in 13 years. In the chaotic months of Labour soul-searching that followed, he again showed a canny ability to ally himself with what was seemingly a lost cause and turn it into success.

True to his Brownite colours, he was chosen as Ed Miliband's campaign manager and helped steer the less-favoured Miliband brother towards an unexpected leadership election victory. He told the New Statesman afterwards that the night before the result, he told Miliband to "prepare for defeat". In that contest, as in the Labour mayoral nomination, Mr Khan's support for the trade union movement helped his campaign secure crucial votes.

He was rewarded with the post of shadow justice secretary - a role in which he did not get off to an auspicious start. His first major speech was badly received when he chose to highlight Labour's failings in government , and in then Justice Secretary Ken Clarke he faced an adversary with whom he admitted he struggled to find things to disagree about. His other brief as shadow political reform minister did not provide much of a chance to shine either, as the coalition needed little help killing off its own proposals for Lords reform and his personal support for changes to the voting system was tempered by his view that the referendum on this - which saw the British public reject change - came at the wrong time.

When Mr Clarke was sacked and replaced with Chris Grayling, however, Mr Khan was able to take the fight to the despatch box more convincingly as a vocal opponent of reforms to legal aid and restrictions on books in prisons. When the Conservatives later reversed several of Mr Grayling's flagship policies he described it as a "huge climbdown" that showed Labour had been right to resist them. Labour's disastrous showing in the election and the swift resignation of Ed Miliband - the man he had helped to the leadership - could have thrown Mr Khan off-course, but he found a new focus for his campaigning energy.

Just a week after the election he announced he would seek the Labour nomination for mayor. He had already been tipped as a possible contender for at least a year but, with typical shrewdness, he had steadfastly refused to be drawn on the subject in public while sounding out MPs and councillors in private to see if he had enough support.

Once he had confirmed his mayoral ambitions, his quest for the nomination - let alone an election win - still seemed like a long shot. Baroness Jowell, who had been MP for Dulwich and West Norwood for 23 years and held a number of senior ministerial positions under Labour, was widely seen as the natural choice. That received wisdom was upended during the Labour leadership contest, when commentators predicted the influx of new members into the party over the summer of "Corbynmania" could play into Mr Khan's hands.

He would take some flak over his role in Jeremy Corbyn's election as party leader, as he nominated him but later voted for Andy Burnham. In the event, however, Mr Khan came out top as Labour choice of candidate not just with new members but in all three groups who could vote. It was a remarkable victory which, as the BBC's Norman Smith observed on the day , surprised him as much as it did his rivals.

The campaign that ensued was bloody. A former aide to long-time Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman, Ayesha Hazarika, reflected that when Zac Goldsmith - who had a reputation for being decent, attractive and independent-minded - was first picked as the Conservative candidate there was despondency in Labour ranks. Mr Khan said himself at one hustings that he thought his opponent had been a "nice guy until [Conservative strategist] Sir Lynton Crosby got his hands on him".

Whoever came up with the approach, Mr Goldsmith's campaign focused heavily on portraying Mr Khan as an associate of "extremists" - which in turn allowed Labour to attack the Conservatives for pursuing "divisive, dog-whistle" tactics. Mr Khan took this to be an attempt to smear him by association because of his religion.

The Conservatives insisted they were talking about his brand of left-wing politics - but Mr Goldsmith repeatedly said the Labour candidate had "given platform, oxygen and cover to extremists".

It became a source of such bitter tension between the two camps that when David Cameron stuck up for Mr Goldsmith's campaign at prime minister's questions he found the word "racist" flung back at him from the Labour benches.

While polls consistently suggested Mr Khan was ahead, Labour pessimists and Conservative optimists would remind themselves that Mr Goldsmith was likely to benefit from a Tory incumbency, from lower turnout among groups that tended to vote Labour, and from the under-reporting of Conservative support seen at the general election. But those things were not enough - or proved not to be the case at all. Now, the boy from Tooting will have to prove himself all over again.

Love them or loathe them, the mayor's predecessors Boris Johnson and Ken Livingstone - the only other men to have done the job - are political heavyweights. Even within his own party, Mr Khan has been accused of lacking vision. The perception of him as inexperienced also lingers on. One close Labour ally pointed out that "unlike Ken, he has held ministerial office - but more than that, he represents the future. Unlike Boris he'll be wholly focused on getting results for London - this isn't just a stepping stone for his career".

She predicted he would be anxious to make good on the ambitious promises he made during the campaign, particularly on addressing London's housing problems. If that were not enough to be getting on with, he faces a dilemma over how to navigate between co-operating with the Conservative government and teaming up with Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party in condemnation of the Tories. In this respect he may hope to repeat the tactics of Boris Johnson, who managed to pull off alternately angering and assisting the government.

If he is to succeed he will need to display the same knack for steering his own course as he has shown as a schoolboy, a campaigning lawyer, a backbench MP and a shadow minister. But those who voted for him will not forget his emphasis on his own disadvantaged background, his speeches about social justice and his promise to be a "mayor for all Londoners". London mayoral election: How Sadiq Khan won.

Khan 'to keep distance from Corbyn'. As London is gearing for its mayoral elections, the incumbent Labour leader, Sadiq Khan, is currently ahead of his Conservative challenger Shaun Bailey, a new poll shows. According to a poll by British data analytics firm YouGov, Khan is a clear favourite against his Conservative rival by 66 per cent to 34 per cent with less than a month to go. Sadiq Khan launched his election manifesto on Tuesday promising voters to focus on protecting and creating jobs after getting re-elected as thousands of people were left unemployed due to the coronavirus disease Covid pandemic.

London has more than six million registered voters for the mayoral election that normally takes place every four years. The upcoming election was originally scheduled for May but was postponed due to the raging pandemic. It will now be held on May 6, , as Britain is witnessing a decline in Covid cases with aggressive vaccination drive. Last time that electors can apply for a replacement for spoilt or lost postal votes - 5pm on May 6, The London mayoral election was originally scheduled for May but was postponed due to the raging Covid pandemic.

Share Via. By hindustantimes. Get our Daily News Capsule Subscribe.