Governance is about accountability, openness and transparency. Change is like motherhood to men: something to be approved of, provided it comes from somebody else. The Labour government was elected with a clear manifesto to modernise the British public. Deep in the heart of that quest for modernisation is the election for an executive mayor with an enormous amount of power over people who live in London, and the general administration of London. The fact of the matter is quite simple: the mayor will have a 5 million majority mandate, which is absolutely enormous, and hitherto unheard of throughout Europe. This will give the mayor a very large amount of power over administrators, such as the commissioner of the police. In other words, the police might decide one thing, but if the mayor decides that it is not compatible with its strategy of governing London, he or she will be able to put a lot of pressure on the commissioner to change their policies.
How is this relevant to ordinary people? By the year 2010, 35% of people living London are going to be from the visible ethnic minorities. That is a huge proportion and much greater than many other city in Europe. The mayor of London will have to take unequivacle notice of what the visible ethnic minorities ask him to do. Therefore they will be able to influence the way that London is run, the way that the transport system is run, and the way that the police are run. The problem I find as the Superintendent for Kensington & Chelsea, which has a ten thousand British-Iranian community living within it, is that it is a silent community. We like to keep our heads down and make sure that we do not ask too much of society. I think that this will be a window of opportunity for the visible ethnic minorities, including British-Iranians, to move intuitively forward and demand whatever it is that affects your lives. Whether that is a question of policing, transport or anything else. In effect, the days of sitting by and watching the world go by should be over.
As a visible ethnic minority, each and every one of us has a fiduciary responsibility to be heard, and demand certain services from the public sector organisations in London. If there are issues in policing that bother you, then you can lobby the mayor, and if the mayor has control over how policing is delivered, then what you want is what you get. Part of the governance of London, and part of the Labour Party's manifesto, is that the consumer is king. In other words, we live in an age of post-modernism. Five years ago we would have waited quite happily at a check-out in Tesco, but now if another one is not open then we would want to know why. That is a classic example of post-modernism and shows that the consumer is king. If there are things that you have had problems with in your schools, within your business community, or with transport, then for the first time in this country you have the ability to put your views across to the mayor and actually see a tangible result.
To sum up, as we sit here, history is being made. So we can either sit back and act as if the role of the mayor is not going to make a difference to our lives, or we can explore it further. We should accept the fact that we are part and parcel of this society, and at least try to change the direction of policing, education and transport in this country.
Big Ben & The House of Commons, Westminster, London