London mayor's aide quits over Caribbean immigrants remark

London mayor's aide quits over Caribbean immigrants remark

June 24, 2008
Caribbean Net News

LONDON, England (AFP): A senior adviser to London mayor Boris Johnson has quit after apparently suggesting that if Caribbean immigrants did not like London they should go home.

James McGrath, a 34-year-old Australian who was appointed director of political strategy after Johnson was elected mayor on May 1, made the comments in an interview with an Internet journalist published on Sunday.

He was responding to a suggestion that the election of Tory politician Johnson, who was attacked for his attitudes towards minorities during the election campaign, could lead to an exodus of Caribbean immigrants.

He was quoted as saying: "Well, let them go if they don't like it here."

Boris Johnson, AFP PHOTO

In response, Johnson said his adviser had been quoted out of context but the remarks made it impossible for him to continue.

"James is not a racist. I know that," he said. "He shares my passionate belief that racism is vile, repulsive and has no place in modern Britain.

"But his response to a silly and hostile question... allowed doubts to be raised about that commitment."

He added: "We both agree that he could not stay on as my political adviser without providing ammunition for those who wish to deliberately misrepresent our clear and unambiguous opposition to any racist tendencies."

Former Labour mayor Ken Livingstone had highlighted comments by the former journalist about black people during his unsuccessful attempt to be re-elected.

Livingstone said that a man who had once referred to black people as "piccaninnies" with "watermelon smiles" in a newspaper article was not fit to run an ethnically-diverse city.

Johnson later apologised for the comments and said he had been taken out of context.

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