Although I was five or ten minutes late, the Keynote speaker wasn't speaking as I went in. There was a great hubbub and some booing and shouting. The Fabians' meeting had been interrupted by Right wing extremists, an old bald chap, and about 6 younger men, all white, in their twenties. The old bald chap was in a right old lather and kept shouting and showing us the American flag. He was offended, I think, that we are not to be visited by Donald Trump, the President of the United States, and thought quite rightly that Sadiq Khan (the Mayor of London) is in some way to blame for this. Sadiq Khan did not respond to him, and the chair of the meeting (a dignified Scotswoman) stayed quite calm (even witty) and waited for the police to come and take him and the supporters away, because they were causing a breach of the peace or whatever. I thought that the Fabians have something in common with the Quakers in that although the Fabians were about a thousand strong they didn't resort to rounding them up and putting them outside themselves, but waited for the police to come. We just booed and shouted "Get out". We all wished that the press had not been there giving the demonstrators publicity - there were far more press men and women than activists. There were about 25 press personnel and two camera crews - they were acting on the hope and expectation that there would be a demonstration. So after about half an hour the demonstrators were ejected, but it was a great nuisance and made us feel very unsettled.
Film of this interruption is supplied by the Telegraph
The Mayor - this is quicker than writing his name - said that in this, the centenary of women finally getting the vote in this country, absolute gender equality is far from our grasp. Change has happened too slowly. Only from 1994 has there been such a thing as rape of a wife by a husband. He said that there has been zero progress in the last decade and there are even signs of progress eroding. An anti-feminist movement is on the rise. "Feminist" is being made to sound pejorative. "Social justice warriors" is being used as an insult. (How can it be an insult?) S. Khan says we must fight back. He, personally, is trying to make City Hall a model workplace for women. He says men must challenge the culture in pubs, and workplaces. He says the policies in the election manifesto must be studied carefully for their impact on women. This is something that the Labour Party didn't do well at the last election. (The Fabian Society analysed their manifesto promises and judged that they would not improve life for the people they aimed to help.)
Throughout the conference the chair of the meeting asked for questions and took the first question from a woman, because it has been found scientifically that if the first question is asked by a woman, other women will ask questions, but if the first question is asked by a man, more men than women ask the questions. However, in the case of the Fabian conference woman were given the floor many more times than the men. I think this unfair. They were also careful to chose people of ethnic minorities. This is fair enough.
There were ideas about misogyny being included as a category of "hate crime" and what to do about online hate crime.
The Mayor wanted much more funding for child services, parenting classes and youth services. I agree. I think cutting all of these is a false economy.
The Mayor himself goes and visits schools in order to raise the aspirations of the children, and especially primary schools. He is interested in what schools are doing about equality and self-esteem in all the children, girls and boys and different races. Tells children his father was an immigrant bus driver but he became a lawyer - mainly because one of his teachers told him he enjoyed arguing so much, he should be a lawyer.
He also thinks schools have gone too far promoting Science, Technology and Maths, and should be encouraging students into the arts. The arts are strong in the UK and make a huge impact worldwide - we should do more to encourage them.
My impression of Sadiq Khan is that he is intelligent enough to do his job well, and that he even has a sense of humour at times, but he has a lot to put up with. In short, I liked him.
Sadiq Khan wore an expensive-looking black suit with some sort of white trainers and a collared shirt buttoned up to the top. This may be a fashionable look but I absolutely didn't like it and spent some time trying to decide what would suit him! In particular, I didn't like the buttoned-up neck but no tie look. On the other hand, ties signal a very conformist attitude these days. I think maybe a thin jumper in a subtle colour under the suit, but the suit was too black for my taste - it looked like funeral wear. I looked up his Google images and found he usually wears a blue suit and often wears a tie. I hope he has some brogues.
He didn't mention terrorism. Trump said Khan was complacent for saying that all big cities are prone to terrorist attacks and the risk of them is a part of living in one these days. I think Londoners would agree with him. They know that there are loads of people working in security to prevent and deal with terrorist attacks, because we all know someone who does. We have all seen the huge barriers in place to protect areas that would be vulnerable. Nobody thinks the Mayor isn't providing what is needed in the way of security or prevention.
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