I’m not speaking to Ken. Whether he can’t sleep nights because of this, I don’t know!

But what a wimp he is turning out to be when London really needs him – when the chips are down.

At Mayor’s question time last week I called on him to rally the people of London in a mass lobby of Parliament on St George’s day, April 23. We never quite know what to do with our national day in England with respectable national pride often seeming to be squeezed out by the drunken violence of so-called football fans or the nostalgic xenophobia of those whose pride in our country extends no further than reminiscing about bombing Germany.

London’s underground system should be a source of national pride. As with so many public services, our forbearers led the way in their construction and bequeathed us with a infrastructure of trains, tunnels, sewers and so much more that was the envy of many other countries. In an ironic historical twist, the first chairman and managing director of London Transport was Albert Stanley – an American brought in because of his successful track record in the US. Sounds familiar?

But there’s little to be envious now of the state of the tube. And other countries certainly aren’t looking to copy Labour’s plans to break-up and privatise the Tube. This isn’t just a transitory issue, a chance for a bit of political swordplay. If PPP goes ahead it will determine the fate of our Tube system for the next thirty years. Just imagine, if Ted Heath had cooked up a similar scheme and signed contracts when he was Prime Minister we would only now be coming to the end of them.

And, of course, with the local elections upon us on the 2nd May – a time when a mass movement of people against the Labour government generally carries more weight than usual. Labour is sensitive to very little – except in the ballot box!

So, where does Ken stand? He says he is opposed to PPP but when it comes to sending Labour the only sort of message they listen to – in the ballot box, he wriggles and squirms.

I remember only too well last year when the General Election presented an opportunity to make the point, Tony Blair made Bob Kiley take the Chair of London Underground ‘to show willing’ – and effectively killed the issue during the election. Two minutes after the election was in the bag for Labour – the whole thing fell apart and Mr Kiley was unceremoniously out of the job and PPP was roaring ahead again.

If it was a Conservative government, would Ken really be so shy of urging people to vote against PPP in the ballot box? Of course not. But he still can’t quite tearing himself away from flirting with Labour and never quite being willing to stand up and be counted when it really matters.