Mick Hartley

Livingstone responds to demands that he apologise:

The Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, today issued the following statement following Associated Newspapers failure to deny stories appearing in the newspapers this morning:

‘Associated Newspapers is attempting to avoid answering the very serious allegations made in newspapers this morning regarding a party in Nazi dress held by its most senior management. A continued failure to make any statement on such a serious matter could only be taken as an admission that the allegations are true. If so this issue is directly relevant to the demand that I apologise for remarks made to an Evening Standard reporter after a party.

‘According to the statements in the newspapers this morning: “when David [English] retired as editor of the Daily Mail in order to take over as chairman of Associated Newspapers, he gave a party wherein he and all his editorial staff dressed up like Hitler and various members of the Third Reich. A memorable appearance of the newspaper’s drama critic Jack Tinker as Goebbels brought the house down.” This is contained in the book An Unlikely Hero, a history of the Daily Mail, on p171, whose author was assisted in its preparation by the most senior members of the Associated Newspaper group.

‘This has been repeated in public, including by Private Eye, the Daily Express, and the Guardian, with no rebuttal action being issued by Associated Newspapers.

This was ages ago. David English retired as editor of the Daily Mail in 1992. He died in 1998. This is schoolboy stuff from Ken. The Mayor of London, for God’s sake.