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The Guardian view on London: diversity thrives while Tories pander to prejudice | Editorial

Lee Anderson, Liz Truss and other Conservatives peddle shoddy lies about the capital. The truth is far more interesting

Just why do the Conservatives so dislike London? The former deputy chair of the Tory party Lee Anderson recently described the capital’s Labour mayor, Sadiq Khan, as controlled by “Islamists” – a sentiment others in his party rather belatedly accept as “wrong”, even if they won’t say why. Paul Scully, a former minister for London, chipped in with his belief that parts of the city, and of Birmingham, are now “no-go areas”. The previous prime minister Liz Truss lambasted an “anti-growth coalition” incessantly cabbing from their “north London townhouses to the BBC studios”. Rishi Sunak marked his first ever prime minister’s questions by attacking Labour’s Keir Starmer as a leader who “rarely leaves north London”.

Put these statements together and it appears that, in the collective mind of the post-Brexit Tory party, London has become synonymous with all that ails modern Britain. It is either bursting with woke liberal darlings – Guardian-reading tofu eaters, to coin a phrase – backslapping each other over their latest panel show, or it is chockful of mullahs who detest British liberalism and want the country under sharia law.

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