Running a bric-a-brac store in East Finchley is not the usual passport for entering front-line politics. But that is not stopping Noel Lynch from taking up his post as a new London Assembly member on Friday (May 2).
Mr Lynch, who lives above his shop, The Bargain Centre, in High Road, is being sworn in as a Green Party London Assembly Member tomorrow, after his party colleague Victor Anderson resigned.
"I'm quite pleased," he said. "At the moment, I'm catching my breath. I've been spending a lifetime preparing."
Under the proportional representation system used in the assembly elections, each party receives the amount of assembly seats proportional to the number of votes they received at the election.
The Greens won three seats at the 2000 election, which went to the first three candidates on their party list.
As Mr Lynch was fourth on that list, he automatically becomes an assembly member when any of the three above him resign.
Mr Lynch is a well-known Green campaigner who stood for East Finchley ward in last year's Barnet Council election, winning 626 votes. He will be an assembly member on a salary of £47,000 until the GLA elections next summer, when he will be seeking re-election.
"We will be giving our backing to community organisations and our whole philosophy is to support local people against Ken Livingstone's idea of a world city. We see London as a city of 300 villages and we want to support and enhance, as much as possible, local communities and local businesses," he said.
April 30, 2003 19:00
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