Search icon

Politics

09th Oct 2018

Shaun Bailey says single mums ‘deliberately become pregnant’ for benefits and is there anyone in the capital left for him to offend?

This is good going for the Tory mayoral candidate

Oli Dugmore

This is good going for the Tory mayoral candidate

Two weeks in and the Conservative candidate to contest the London mayoralty with Sadiq Khan has been found to chat shit about another segment of his electorate. This time it’s single mums.

Business Insider discovered Bailey writing in the Telegraph in 2006: “Any young girl living in the inner city will be clued up on how the system works.”

In the comments section he said the state should not promote that it’s “acceptable” to be a single mother and continued: “They won’t be too careful about not becoming parents. In some cases, they will deliberately become pregnant – as they know that if they do, they will get a flat.

“It is the same with benefits. These people are not stupid. If the state offers them money for doing something, they will do it. It is as simple as that.”

The Observer reports Bailey also told Conservative party conference in 2008: “Girls getting knocked up to get housing? It’s a cottage industry where I come from.”

The remarks come after it was discovered that the Tory pick to fight Sadiqqi said integrating Muslims and Hindus “robs Britain of its community” and risks turning the country into a “crime-riddled cesspool.”

A spokesman for Bailey said: “Instead of trying to misrepresent and take out of context historical comments from Shaun Bailey, [the mayor] Sadiq Khan’s team should try and focus on tackling the soaring crime rates in London, getting Crossrail back on track and sorting out his dismal record of housing. He needs to spend more time focusing on his day job and less time on the red carpet.”

So, outside of single parents households, the children that come from them, Muslims, Hindus and the socially liberal who find these types of comment abhorrent – who is Mr Bailey hoping will vote for him?