John Bird: "politics is too hard"

Big Issue founder John Bird announced he would step down from the London mayoral race, it was announced yesterday.

Speaking exclusively to Westmonster, Mr Bird said that he had "considered whooping Ken's ass and would definitely had won had he chosen to," but was reluctant to actually become a politician.

"Politics is all about complex dispute resolution, shades of grey and all that kind of stuff," Mr Bird said. "Had I have won I would have had to do deals and make compromises and possibly be on the receiving end of criticism from people in ivory towers of ideological purity, who only see the world through the prism of their particular beef. People like me, basically, who don't want to consider other people's priorities unless we have to."

"Yeah, I might have made a difference to people's lives if I'd been mayor, but my self-regard has to come first."

John Bird plans to spend more time with his populist grandstanding.