AS a kid, the first I came across Ken Livingstone was on television in my living room in Portsmouth. 

My dad said something like “good old Red Ken, he can really stick it to the Tories.” The second time, I was rooting through old Hansard speeches in the university library for an essay I was writing on Section 28. 

His speech was courageous. At a time when the majority of people thought there was something morally outrageous about gay people — when Neil Kinnock was calling Peter Tatchell a “fairy” and Patricia Hewitt was writing memos bemoaning that “the gay and lesbian issue is costing us dear amongst the pensioners” — Livingstone was raining down oratorical fury on state-sanctioned homophobia.

These are personal anecdotes, but they’re important because they demonstrate that Livingstone’s political reach stretched well beyond the borders of the Greater London Authority, and before it, the Greater London Council. Livingstone provided progressive political leadership nationally, and even internationally.

Nationally, he is the Labour left politician who has managed to put his politics into practice by winning and holding senior public office. 

As he himself pointed out, the example he set as leader of the GLC was the reason the Thatcher government wished to abolish it. 
He demonstrated that a progressive alternative was not only possible, but that it could deliver for Londoners, with policies such as Fares Fair reducing transport costs by 32 per cent.

Livingstone fought for equality at a time when the struggles against racism, sexism and homophobia were decried as hobby-horse issues of the “loony left.” 

During his tenure as leader of the GLC, funding for women’s and LGBT rights groups and anti-racism campaigns rocketed. 

One of Livingstone’s greatest achievements at this time was to challenge and change prevailing social attitudes towards women, LGBT and black people.

This record continued into the mayoralty with the Rise festival, Eid in the Square, the Trafalgar Square Hanukkah celebrations, and the St Patrick’s Day celebration of London’s Irish community, alongside an emotional public apology for London’s role in the slave trade issued on the anniversary of the Haitian revolution. 

Livingstone also blazed a trail for the Civil Partnership Act of 2004, creating Britain’s first ever register for same-sex couples.

As mayor, he continued to transform London’s transport system, overseeing Crossrail, introducing the Oyster card, making travel free to under-18s and over-60s, and reviving the city’s bus system by doubling the number of buses on key routes — a rejuvenation made possible by the introduction of the congestion charge.

The charge formed an important part of Livingstone’s environmental campaigning and contributed to London’s status as the largest low-emission zone in the world. 

On this issue, the London mayor led the way internationally, bringing together municipal leaders from across the world to tackle climate change in the C40 organisation of mayors.  

In addition to demonstrating an alternative to the Thatcherite, neoliberal consensus, Livingstone’s roles as leader of the GLC and mayor of London gave him a national platform to support progressive political causes. 

Active in organisations like Stop the War and Unite Against Fascism, he was one of the most outspoken critics of the war in Iraq and the racist backlash against the Muslim community. 

He has also been a long-time champion of the cause of Palestinians, and of a united Ireland. 

Not only did he champion progressive foreign policy, Livingstone provided international political leadership. When the reaction to terrorist atrocity from many world leaders was to beat the war drums and fan the flames of Islamophobia, the Labour mayor answered the horror of the July 7 2005 bombings with a dignified and passionate call for unity. 

The speech he gave celebrating London’s diversity demonstrated on the international stage that there was an alternative political response to terrorism.

This record is important. We would do well to remember that many of those seeking to bury Livingstone today opposed him on these crucial issues, not least within his own party. 

Indeed, he took on, and beat, the Labour Establishment in his first mayoral campaign — the same machine that set itself against Jeremy Corbyn following his election to the leadership.

Livingstone represented not only an alternative to Thatcherism, but its New Labour inheritors. 

He championed the public ownership of key utilities and mounted a legal challenge to the Blair government’s misconceived decision to part-privatise the London Underground. 

Although he lost the court battle, publicly owned utilities are now a key plank of Corbyn’s manifesto for a Labour government (and, notably, the Underground is now back in public hands). 

Similarly, as mayor, he introduced and enforced some of the toughest planning rules in the Western world, forcing developers to build at least 40 per cent social or affordable homes — policies Boris Johnson quickly scrapped but which the Labour leadership now hopes to emulate.

Livingstone was right to resign his membership of the Labour Party. As he said, his comments have become a distraction from pushing forward Corbyn’s transformative agenda for the country. 

But we should be absolutely clear about his contribution to left politics and what he delivered for Londoners. It’s this impressive legacy that has paved the way for the advance of the left today.  

Sam Browse is a Labour Party and Momentum activist in Sheffield.