It's election time in UK. Defections and desertions have started. However, this one catches your imagination. Anwara Ali, a Labour councillor and also a GP, whose face adorned a NHS poster has joined the Tories. Ali feels Labour has failed to reform the health services and the Tories have a better plan.Dr Ali has worked to spread awareness on breast cancer and was a member of a taskforce to encourage more women from BME (Black Minority Ethnic) groups to become councillors. Dr Ali's role as GP brings her face to face with several local citizens everyday.
While her defection is certainly a setback for the Labour party, it will be interesting to see what difference she makes in the elections. Dr Ali's parents are from Bangladesh and she reportedly had a good influence on the Bengali-speaking women in Tower Hamlet. In the run up to the elections, this is one of the earliest high-profile defections involving an individual of Asian origin.
Ali, who was elected as a councillor in 2006, met David Cameron at the party's headquarters and will work with the Conservative councillors at Tower Hamlets. However, for some of her Labour colleagues it has been a good riddance.
As one of the comments on Evening Standard says: "I am the leader of the council at Tower Hamlets and can say that we all at the Tower Hamlets Labour Party are glad that she left. She is full of rhetoric but no action. She never made time for her Bow west area. She is sure to cause divisions amongst the Tories. The reason why she defected was because she was delected from Bow West and changed to Shadwell - a ward that would have been tougher to win. I for one am glad that she is now their problem rather than ours."
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