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Sacked over race remark

LONDON: London Mayor Boris Johnson on Monday sacked a senior aide after the latter was embroiled in a race row for saying Caribbean-African immigrants could return to their countries of origin if they did not like living in Tory-ruled London.

James McGrath, who is an Australian, sparked a controversy when — commenting on a Caribbean academic’s criticism of Mr. Johnson — he told an online journalist: “Well, let them go if they don’t like it here.”

Mr. McGrath claimed his remarks were taken out of context.

“To imply that I meant that all black people who didn’t support Boris Johnson should leave the country is absurd and incorrect,” he said. His boss, however, believed he should not have made remarks that could provide “ammunition” to critics. Mr. Johnson, who himself has courted controversy in the past by making allegedly racist comments, said Mr. McGrath was “not racist,” but his remarks made it “impossible for him to continue” as his political adviser.

Tory leader David Cameron said Mr. McGrath had to “face the consequences” for his “lapse of judgement.”

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