Frank Maloney
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- This article is about the boxing promoter. For the unrelated American writer and poet, see Frank Richard Maloney.
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Frank Maloney is a boxing manager and promoter and United Kingdom Independence Party politician. He stood in the London mayoral election, 2004, coming fourth with 6.19% of the vote.
He was born in Peckham, to Irish parents. He began boxing at school. In his youth he wanted to become a Catholic priest, however he did not enjoy his time at a seminary. After failing in attempts to become a jockey and a professional footballer, he became a chef. He continued boxing and began training other boxers and organising amateur contests before the age of twenty. He became a professional trainer in the late 1970s, forming a partnership with Frank Warren.
After splitting with Warren in the 1980s, Maloney moved into management and began promoting professional fights. In 1989 he became Lennox Lewis's manager, a relationship that lasted until 2001. He currently manages five world champion boxers and lives in Chislehurst with his family.
As well as opposition to membership of the European Union, Maloney's priorities include combatting crime and reducing immigration. He also wishes to abolish the Greater London Authority and increase the powers of Mayor of London, and has proposed the legalisation of brothels in order to take prostitution off the streets.
His campaign ran into trouble before the election period officially began, when he was roundly condemned for citing the presence of "too many gays" as reason for not campaigning in certain areas of London. He later said "I don't want to campaign around gays [...] I don't think they do a lot for society", and, "I'm not homophobic, but in public let's live a proper, moral life".[citation needed] He also claimed that homosexuals would automatically vote for one of three homosexual candidates, thought to be a reference to Ivan Massow (an independent candidate who subsequently dropped out of the race), Darren Johnson and one other candidate. In January 2006 the Liberal Democrat candidate Simon Hughes admitted gay relationships.
