Independent London mayoral candidate Malcolm McLaren has warned that voters will not tolerate the Labour party trying to manipulate the city into accepting a candidate that nobody wants.

Speaking as speculation continued on whether narrowly defeated Labour contender Ken Livingstone would leave his party and run an independent campaign, Mr McLaren told the BBC his potential rival had been the victim of party machinations.

"I think that it is clear that Ken Livingstone has been subjected to an extraordinarily bullying party machine which is beginning to turn out to be rather old fashioned," he said.

"I don't think that Londoners feel that their city is spinnable as much as Tony Blair and his cronies thought that it could be.

"You cannot keep turning around and saying that London is the coolest city on the planet and then add that, by the way, your mayor is going to be Frank Dobson [the official Labour candidate]."

Mr McLaren, who has recently launched a campaign website and is planning to start his campaigning in the coming weeks, said that he had not been frustrated by the focus on the internal Labour row.

"If Ken is to stand as an independent that can only wave the flag for independence more," he said.

"It makes Londoners feel that there is potentially a possibility of the mayor being part of the devolution of power from Parliament in a truly independent, organic and natural way."

Mr McLaren said that while Mr Livingstone had been campaigning for up to two years, he had already picked up the support of 6% of voters in a matter of weeks - and he predicted that more would come.

"Our manifesto is very simple," he said. "It is about London beginning to protect itself from government rather than feel that it always has to be part of government."