Great British Beer Festival - we Are All Londoners Now

There were many fine messages of support for London following 7 July but the most poignant was a one-sentence letter in the Guardian from a reader in - of all places - Texas. It said simply: "We are all Londoners now".

I haven't lived in London for nigh on 30 years. But I think of it as my place. When I go to London, in particular to East London, I am going home.

So I don't like my town being blown up, with people killed and maimed as a result. Attack London and you attack me.

I happen to believe passionately that there is a powerful link between the Iraq war and the bombing of first Madrid and now London. I won't labour the point, because beer-pages is not a political paper. In the unlikely event that the people behind the atrocity of 7 July and the attempted atrocity of 21 July read this, I will simply say they have chosen the wrong target, the wrong town and the wrong people.

On the night of 6 July, just a few hours before the bombs went off in London the following morning, I was present at the annual dinner of the All-Parliamentary Beer Club in a palatial building a stone's throw from the Houses of Parliament. The bombers had the opportunity to blow to Kingdom Come MPs, peers, the Speaker of the Commons, and sundry brewers and journalists.

But that is not the bombers' style. They go for the soft targets, the innocents packing Tubes and buses, people from all walks of life, ethnic groups and religions. The bombers make a fundamental mistake in choosing the soft targets: they bind us together and make us more determined to withstand anything that can be thrown at us.

I do not - as someone born during World War Two and whose home was destroyed by German bombs - talk about the "spirit of the Blitz" returning in 2005. London is a different place now with a vastly different and more diverse population. Neither do I wish to indulge in the easy jingoism that sees Londoners and Brits in general as braver than the people of Madrid or New York. All the people of three great cities have bonded together as never before as a result of the attacks.

That fine journalist Harold Evans, a former editor of the Sunday Times and The Times, who has lived and worked in New York for many years, said last week that the result of the attack of 9/11 was to turn the city from a group of disparate boroughs and individuals into a genuine community. That clearly happened in Madrid, with the memorable torch-lit parade through the city. It is demonstrably happening in London.

Mayor Ken Livingstone, with palpable anger and grief etched on his face on 7 July, called upon people everywhere to express their solidarity with the people of London.

We, the readers of beer-pages - beer drinkers publicans and brewers - have the opportunity to show our solidarity with London this week by attending in greater, not diminished, numbers the Great British Beer Festival at Olympia. The journey may well be difficult. Some Underground services may not be running and we will have to suffer the inadequate train link between Earls Court and Olympia. But let us grin and bear it, and make the effort. It may be the Great British festival but it is not - and never has been - a flag-waving event. As well 450 home-grown cask beers, there are beers from mainland Europe and North America. More than any festival in the world, the Great British pays homage to the history, the tradition, the heritage and, above all, the pleasure and communality of enjoying good beer in the company of friends.

The festival runs until Saturday 6 August. Tuesday afternoon is the Trade Session, when publicans and brewers can mingle, sample the enormous range of beers on offer and hear the winners of the Champion Beer of Britain awards. (For further information see www.gbbf.org or phone Camra on 01727 867201.)

It will be, as always, a great occasion. But this year it takes on even greater significance.

Be there. We are all Londoners now.