Our 2026 local election campaign in London
- This topic has 73 replies, 8 voices, and was last updated 4 days, 16 hours ago by
.
-
Posts
-
ALB – “if you want reforms you might as well vote for a party that has a chance of getting elected and so in a position to implement some.”
The state will only implement reforms that benefit the working class (to a certain extent) if it can afford to do so (if the economy is booming, which it isn’t).
Also, I wonder how many people voted for us because they thought we were SPEW.
BBC News. Reports that there are going to be by-elections, Lambeth x 2
The BBC article states that by-elections may cost up to £250,000. This is thoroughly distasteful bringing up the cost of running a democracy.
As an aside. The BBC has announced a savings plan of £600m with around 2,000 jobs losses. Perhaps the author of the article should be culled. KarmaGreen by-elections may cost up to £250,000 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cze2j7wjw0no
One of the newly-elected Green councillors is Michael Chessum who describes himself as a “socialist writer and activist”. He is the author of a book called This is Only the Beginning. The Making of a New Left, From Anti-Austerity to the Fall of Corbyn.
In this Lambeth Green Party election video on Instagram he says (he’s the last one on):
“We’ll fight to reverse austerity, empowering workers and the community we serve.”
(https://www.instagram.com/reel/DXuCReljFxt/ )
Of course fighting to reverse austerity is not the same as actually reversing it. In fact in his book he describes the fight to reverse austerity in the period 2010-15 and writes of “the defeat of the anti-austerity movement” (p. 104). He attributes this to the movement not having an effective political expression because the Labour Party and the TUC didn’t take up the fight. Presumably he now thinks that the Green Party will. He doesn’t consider the possibility that “austerity” is necessary and even built in under capitalism and that’s why the movement against it failed.
In his statement last June announcing that he was joining the Green Party he wrote:
“In the coming years, there will be mass movements against austerity and the wider policy of the Labour government. The Greens’ strong internal democracy will be a boon, allowing movements to shape and own the Greens from the bottom up. Social and industrial struggle must be viewed as a primary method for doing politics. Without a mobilised local community, left wing councillors will be fighting a losing battle. Without a mass movement engaged in something other than electioneering, electoral projects lack a legacy.” (https://leftfootforward.org/2025/06/michael-chessum-why-im-joining-the-green-party/)
It looks as if we are going to have a ring-side seat, from Head Office in Lambeth, to see an attempt to mobilise “the local community” here “to fight to reverse austerity”.
Mind you, the first thing Councillor Chessum will have to do is to convince his fellow Green councillors who don’t regard themselves as “socialists” to go along with this. Otherwise, on his own admission, he will be fighting a losing battle. Not that he won’t be anyway.
Councillor Chessum has just been appointed Cabinet member for “Economy, Cost of Living and Empowered Communities”. It’s going to be interesting to see how he handles this and instructive to see what happens.
Meanwhile London Branch are considering standing a candidate in one of the by-elections the date for which has now been fixed as Thursday 9 July. It would be the one in Clapham Park which is next door to one we contested on 7 May and a part of which is within walking distance of our Head Office.
The Executive Committee has given London Branch the go-ahead to contest the Clapham Park by-election on Thursday 9 July. We have completed the nomination papers except for the signature of one of the two electors nominating our candidate; the sympathiser prepared to sign is currently out of the country but will be back on Tuesday. After they have signed we will formally hand the papers in to the Returning Officer by the deadline of 12 June.
There is by-election in another ward on the same day which we will not contest but, if we have time, we might leaflet suggesting that those who want socialism write this on their ballot paper.
These will be hotly contested by-elections, especially in Clapham Park where two of the three councillors elected in May were Labourites. The Greens have put out an appeal to Green Party members in the rest of London to come and help, as here:
“Dear London Greens, Lambeth Council hangs by a thread. The Greens, on 27 councillors, have a majority of just ONE over the Labour Group. Two by-elections on 9 July will decide the fate of the council for the next 4 years. We cannot do this alone. Green Party Lambeth.”
If nothing else, this will mean more local and even London coverage and more political activity in the two wards, with being in a position to make our voice heard at least in Clapham Park.
The nomination papers for our candidate were handed in at Lambeth Town Hall and accepted this afternoon. We won’t know who the other candidates are till after nominations close on Friday at 4pm.
So far only the Greens and Labour have named their candidates. The Greens have already started canvassing.
We now know who our opponents are: the Gang of Five and the Christian Peoples Alliance
The 3000 election leaflets arrived yesterday. Distribution began today.
Here is what it says:
A WORD TO THE ELECTORS OF CLAPHAM PARK
You are being asked to vote in yet another election. The other parties will come to you with lists of promises: more housing, safer streets, better parks, protection for LGBTQ+ people. They will tell you that if you elect them to the council, they will manage capitalism a little more humanely.We say: we have all heard these promises before. Labour, Lib Dem, Green, they have all sat in the council chamber. The housing crisis has deepened. Rents have soared. Our parks have been fenced off for private profit. And still they ask for your vote on the promise that this time it will be different.
The SOCIALIST PARTY does not make promises we cannot keep. We do not ask you to vote for us in order to administer capitalism more efficiently. The other candidates will tell you they can make Lambeth “better.” We tell you the truth: Lambeth cannot be made better while capitalism remains. The council, whatever its political colour, is an administrative body of a class state. It manages the affairs of capital in our locality. It cannot abolish the profit motive. It cannot communalise housing. It cannot de-commodify our parks. It cannot produce safety without force.
Only the conscious, organised working class can do these things. Only when the majority of people understand their interest in the abolition of capitalism and act upon that understanding can we move beyond the endless cycle of reform and reaction.
Your vote for the ANYA KRYCEK is not a vote for a councillor. It is a vote for socialism. It is a declaration that you refuse to be bought off with promises of “affordable” rents and “community” policing. It is a recognition that the problems of Clapham Park are the problems of the capitalist world system and that their solution lies not in the council chamber but in the abolition of that system and its replacement by one based on the common ownership and democratic control of the means and instruments for producing and distributing wealth by and in the interest of the whole community.
More (from another site) on the other candidates:
LAMBETH LBC; Clapham Park (Grn resigned)
Candidates:
AMOS, Ben (Liberal Democrat)
BALL, Michael Sherif (Green)
FORRESTER, Joshua Jack (Conservative)
JEHWO, Susanna Kehinde (Christian Peoples Alliance)
KRYCEK, Anya (Socialist Party (GB))
READ, Martin Lester (Reform UK)
SOMERVILLE-SUTHERLAND, Louie (Labour)2026: Lab 1285, 1158, 1117; Grn 1154, 1033, 938; LD 364, 312, 262; Con 308, 259, 205; Ref 235; Ind 202; SDP 38
2022: Lab 1545, 1416, 1361; Grn 574, 424, 405; Con 303, 286, 231; LD 239, 207, 186Louie Somerville-Sutherland was the unsuccessful Labour candidate here in May, whilst Ben Amos was the top Lib Dem and Martin Read was the Reform candidate. Read was also the 3rd Conservative here in 2022. Michael Ball (Grn) stood in Kennington in May (also in 2022), Joshua Forrester (Con) in Clapham Town and Anya Krycek (SPGB) in Brixton North.
In our election campaign one of the points we are making is that the opposition between the Greens and Labour is a sham fight, “sibling rivalry”. Revealing confirmation of this is an article written by Green councillor Michael Chessum (before he was a councillor and Burnham was a prime minister in waiting) in which he holds out the possibility of a Labour-Green pact:
“Just as Sánchez formed coalitions with Podemos and Sumar, it is possible to imagine Burnham’s Labour entering a pact with an insurgent Green Party, reducing the chances of a Reform UK government.“
https://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2026/january/who-s-afraid-of-andy-burnham
This local by-election is attracting national party leaders as well as future prime ministers (though in the end he didn’t turn up):
Andy Burnham backs out of Clapham Park rally as Zack Polanski bolsters borough campaigners
We will have to step up pointing out “Labour Green, Same old scene”, especially as Polanski himself is on record as not ruling out working with Labour under Burnham (though not under Starmer).
https://www.itn.co.uk/news/polanski-greens-could-work-cooperatively-burnham
Leaflet distribution continues. Of the 3000 leaflets printed some 750 remain. Most of the immediately accessible letter boxes in four of the five polling districts have been covered. The remaining one will be on Thursday.
The Greens and Labourites are out canvassing every day. Not surprising as what’s at stake for them is which of them will have the most seats on the council. Whether the ordinary elector is that motivated remains to be seen. At the full council elections in May the turnout was only 33 percent.
The latest Green leaflet we saw being distributed on Saturday said the choice is between their “local champion” and “More of Starmer’s Labour”. Well, that’s no longer the case. It’s now between them and Labour led by a stage Northener. Not that either was a real choice.
We also came across a Green Party leaflet left over from May which promised that they would “cut bills and raise everyone’s wages”. Wages increases all round, that “eco-populism” for you!
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.