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Five of us were at the count last night. It finished after midnight. Here’s the result:
Clapham Park:
Green – 842 (43.8%)
Labour – 799 (41.5%)
Lib Dem – 108 (5.6%)
Conservative – 85 (4.4%)
Reform UK – 71 (3.7%)
CPA – 12 (0.6%)
Socialist – 6 (0.3%)There was a low turnout. Down to 20 percent compared with the 33 percent at the full council elections in May. Only 1,952 of the 9,559 on the electoral registered bothered to vote.
The Greens held on to the seat but they lost the other Lambeth council by-election to the LibDems, a bit of a surprise but even by the standards of conventional politics it’s difficult to see the difference between the Labour, the Greens and the LibDems.
We can’t anyway in view of this 2006 Conference Resolution:
“That no more by-elections be contested as they appear to be a waste of money.”
The resolution mentions a waste of money but an additional reason was being beaten by what are now being called “novelty” candidates. In one case, by both Screaming Lord Sutch and Mr.Blobby:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1995_Littleborough_and_Saddleworth_by-election
This by-election is known in party lore as the little and sad election.
According to this post on Urban75, we will have got a fleeting mention on the BBC’s live update about Burnham on 23 June:
“The original BBC live update named the Labour candidate Burnham was supposed to be campaigning alongside as well as all the other candidates standing. Next time I’ll remember to do a screenprint!”
Not bad for a council by-election.
Since then, the remaining election leaflets were distributed on Thursday and Saturday.
We have now only to wait to see what the Brixton Buzz will say about us. Four of us are going to count next Thursday. We are not expecting a spectacular result.
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!
Six new articles have been added to the French-language section on the World Socialist Movement site here:
They are:
Manifester … jusqu’à quand?
Condamnés au capitalisme à perpetuité?
“Humaniser” le capitalisme?
“Humaniser” la société … ou en changer?
Le monde dans lequel on pourrait vivre.
Liberté ou capitalisme?These are not translations but were leaflets written in French by a native French-speaker and distributed by socialists in France at the turn of the century.
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
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
The first draft of our election address for the local council by-election in Lambeth, London, stated that “the council … cannot abolish the value form.” The Party’s Executive Committee, although agreeing with this, changed it to “cannot abolish the profit motive” on the grounds that the original version might not be immediately understood by too many voters.
Pity in one sense as it would have taken the discussion from academic circles into the real world. While they talk there about it we try to spread the idea amongst the working class generally. I wonder how the academics would react to the objection we met that this amounts to advocating “universal shoplifting”. Come to think of it, that’s not entirely wrong. It’s certainly a simple way of putting it.
We now know what Burnham is selling from his stall. It’s “business friendly socialism”:
Probably the same as Streeting’s “progressive capitalism” but less honest. In any event, both are oxymorons.
https://www.ft.com/content/83d1ff43-27ee-464b-ad9a-3155a526f799
I wonder what sort of capitalism Burnham is selling from his stall.
By the way, this could be last entry on this thread as it looks as if we will have to start a new one on the Burnham Labour Government to record its failures and anti-working class measures.
Let’s face it, “degrowth” under capitalism is a bonkers idea. The driving force of the capitalist economy is growth in the form of capital accumulation out of profits. This can’t be stopped without upsetting the whole economy. Which is what any attempt to do would result in.
Since “growth” is measured as an increase in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) which itself is measured in terms of money, “degrowth” won’t make sense this as there won’t be a general unit of account such as money and so no GDP to aim at reducing.
This said, the production of some things will of course be decreased but that of others will be increased.
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.
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.
We now know who our opponents are: the Gang of Five and the Christian Peoples Alliance
