News

Two counties have been in the news recently about plans to carve out new unitary authorities from existing district and county councils. Northamptonshire County Council made headlines last month as it was declared effectively bankrupt. A report recommended scrapping the county and its constituent districts and replacing them with two new unitary authorities in 2020, one for the east and one for the west of the county. Elsewhere, Sajid Javid announced that he was minded to approve plans for a single unitary authority in Buckinghamshire.

Will other councils across England follow suit? And what will the creation of unitary authorities mean for existing planning policies in these areas?

At present the two tiers of local government district and county have separate responsibilities. The district makes decisions on housing, refuse collection, council tax, planning and car parking amongst others whilst county councils make decisions on transport, highways, social services and education. This separation of powers is one reason why MP David Lidington welcomed the plans for a new unitary authority in Buckinghamshire stating “the district takes decisions about housing and planning but it’s the county council that has to plan for roads, schools and social services…getting rid of that confusion will be a good thing”.

Confusion aside, the creation of unitary authorities has the potential to save lots of money for local taxpayers, a prize eyed by Conservative councillors and MPs alike. In the ongoing age of austerity local councils are having to make further cuts to budgets, all part of the governments drive to eliminate the budget deficit and bring down debt. Javid explained his support for a new unitary authority in Buckinghamshire by asserting ‘a new single council would be likely to improve local government … and save local taxpayers money’. Lidington agreed stating the ‘management and administrative costs of one council will be less than those of five’. Buckinghamshire County Council estimates that over five years £58million could be saved by the creation of a new Buckinghamshire unitary.

With obvious financial benefits outlined in Buckinghamshire and to a lesser extent in Northamptonshire where two authorities are needed to ensure they are truly local, could unitary councils become more widespread? It seems the answer is yes. Already approved are two new unitary authorities in Dorset, one for Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch and one for the rest of the county. Moreover there appears to be support for this direction of travel amongst Conservative councillors, activists and MPs. In recent years there has been a plethora of articles on ConservativeHome advocating this very idea and the influential book ‘The Plan’ by Daniel Hannan MEP and Douglas Carswell MP argued that current powers devolved to Scotland could certainly be devolved to new unitary authorities.

In a new age of unitary authorities the council areas become bigger, meaning councillors from more rural parts of a county may successfully lobby to protect greenbelt and push housing to the more urban areas where it is deemed the infrastructure can cope and greenbelt destruction is less of a threat. Equally, the greater number of councillors that will be representing more urban areas will have a greater vote when it comes to deciding where housing is to be allocated and built. One can easily imagine a situation where an area represented by an opposition party starts getting lots of housing allocated to it.

The longer the Conservative party are in office unitary authorities may become more likely as support for them is growing across both the voluntary and professional wings of the party. Moreover Conservative Party policy remains to reduce spending in order to reduce the deficit and the debt. Thus the longer government budget cuts bite; the more likely it is that housebuilders could be dealing with more unitary authorities in five to ten years’ time across England.

The Guardian has today published a story about councillors employed in ‘planning’ companies.

He contacted several of our employees before he published the story, and each of them gave the same quote:

“Thorncliffe expressly prohibits any of its employees from any form of engagement, on behalf of a client, of a local authority area of which they are an elected member.

“I fully comply with my council’s own code of conduct. It is unacceptable for councillors, of any party, to accept any form of payment to lobby their own council. My company seeks to expand good practice by having its own compliance register, and championing within the industry a ban on retired councillors from lobbying their former council for six months after they have left office.”

As a result of the story today, Managing Director Richard Patient said:

“It is unacceptable for councillors to be receiving any form of payment to lobby their own council. Our Triple Lock Code of Conduct expressly forbids it, and all the councillors we employ have to sign and obey our company code, their council’s own code, and the law.

“As a business, we’ve taken steps to put our employees into line with MPs. That’s why we have been encouraging the industry to ban retired councillors from lobbying their former council for six months. It seems the right thing to do.

“I would also quote from a former Communities Secretary of State about this issue: ‘Councillors are not full-time politicians; they can and should have outside jobs and interests’.”

THIS WEEK
Bexley, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kingston upon Thames, Lewisham, Redbridge, Southwark, Waltham Forest

LAST WEEK
Barnet, Bromley, Croydon, Ealing, Kensington and Chelsea, Lambeth, Newham, Richmond upon Thames, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth

FIRST WEEK
Barking and Dagenhan, Bexley, Camden, Enfield, Greenwich, Haringey, Merton, Sutton, Westminster

Bexley

This patch of outer south-east London was expected to have a reasonable chance for Labour control when the council was established, but the party has only rarely been able to win a majority. The most recent period of Labour control, with an overall majority of one seat between 2002 and 2006, was achieved with the help of favourable boundaries and the ability of the Blair era Labour Party to reach into suburban middle class communities.

Neither of those reasons apply any more. The Labour Party in the Corbyn era is not emulating the appeal of Blair, and instead Bexley is increasingly aligned with the right: it saw one of the highest UK Independence Party votes in 2014 which was enough to win them three seats. This sizeable vote collapsed to 4% in the 2017 general election, and those votes seem to have gone mainly to the Conservatives. The overall swing in Bexley between 2014 local elections and 2017 was 3% to the Conservatives – against a Londonwide trend to Labour.

Bexley has also undergone ward boundary changes. Unlike the three other boroughs which have had boundary reviews, in Bexley an opportunity was taken to make a significant reduction in the overall number of seats which have fallen from 63 to 45. Had these wards been used in 2014 we estimate the result would have been 34 Conservatives, 10 Labour and one from the UK Independence Party. The changes slightly increase the swing Labour needs to win control to 8%, and means each of the marginal wards is now larger and more mixed.

Although local social media can be derisively critical of the Conservative leadership, it is highly favoured to hold on to control of the council.

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Hackney

The period between 1996 and 2001 when Hackney passed out of Labour control due to scandal and split now seems like a different age, and Labour is now solidly back in control of this borough with the enthusiastic backing of local residents. Not only did Jules Pipe win the Mayoralty on the first ballot in 2014 with over 60% of the vote, when he stepped down to join Sadiq Khan’s team in 2016 his successor Philip Glanville won a Mayoral byelection with 69%.

This result shows that Labour can get its vote out even in a low-turnout election outside the normal cycle. Labour also had a very good general election, achieving a swing of over 10% since the already good 2014 local elections. Hackney’s council administration has managed to deliver on some major council estate regeneration schemes in Stoke Newington (Woodberry Down) with a private partner in a way not totally different to the schemes proposed in Haringey, but with nothing like the same level of controversy.

Unlike other inner London boroughs the other major parties are able to hold seats and form opposition groups on Hackney council. Both the Conservative held ward of Springfield and the adjacent Liberal Democrat ward of Cazenove are influenced by the votes of a large community of orthodox Haredi Jews.

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Hammersmith and Fulham

Until May 2014, the story in Hammersmith and Fulham was of a traditionally Labour borough that was trending to the Conservatives – partly due to gentrification, but also due to a politically savvy and well-connected Conservative group. The borough was sometimes described as ‘David Cameron’s favourite council’. Although it had been Labour controlled up to 2006, the borough was not designated as a target by Labour’s London regional office at the 2014 local elections.

The local Labour Party had other ideas, and launched an energetic campaign to regain control using local anger at the Conservative council’s estate regeneration programme and, in particular, proposals for changing the role of Charing Cross hospital. Unexpectedly Labour succeeded, gaining 11 seats and retaking control.

The Labour administration has since done everything it can to keep up the campaign to retain a marginal borough – continuing to campaign on the hospital issue. It has also done well on council finances: Hammersmith and Fulham is the only London borough where residents are paying less council tax now than they were at the time of the 2014 elections. In 2017 Labour benefited from a swing of 8% at the general election, and also did well in two council byelections in marginal wards.

While the local Conservatives are motivated and skilled campaigners (and have some issues to go on, including the embarrassing failure to update parking meters to take new pound coins), there is nobody in the Conservative Party talking up their chances of regaining control. The borough’s population profile includes many younger people in housing need and EU nationals, both groups which are trending to Labour. An increased Labour majority is likely.

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Harrow

Labour’s 2014 election in Harrow was a difficult one. The party had won a majority in 2010 but council leader Bill Stephenson only served for two and a half years before making way for a successor. The Labour group first picked Thaya Idaikkadar, who duly became council leader, but only six months later he was voted out by the Labour group. Idaikkadar refused to resign the council leadership and instead left the Labour Party along with several supporters. He charged the Labour group with racism, but an inquiry could not find any support. He was replaced as leader by Susan Hall of the Conservatives shortly before the 2014 election.

Labour therefore found itself fighting to regain control on two fronts – against the Conservatives and against the ‘Independent Labour’ group. Labour did well to regain control, but made no net seat gains. Both Labour’s 2010 and 2014 victories in Harrow were achieved despite the Conservatives winning more votes across the borough. The GLA elections of 2016 also saw a relatively good Conservative performance (partly through increased appeal to the Asian community in north-west London), and in April 2017 the Conservatives won a seat in Kenton East ward from Labour at a council byelection.

Retaining control of Harrow again may accordingly be difficult for Labour. The council leadership did not welcome the distraction of having to select a Parliamentary candidate with the council election imminent. Harrow is not so affected by the London effect boosting Labour in the inner boroughs; Harrow has a relatively older population. However getting a swing to the Conservatives does seem unlikely; at the general election the swing was over 3% to Labour. Conservative group leader Susan Hall now has a prominent position in the London Assembly.

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Havering

Local politics in Havering are difficult to analyse using national trends because the various residents’ associations are potent electoral forces, but do not have a clear identity in terms of national politics. At present the residents’ association councillors sit in three separate groups and rarely vote the same way.

When the Conservatives lost their overall majority in the 2014 local elections, they managed to agree a coalition deal with residents’ association councillors elected from Cranham, Upminster and Harold Wood wards – all three being wards where the Conservatives are not strong electoral challengers in local elections. The councillors from wards in Hornchurch sponsored by the Hornchurch Residents’ Association remained in opposition. Residents’ councillors representing the wards of South Hornchurch and Rainham and Wennington, which are mostly working class, have been in a separate ‘Independent Residents’ group for many years.

Havering was tailor-made for the UK Independence Party, and the party won seven seats in 2014 – reduced to six by a byelection loss to Labour in 2016. Despite UKIP’s travails the six have been able to hold together in the party and in the same group, but the UKIP vote fell to 6% in general election. That byelection gain does not signify much chance of Labour regaining its strength; Labour are in contention only in a couple of wards.

With the Conservatives having regained their voters from UKIP and split the residents groups, 2018 may be a chance to make seat gains. Havering has many of the older traditional working class groups who have shifted to the Conservatives. We think a narrow Conservative overall majority most likely.

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Hillingdon

Hillingdon is a very large borough on the map and has a very wide range of areas: strongly working-class communities, mixed residential, industrial zones, a university, and prosperous outer suburbia. It even has a separate village (Harefield).

Perhaps surprisingly Hillingdon’s Ray Puddifoot is the longest serving Conservative council leader in London. It is a borough which has been considered marginal but the Conservatives have had control for 20 years. Coming into 2018, Labour need a swing of only 4% to win a majority, and yet many Labour sources are downplaying their chances. It is thought to be the sort of outer London area where Labour is doing less well.

While the general election swing (5% to Labour) was enough if it was uniform, it seems possible that it was concentrated in areas which will not deliver enough seat gains. The younger voters who are moving to Labour tend to live around Brunel University in Uxbridge which helps Labour there but is not in itself enough to take the council. Labour campaigners have been heading for the Uxbridge constituency to try to overturn Boris Johnson’s less than stellar general election majority.

It is not impossible to see Labour take Hillingdon but it is not easy. The key wards are South Ruislip and Hillingdon East; if Labour starts winning seats there, it might nick a small majority. Meanwhile Ladbrokes will give you 6/5 on for either Labour or Conservatives to win a majority.

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Hounslow

It seems odd now to recall that at the beginning of 2010, the Conservatives were the leading party on Hounslow having outpolled Labour at the previous election and running a coalition with a localist group who were good centre-right allies. Some expected the Conservatives to win a majority at the 2010 election, but things turned out the other way: a Labour majority of ten seats, expanded to 38 in 2014.

Partly this was because the Labour administration treated the borough as a marginal, including years in which they cut the council tax level. But Labour has also solidified its support in traditional Labour areas of Feltham, where populist Conservatives were previously able to win council elections.

The 2017 general election was counted by ward in Hounslow, and showed (to general astonishment) that Labour had managed a clean sweep and outpolled the Conservatives everywhere – even in three traditionally Conservative wards in Chiswick (Chiswick Homefields, Chiswick Riverside, and Turnham Green).

Local opinion considers this outcome unlikely in the council election, although some seat gains here may be likely. It was achieved despite a small overall swing across the borough of under 3% since the 2014 local elections.

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Islington

After spending ten years under Liberal Democrat control, Islington is a borough once again personally identified with the Leader of the Labour Party. But by contrast with the 1990s when Tony Blair lived there and the council was run by Blairites, the current council leadership is not entirely made up of ideological soulmates of Jeremy Corbyn. Council leader Richard Watts accompanied Corbyn to the count at the 2017 general election but local Labour councillors are drawn from across the party.

The perception that Islington is ‘Corbyn central’ did help Labour achieve strong support in the 2017 general election, and is likely to help Labour in the council elections as well. The Liberal Democrats tended to prosper in winning council seats when they were able to pitch to the left of Labour. Islington has a minimal Conservative vote; the Conservatives have only won three seats in the past half century, the most recent in 1994.

For the past four years the only opposition has come from a single Green Party councillor in Highbury East ward. Labour are now targeting that seat to get a clean sweep in the borough (which last happened in the early 1970s). Such an outcome is distinctly possible.

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Kingston upon Thames

The Royal Borough of Kingston-upon-Thames is a small outer-London borough, but local politics can get very heated. The council has been a back-and-forth battle between the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats/Liberal Alliance since the early 1980s, and each side fights fiercely. In the midst of this, the council has set the highest Band D council tax in London. Neither party seems able to reduce it.

In 2014 the Conservatives capitalised on the Liberal Democrats’ unpopularity in national politics to succeed in retaking majority control of the council. In opposition the Liberal Democrats targeted council leader Kevin Davis for personal criticism, alleging conflicts of interest with his role at the political engagement consultancy Cratus Communications which he had set up.

Gossip about Davis’s links to property developers has been constant; when Davis’s son was employed by a local developer, a 17-year-old community activist criticised Davis on Twitter. Davis hit back at his “appalling little child” interrogator. This overreaction has prompted petitions calling on him to resign the leadership.

At the general election the Liberal Democrats did well, winning back the Kingston and Surbiton seat that covers most of the borough and leading the Conservatives by 6% across the whole borough. Such a shift is easily enough for them to win back control. The Liberal Democrats are also targeting the Labour seats in Norbiton ward. Given the Liberal Democrat ability to target their activity, and that resentments tend to build up against council leaderships, they are likely to be able to retake the borough.

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Lewisham

Sir Steve Bullock, Mayor of Lewisham since the Mayoral system was set up, announced his retirement in early 2017, just after the council found itself involved in a storm over a possible housing development of land around Millwall FC’s stadium the ‘New Den’. The council intended to use compulsory purchase powers to unify land ownership, then sell them to developers Renewal. The Club launched a fierce opposition, claiming its future was threatened and making accusations of corruption. Political support for the deal collapsed; an inquiry was ordered, and Steve Bullock called time on his period as Mayor.

Would that be an opportunity for a Momentum supported left-winger to win the ballot of Labour Party members and become the new Mayor? Momentum are very strong in the borough, but after a fascinating selection contest, the winner was Damien Egan – a moderate Labour Party member and close to Sir Steve Bullock. Since then Bullock has been easing Egan into the leadership so the transition is easy. The inquiry into the land deal failed to stand up any of the claims, and London journalist Dave Hill has observed that “pretty much the whole thing has been a big bag of hot air”.

Otherwise Lewisham, which includes some very mixed suburbia, is becoming increasingly strong for Labour. There was a very large general election swing. In local elections, Labour has mainly been challenged from the left – the Liberal Democrats for a time, the Green Party, and the far left in the form of ‘Lewisham People Before Profit’. But in 2018 the question will be whether Labour can make it a clean sweep by winning the last Green Party seat which the party won by 53 votes last time.

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Redbridge

At the 2014 elections, Redbridge was Labour’s London highlight when the party succeeded in winning a majority in a borough which they had never previously won outright. The decision to target Redbridge was highly publicised and well prepared, and it helped that the Conservative group on the council had suffered several members falling out with each other. Having succeeded on the council, Labour went on to score an impressive win in the Ilford North constituency in the 2015 general election.

Coming into 2018, Redbridge has continued to swing to Labour. Ilford North now looks like a safe Labour seat with a near 10,000 majority and the demographic trends which have been helping Labour in Redbridge have continued. There have also been a round of boundary changes; we estimate that if the new boundaries had been used in 2014, Labour would have won 38 seats, the Conservatives 23, and the Liberal Democrats two.

The new boundaries seem likely to create many marginal wards and give all parties many targets. However the wind is blowing towards Labour, and they may look to wards such as Barkingside, Bridge, Clayhall, Fairlop and Fullwell as possibly giving gains. The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats will fight it out in Churchfields and South Woodford wards where the Boundary Commission has made major changes.

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Southwark

Southwark borough council is one of the largest landlords in London, with the centre and north of the borough being dominated by council estates. Most of them were built rather cheaply in the 1950s and 1960s and the desire of the council to refurbish and redevelop them has become the main controversy in local politics: lacking any access to finance, Southwark has entered into deals with private developers including Lendlease which fund redevelopment at the cost of building market property.

It was in Southwark that grassroots campaigns against council deals with developers first developed, with the campaigners calling themselves the “35% Campaign” after the proportion of affordable housing set in Southwark planning policy. They have branched out into wider campaigning, but their main focus remains opposition to the council.

Surprisingly this activism has not led to reselection difficulties for anyone associated with Peter John’s moderate Labour leadership. Labour had more problems in 2014 when a disillusioned party member who had not been selected for the Bermondsey constituency set up the ‘All People’s Party’, but failed to win a significant vote. It is likely, with the emphatic defeat of Liberal Democrat Sir Simon Hughes in the 2017 election, that the Liberal Democrats will lose further seats in the north of the borough – though a complete wipeout is unlikely.

There are new ward boundaries in Southwark in 2018, which help the Conservatives retain a toehold as Dulwich Village ward is made safer for them. The Conservatives also hope to take seats from the Liberal Democrats in the Surrey Docks area. Had the new boundaries been used in 2014, Labour would have had 49 seats, the Liberal Democrats 12, and the Conservatives two.

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Waltham Forest

Although geography makes Waltham Forest an outer London borough, its residential demography and good transport connections between the centre and most of the area make it behave electorally far more like inner London. Labour were under strong Liberal Democrat challenge in Walthamstow and Leyton in the 2000s with the Liberal Democrats pitching to the left; there are also groups on the far left who are well organised.

As with most inner London boroughs, there are a large number of Momentum activists in the local Labour Party but they have not been successful in getting their candidates selected to stand for the council (and possibly as a result, they are complaining about the selection process). Waltham Forest’s Labour leadership is not as Blairite as most London boroughs but its regeneration programme in Walthamstow Central – including some very tall buildings and low proportions of affordable housing – has been a focus for discontent.

That may mean a relatively weak campaign for Labour in its safe areas, but the electoral action in Waltham Forest is now in the north of the borough where the Conservatives are on the defence in Chingford. This area is showing some of the same changes which have affected next door Redbridge, and Labour activists from outside have been organised to campaign there. There was a large swing at the general election in all parts of the borough.

Labour will go in to the election with Clare Coghill as a new leader still in her honeymoon phase with the voters, and also with a nice helping hand from the Mayor of London: Sadiq Khan named Waltham Forest as the ‘London Borough of Culture’ for 2019.

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THIRD WEEK
Bexley, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kingston upon Thames, Lewisham, Redbridge, Southwark, Waltham Forest

SECOND WEEK
Barnet, Bromley, Croydon, Ealing, Kensington and Chelsea, Lambeth, Newham, Richmond upon Thames, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth

FIRST WEEK
Barking and Dagenhan, Bexley, Camden, Enfield, Greenwich, Haringey, Merton, Sutton, Westminster

Barnet

Throughout the count in 2014, control of Barnet council was on a knife edge. It was not until a recount in the final ward to declare (Childs Hill ward) gave the Conservatives two seats that the Conservative victory was confirmed. Going into 2018, all Labour needs to do go win control is hold all its current seats, add one seat in Childs Hill ward (where a Labour candidate was just 46 votes away from being elected), and win the final seat in Brunswick Park ward (where Labour was 79 votes behind). These two are not the only marginal wards in the borough: Labour also has chances of gaining seats in Hale ward.

Barnet’s recent history has seen the council sign a major contract under which almost all of its services were to be delivered by outsourcing company Capita. This policy was described by former leader Mike Freer (now MP for Finchley and Golders Green) as ‘EasyCouncil’ by contrast with EasyJet’s business model of no frills, streamlined service; the term is now more widely used as a criticism. In May 2016 the council’s running of the Greater London Authority elections was a shambles as polling stations were not given the full electoral register; the chief executive resigned in disgrace.

The many council housing estates in Barnet have been proposed for estate regeneration schemes by the council, with the West Hendon estate nearing completion; a TV documentary shown in 2016 was implicitly highly critical of the scheme. More recently Sadiq Khan as Mayor blocked redevelopment of Grahame Park estate in Colindale, regarding the loss of social rented homes as unacceptable; it was in Barnet that Khan and Jeremy Corbyn launched the Labour Party policy of requiring ballots on all estate regeneration schemes.

Barnet is therefore a target for Labour, but one that has some difficulties for the party. In a borough with the largest Jewish community there is widespread concern about Labour activists expressing antisemitic views without any action being taken against them. There was no swing between the 2014 local election and the 2017 general election. But Labour’s Jewish problem may not harm their chances in local elections to the same extent as in national elections: London borough councils do not have their own foreign policy and there are many Jewish members of the Labour Party locally who maintain the party’s community links.

Ladbrokes had quoted odds of 5/1 on for Labour to win a majority; 7/2 against for the Conservatives to keep their majority, and 16/1 against for no overall control. Those odds have changed, with Labour now out to 2/5. However, in the light of Londonwide trends and specific issues affecting this borough, we agree that a change of control is likely.

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Bromley

There has only been one set of London elections in which the party has failed to secure a majority in Bromley, and that was in 1998 when the Conservatives were laid low by a combination of Liberal Democrat activism and Blairite Labour appeal to middle class voters. Neither of those factors would seem to be present in 2018.

Bromley’s Conservative leadership has just had a refresh. Stephen Carr stepped down to allow a successor time to prepare for the local elections, and Colin Smith was chosen to take charge. He is staking out a position as a local champion who will make the borough’s case to central government and to a London government that Bromley often feels it has little in common with. Providing extra schools for the borough’s children is one of the biggest difficulties locally.

As in neighbouring Bexley, UKIP were strong in 2014 and won two seats in Cray Valley West ward, an area with a lot of social housing. If the UKIP vote went to Labour then it might help Labour win that ward for the first time since 2002, but the indications are that it is not doing so. The swing between the 2014 local elections and 2017 general election was nil. While Labour now has a strong base in Penge and around Crystal Palace, it has few opportunities anywhere else. The Liberal Democrats used to have a strong base in Orpington which lasted 50 years but it has disappeared and does not seem to be coming back.

A last minute split over deselection of one Conservative councillor has resulted in three going Independent, but this will only be a little local difficulty for the party in those wards. Bromley will retain a Conservative majority.

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Croydon

London’s largest borough in terms of population is also strikingly heterogenous, with the working-class north feeling like a densely populated city area that has little in common with the commuter suburbs in the prosperous south of the borough. As might be expected, that means safe Labour seats in the north, safe Conservative seats in the south, and the control of the borough decided in a small group of marginal seats in the middle. Because the Conservatives tended to build up larger majorities in their safe seats, Croydon was a council where Labour was able to win a majority in 1998 and 2002 despite the Conservatives polling more overall. The 2014 elections were the first in which Labour actually outpolled the Conservatives.

Labour’s leadership of the borough has been notably pro-development, getting the council considerable criticism on the blog ‘Inside Croydon’ which is well-informed and written from a strongly left-wing standpoint. The council has put a lot of emphasis on its company, Brick by Brick, which develops housing including a decent proportion of affordable housing; its critics charge that this is just another commercial developer.

Croydon has new ward boundaries for this election. Had they been in place in 2014 we estimate the result would have been Labour 42, Conservatives 28. The key marginal wards are Fairfield (which becomes notionally Labour held), Shirley North (replacing the current Ashburton), Waddon, and Addiscombe West. Labour’s hopes for advance may take them to Addiscombe East and South Croydon. The Conservatives are targeting Norbury Park ward where a potential marginal seat is created out of two safe Labour seats.

The general election swing to Labour in Croydon was 6%, enough to give a comfortable majority on the council.

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Ealing

Ealing again broke its reputation as a bellwether in 2014. At every previous election save 1986, the party which won Ealing in the London Borough elections went on to win the next general election. For the future it seems unlikely that Ealing will become such a good predictor of national trends, as it is increasingly turning into a Labour dominated borough.

The factors that made Ealing marginal were connected mostly to the parts of Acton, Northolt and Perivale that included a lot of middle-income families – neither properly wealthy nor suffering economic hardship, and living in a mix of private housing and council estates. Those groups are now increasingly drawn to Labour over housing costs and public services. Conservative councillors are now penned back into a small area of west Acton and east Ealing where wealthy residents live.

Ealing’s Labour leadership is also in the hands of a moderate group (Julian Bell is a supporter of Progress), and the local Momentum Group has complained about the candidate selection process when it could not get its members selected: they tried but failed to get all of the London councillor selections overturned. However a delay at releasing the 2018 manifesto hint at internal issues over policy direction. Unusually for a Labour-held borough, the Liberal Democrats have been able to keep a toehold on the council: they stand a good chance of keeping Southfield ward.

The Conservatives would need a swing of 10% in their favour to win back control. At the general election the swing was 7% to Labour. Ealing is likely to stay with its present council leadership.

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Kensington and Chelsea

Local elections in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea are normally very placid affairs, with a Conservative win assured from the outset and very few seats ever likely to change hands. At five successive elections from 1982 to 1998, the same seats elected the same party’s candidates.

Two events within a week of each other last June have changed things and made the 2018 elections in this small borough ones which will be watched closely. Late on Friday evening, the final result in the general election saw Labour win the Kensington seat. On the following Wednesday morning, 71 residents of the Grenfell Tower in north Kensington were killed in the worst fire in a century – and one quickly blamed on the council’s project to reclad the tower.

A flatfooted response to the fire forced out the Conservative leadership and the new council leaders are trying to let the local community know they are different (many sitting councillors have been deselected or persuaded to stand down). They face considerable obstacles in trying to win re-election: anger over Grenfell, a rise in the Labour vote, strong local opposition to Brexit, and a new local centrist party ‘Advance’. Can they win re-election with all that against them? We predict they will.

Kensington and Chelsea remains a very heterogenous borough with an extremely sharp divide. For the Conservatives to lose would mean losing wards full of the ‘Made in Chelsea’ set; for all that they may be saddened by Grenfell and feel the council was partly responsible, it is not likely to turn them into Labour voters. It should also be noted that the Kensington constituency was often misnamed as ‘Kensington and Chelsea’ (it includes Notting Hill but doesn’t include Chelsea) and that Labour only won it by 20 votes.

The overall swing between the 2014 local elections and the 2017 general election was 8.5% to Labour, but such is the divide in this borough that it would mean Labour gaining just one seat – and that in a ward which is currently split between Labour and Conservatives. Labour’s target seats are Chelsea Riverside and Earls Court.

The new ‘Advance’ party was set up by the Liberal Democrat candidate in Kensington Annabel Mullin, and has drawn support from some other former party activists in the area and at least one former Labour councillor. However it is difficult to see where it will make an impact: it needs to find particular wards to concentrate on.

Ladbrokes have offered odds on the outcome of the election (probably a first) and odds on a Conservative win have moved from a very probable 5/1 on to a rock solid 16/1 on. The other odds are No overall control, 12/1 against; a Labour majority, 12/1 against; an Advance majority, 66/1.

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Lambeth

When the Labour far left were last in the ascendancy in the 1980s, Lambeth town hall – under the control of the council led by ‘Red Ted’ Knight – was one of their headquarters. Even many years later the Liberal Democrats, briefly in the council leadership, found the council’s old red flag in storage ready for the day when the left ruled again.

That day has not come. Lambeth’s Labour leadership since 2006, when the party regained control against the Londonwide trend, has been firmly on the Blairite wing. Steve Reed and now Lib Peck remain committed to moderate policies and controversial partnerships with private sector developers to help the council regenerate its many estates.

Frustration has built up within the local party with left-wing activists who often describe Lambeth as a ‘Progress council’ rather than a Labour one (Progress being the Blairite activist group). In 2016 a Progress supporting Labour candidate was elected in a byelection in Gipsy Hill ward but by a small majority over a Green Party candidate who benefited from unofficial support from the local Momentum group.

Yet Momentum have been unable, as they were able in Haringey, to impose themselves on Labour selections. Labour also did well in the general election, increasing the majority for prominent Labour Leave supporter Kate Hoey in Vauxhall despite a strong challenge in the nation’s most Remain constituency. Lambeth’s mainly young, ethnically diverse, inner London population suffering from high housing costs are tailor-made for Labour voting. The area shows no sign of a Liberal Democrat revival and Labour may well recapture the one Green seat and be able to challenge the Conservative ward in Clapham Common.

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Newham

Newham has suddenly gone from being one of the most predictable and stable boroughs in London, to extraordinarily unpredictable in the space of a few weeks. Directly-elected Mayor Sir Robin Wales is the longest serving borough leader in London, and assumed he would be reselected on the nod – but faced a strong challenge and his reselection was overturned. He was subsequently defeated by Rokhsana Fiaz, running from the left but not, as was widely reported at the time, a fully signed up member of the Momentum faction.

Her victory as mayor is as close as possible to assured. Sir Robin Wales had over 60% of the vote last time, and it is now 12 years since anyone other than Labour won a council seat (and 24 years since a member of a mainstream party did)

It is still odds on for Labour to sweep the board in Newham. The Conservatives have based their attempt to re-establish themselves on recruiting prominent local figures in the muslim community, partly successfully but not sufficient to win seats. They previously challenged Labour in Royal Docks ward where there are expensive dockside developments, but the local population that actually votes there are now inclined to vote Labour.

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Richmond upon Thames

The Conservatives won control in 2010 and increased their hold on Richmond in 2014 as the Liberal Democrat vote fell away, but there are strong signs locally that the tide may have turned. The Liberal Democrats have re-energised their local campaigning strength, having won the Richmond Park constituency in a December 2016 byelection. Although they lost the seat narrowly in June 2017, it was by a handful of votes; as the strongest Conservative area is in Kingston borough, the Liberal Democrats must have been ahead in the Richmond part.

In 2014 the Conservatives did well in the Twickenham part of the borough, where almost all the wards were competitive. It presaged the Conservative gain of the Twickenham constituency in 2015, but this win was not sustained and the Liberal Democrats won it back in 2017. Winning back control of the borough council would be a fillip for new party leader Vince Cable.

Labour did not have any seats on the council from 2002 until it gained one through the defection of Jennifer Churchill in 2015. Although the local party is keen to fight several seats, it may find it divides its campaigning too thinly in a borough which is not naturally good Labour territory.

Richmond is one of those councils where local residents have a tendency to fall out of love with the council leadership relatively rapidly. Council control changed hands in the elections of 2002, 2006 and 2010. Although Lord True retired and allowed Paul Hodgins time to prepare for the council elections, Ladbrokes will tell you a Liberal Democrat majority is 5/4 on, and a Conservative majority is Evens.

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Tower Hamlets

Tower Hamlets has not been a very good advertisement for local politics in the recent past. Creating a directly-elected Mayor allowed a group based within the Bangladeshi community to take over the council and retain it using a system found by the commissioner of an election court to amount to bribery. Strikingly, despite the manifest abuses at the 2014 election, it was not the defeated Labour Party but four individual electors who risked their life savings to challenge it.

When their challenge was successful, it was Labour’s John Biggs who took over the Mayoralty – winning a Mayoral byelection with 40% of the vote; but even after all the negative publicity, he only beat the chosen successor of ousted Mayor Lutfur Rahman by 2.2%. In council byelections, successors of Rahman have held seats where they were previously strong. Politics in Tower Hamlets remains very fragmented on racial lines, and the Bangladeshi community tends to rely on its own media.

In 2018 Tower Hamlets may have slightly less high profile local politics, with John Biggs having stabilised the council and built back up his contacts with the local Bangladeshi community. The group of Lutfur Rahman’s supporters is now now split, with most being in a new political party called Aspire. Their mayoral candidate is Oliur Rahman. The smaller People’s Alliance of Tower Hamlets under Rabina Khan is a slightly more moderate group.

The Conservative Party’s loss of seats in Tower Hamlets in 2014 was unexpected. They are still contenders in the Isle of Dogs and Wapping areas, where they are reliant on retaining decent levels of support from residents of council estates; unlike other parts of London, they seem to have succeeded. Conservative Mayoral candidate Anwara Ali was a Labour to Conservative defector in 2008.

Overall John Biggs is a clear favourite to hold on to the Mayoralty against divided opposition, and it is likely that Labour will make seat gains to give it an overall majority on the council (it was only just off doing so in 2014). However Lutfur Rahman’s victories in 2010 and 2014 were not built on sand and those hoping for a wipeout of his movement will be disappointed.

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Wandsworth

The Conservatives have controlled Wandsworth since 1978, and have wanted everyone to know it. From the start they adopted a policy of contracting out services, market driven solutions, and cutting taxes: a sort of municipal Thatcherism to counteract the municipal socialism which big city Labour authorities preferred. In the 1980s this approach chimed with young London professional voters who moved into former Wandsworth council homes sold under the right to buy, and became electorally popular. The Conservatives held control in 1986 and 1990 against adverse national trends because of local popularity.

It is as well to note at this stage that the council leadership is more pragmatic than its ideological reputation would suggest; they have been building social rented homes in unused parts of council estates long before other councils took up this policy. Ravi Govindia is a canny leader who has guided complex regeneration schemes around Nine Elms.

Why is Wandsworth’s Conservative leadership now seriously under threat? For one thing, austerity cuts to government grants force all councils to cut spending, so it is no longer distinctive. The Localism Act provisions about council tax referendums make it difficult for the Conservatives to threaten voters with tax rises if Labour took over (and Labour promise to keep council tax low). Action in the council can no longer insulate it from wider electoral trends.

Those trends now favour Labour. Wandsworth’s young population have seen wages frozen and housing costs rise (part of the reason Labour were already reviving in 2014), and now a Conservative government is taking Britain out of the EU when Wandsworth residents would prefer to remain in. Wandsworth is the home borough of Sadiq Khan who remains London’s most popular politician.

Going into the 2018 local elections, the Conservatives have lost two councillors through deselection; one of them, James Cousins, has just joined the centrist pro-EU party Renew which was founded in the borough. Renew is standing in the local elections and may be a conduit for voters to abandon the Conservatives, but winning seats would seem to be unlikely.

Labour stands to benefit from a large number of incoming campaigners who recognise the symbolism of regaining control of the borough (even if many of them were not alive to see Kenneth Baker brandishing the Evening Standard after the Conservatives retained Wandsworth in 1990). The general election saw a 9% swing to Labour compared with the 2014 borough election, and that would be enough for Labour to win 37 seats and a majority of 14. Ladbrokes make Labour 11/8 on favourites, with the Conservatives evens to retain control. We tip Labour to win.
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Today, we start serialising our election briefing reports for all the 32 London Boroughs across the capital.

THIS WEEK:
Barking and Dagenhan, Bexley, Camden, Enfield, Greenwich, Haringey, Merton, Sutton, Westminster

SECOND WEEK
Barnet, Bromley, Croydon, Ealing, Kensington and Chelsea, Lambeth, Newham, Richmond upon Thames, Tower Hamlets, Wandsworth

THIRD WEEK
Bexley, Hackney, Hammersmith and Fulham, Harrow, Havering, Hillingdon, Hounslow, Islington, Kingston upon Thames, Lewisham, Redbridge, Southwark, Waltham Forest

Barking and Dagenham

Given that Labour holds 49 of the 51 seats on this council, predicting a Labour win is no great stretch. Indeed, it is one of the select few boroughs that has always been run by the same party since the present system of local government in London was established in 1964. The days when people were seriously worried of a British National Party led council seem long gone.

Labour’s strength in Barking and Dagenham is not, however, as fully comprehensive as it appears. The UK Independence Party was close to winning seats in 2014, and there is also some internal tension: former council leader Liam Smith resigned the party whip at the beginning of 2017. He is a leave supporter and backed Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership bid. As with many Labour groups of councillors there are internal tensions, not least the mutual distrust between Barking councillors and Dagenham councillors.

With all that, there is little opportunity for revival of other parties in the short term. The borough of Barking and Dagenham is very homogenous, so there are no wards which are obvious targets for opposition parties to concentrate their campaigning on. A further Labour shut-out may be likely for 2018.

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Bexley

This patch of outer south-east London was expected to have a reasonable chance for Labour control when the council was established, but the party has only rarely been able to win a majority. The most recent period of Labour control, with an overall majority of one seat between 2002 and 2006, was achieved with the help of favourable boundaries and the ability of the Blair era Labour Party to reach into suburban middle class communities.

Neither of those reasons apply any more. The Labour Party in the Corbyn era is not emulating the appeal of Blair, and instead Bexley is increasingly aligned with the right: it saw one of the highest UK Independence Party votes in 2014 which was enough to win them three seats. This sizeable vote collapsed to 4% in the 2017 general election, and those votes seem to have gone mainly to the Conservatives. The overall swing in Bexley between 2014 local elections and 2017 was 3% to the Conservatives – against a Londonwide trend to Labour.

Bexley has also undergone ward boundary changes. Unlike the three other boroughs which have had boundary reviews, in Bexley an opportunity was taken to make a significant reduction in the overall number of seats which have fallen from 63 to 45. Had these wards been used in 2014 we estimate the result would have been 34 Conservatives, 10 Labour and one from the UK Independence Party. The changes slightly increase the swing Labour needs to win control to 8%, and means each of the marginal wards is now larger and more mixed.

Although local social media can be derisively critical of the Conservative leadership, it is highly favoured to hold on to control of the council.

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Camden

Camden has been in Labour control for all but two terms since its creation. Labour actually performed badly in terms of vote share in the early 2000s, retaining a majority with only 33% of the vote in 2002, and being squeezed by the Liberal Democrats’ shifting to the left during the Blair era. Labour’s revival since 2007 is not surprising, but there has long been tension within the Labour group which covers a wide range of politics. Georgia Gould, a figure associated with the Blairite group Progress, has done well to keep the party united, and her decision to be highly visible when faced with the crisis evacuation of the Chalcots Estate for fire works in her first week as leader seems to have paid off in the long term.

Since the 1980s, the Conservatives have retained constant levels of support in the wealthier parts of Hampstead, and although they have a big issue over changes to bin collections (which mean fewer collections in Hampstead and more on the council estates), the national picture gives them a serious problem. Strong local opposition to Brexit has led to the defection of the party’s former leader and the resignation of one popular moderate council candidate. The Liberal Democrats had only one survivor in 2014 – the veteran Flick Rea, who is standing once again. Camden has a very lively local political scene with debates taking place on the letters page of the Camden New Journal (a local paper with an editorial line somewhat left of Georgia Gould).

The 2017 general election showed an 8% swing to Labour since 2014, and Camden counted the general election result by ward – shocking local politics by showing Labour was ahead even in Hampstead Town ward. Only Frognal and Fitzjohns ward did not have a Labour majority. In such circumstances a Labour win is strongly favoured.

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Enfield

The Conservatives ran Enfield council throughout 1968-1994, but in the last twenty years the borough has shifted strongly away from the party and towards Labour. Even while the Conservatives were winning two out of the borough’s three Parliamentary seats in 2010, Labour won back control of the council, and at the last election they made further inroads into traditionally Conservative territory in Winchmore Hill and Southgate.

Labour’s administration of the council is moderate and prefers to deliver unspectacular competence rather than outstanding eyecatching innovation. This approach seems to match what local people want, and makes it difficult for both the Conservative opposition and any internal Labour critics to assail it. The Conservatives have been campaigning on the issue of local police station closures for which they are blaming the Mayor of London (Sadiq Khan appears a somewhat distant figure from Enfield Town).

The general election saw Labour achieve a swing of just under 5% since the 2014 local elections, allowing one senior council figure (Bambos Charalambous) to gain the Southgate constituency for Labour in parliament. It is difficult to see how the Conservatives can regain the council in the short term.

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Greenwich

When Greenwich was made London’s third ‘Royal Borough’ in 2012, no-one could have been happier than council leader Chris Roberts. The whole council was rebranded as ‘Royal Greenwich’ and basked in international attention over the summer when it played host to the equestrian events of the London Olympics.

But Chris Roberts’s 14 year leadership of the council came to an abrupt end in 2014. Incidents from Roberts’s past were revealed and Labour councillors made public their concerns about a culture of bullying within the council, which were backed up by a standards inquiry into a voicemail message that Roberts had left. He chose to stand down from the leadership and also from the council. Denise Hyland was narrowly elected as the new leader after the 2014 election.

Hyland has tried to open up the traditionally tight political leadership of the council, but without entire success (she retains a seat on the planning board while also being council leader), but has also engaged in populist stunts such as a motion to ‘ban’ Donald Trump from setting foot in the borough.

While Labour are favoured to hold on, it is not likely to be a walkover. In November 2016 Labour narrowly lost a byelection in the marginal Eltham North ward to the Conservatives, and the general election showed only a small swing to Labour of 3%. The Conservative opposition is being punchy in proposing increased council tax support for the low paid, and has identified wasteful council spending for cutting.

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Haringey

In the last year no London borough has had more attention paid to its internal politics than Haringey. The council’s controversial estate regeneration project, the changes in the local Labour Party and the deselection of many sitting councillors have been written about by many journalists with very different agendas. The depth of the coverage means that some issues have to be unpicked.

The first thing to note is that what the Haringey leadership were proposing to do in the ‘Haringey Development Vehicle’, in linking with developer Lendlease to redevelop council housing estates and add new housing, was different in scale but not in form to other councils. Entering into the agreement at the end of the political term after campaigners had opposed other councils was a hostage to fortune.

The second thing to note is that only in Haringey has such a policy produced mass deselection of councillors. There is much in the point made by some defenders of the council that the policy is far more unpopular with residents of middle-class areas than with estate residents themselves, but they are the group who make up most Labour Party branches.

The third thing to note is that the rebels have won, although their victory has not finally been proclaimed. While the Haringey Development Vehicle is formally on hold, it is practically impossible for it to go ahead and the new council will vote to kill it off. Council leader Claire Kober is standing down and not seeking re-election (she can have the satisfaction of rescuing the council, as she came in amid the scandal following the death of ‘Baby P’).

With those preliminary observations, how will it affect voting in May? Any hopes by opposition parties that the ructions will cause a break in Haringey’s traditional Labour support is going to be disappointed. For all the damage that is done to centre ground appeal when moderate politicians are deposed by ideological ones, there is no particular reason to think the Haringey Development Vehicle was particularly popular and several good reasons to think it would have lost Labour votes if it had been put forward at the election. It should be noted that the Liberal Democrat opposition on the council were strongly opposed.

Haringey remains a very polarised borough between a mixed and partly middle-class west of the borough (Hornsey, Crouch End, Muswell Hill), and a working class east (Tottenham). In the 2000s the Liberal Democrats cleaned up in the west but failed to break into the east. They are now in retreat, and Labour had a large swing in its favour at the general election. There are no realistic Conservative targets save for Highgate ward, where it is the Liberal Democrats under attack and not Labour.

The real fight for control of Haringey will be in the Labour group on the Saturday after the election, between various shades of left.

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Merton

Merton is a classic marginal London borough, with control moving between the main two parties in 2006 and 2010. The social mixture of the borough can tend to polarise between middle class Wimbledon and working-class Mitcham but save in some small pockets, neither tends to approach either extreme wealth or extreme poverty and there are many in the middle.

The political affiliations of the Labour leadership are firmly on the moderate wing of the party, particularly in the Mitcham and Morden constituency where most of the Labour councillors are based. Council leader Stephen Alambritis, previously known as a spokesperson for small business, is a very high profile figure.

If Labour’s general election performance looks rather below par for London, this is partly due to problems during the election campaign involving the Labour candidate in the Wimbledon constituency. The Conservatives have retreated as an electoral force in the Mitcham and Morden area, and although the seat numbers are close, it would need an 8% swing to the Conservatives for them to get an overall majority.

Merton counted the election result by ward, showing Labour were doing well in marginal wards West Barnes, Cannon Hill and Trinity. An oddity of electoral politics in Merton are the Merton Park Ward Independent Residents, who won their seats from the Conservatives in 1986 and have made them safe; if they hold the balance of power, the three Independent Resident councillors vote to support which of the other parties is closest to a majority.

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Sutton

The council election result in 2014 in Sutton was perhaps one of the most remarkable of the year. Despite the Liberal Democrats’ national support having collapsed, and the party having lost seats in most local elections, in Sutton the party stretched its lead over the Conservatives in vote share and made a net gain of two seats.

Sutton is a relatively small London borough and it has been in Liberal Democrat control for as long as that party has existed (the Alliance first won control in 1986). Voters living in reasonably comfortable suburban homes, but not quite as wealthy as those in neighbouring Purley and Coulsdon, seem to have welcomed centre politics and the Liberal Democrat tradition of community activism.

However recently there are clear signs that the council administration might find it difficult at the 2018 elections. The Liberal Democrats have been in power for long enough that there seems some validity in opposition parties’ claims that the leaders are persuading officers to use their council roles to support political campaigning. The council has also lost support over building an energy recovery facility in Beddington (which opponents tag as an incinerator).

The Conservatives did poorly in 2014 partly because the UK Independence Party did well: Sutton had a very strong Leave vote in the EU referendum. That vote went straight to the Conservatives in 2017 giving them a clear lead. Labour is also challenging hard in its areas to re-establish itself on a council where it hasn’t won any seats since 2002.

Ladbrokes make the Liberal Democrats favourites, but only as 5/4 on; the Conservatives are 5/4 against. We think those are good odds; our tip is for a surprise Conservative gain.

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Westminster

Wandsworth and Westminster councils are often bracketed together, never more so than in 1990 when both saw striking Conservative victories against the trend. However their electoral situations are somewhat different: while Wandsworth was a traditionally Labour area which the Conservatives took over, Westminster has been run by the Conservatives throughout its existence. But at the 2018 election, there is a small chance that Westminster will vote in a Labour-run council for the first time ever.

Labour came close to winning once before, when in 1986 the party noticed favourable Londonwide trends and spotted local Conservatives were not very good at campaigning. After campaigning strongly in the marginal wards, Labour came within 106 votes of winning control. The reaction of the then Conservative leadership led them to an extraordinary audit, surcharges and Dame Shirley Porter paying £12m for the illegal policy called ‘homes for votes’.

The Conservatives have moved on from the scandal, but they have other problems. Former deputy leader Robert Davis’s prodigious register of gifts and hospitality gave bad publicity early in 2018, and there are many rumours of internal strife in the Conservative group: some popular sitting councillors have been deselected. Current council leader Nickie Aiken cultivates a reputation as a political streetfighter.

Central London demographic changes have not helped the Conservatives, who traditionally counted on support from wealthy residents who use few council services and simply want low bills; increasing property prices mean many British people have sold up and been replaced by non-UK nationals who may not have votes even if they are permanent residents. Westminster’s population also includes a very large number of EU citizens who are no longer well-disposed towards the Conservative Party. People who move to Westminster are very likely to live in private rented housing, and private tenants are a group which have shifted to Labour in recent elections.

All this explains why Labour was well ahead across Westminster in the 2017 general election. However Labour faces a problem as its support is concentrated in four safe wards in the north of the city – finding the wards to target to give a Labour a majority on the council is not obvious. It is quite possible Labour will outpoll the Conservatives again, but the arrangement of that vote will allow the Conservatives to squeeze home. The odds available from Ladbrokes at the time of writing seem to bear that out: the Conservatives are 7/4 on favourites. However a Labour majority, at 5/4 against, is distinctly possible.

 

 

Congratulations to Peter Exton, a Housing Development Consultant and a triathlete, who wins the Thorncliffe Spring Quiz. For those who attempted it and who want to know the answers, here they are:

1. Under what circumstances should a planning applicant submit ownership Certificate D?

When submitting an application on a site where the applicant only owns part of the land and does not know the identity of any of the other owners.

2. Name either of the two towns (one in England, one in Scotland) that were previously Cities but are no longer.

Elgin (Scotland) and Rochester-upon-Medway (England).

3. The three longest serving Labour council leaders in London, Robin Wales, Steve Bullock and Claire Kober, are all retiring at this May’s elections. Name one of the four Labour council leaders who have been in post since May 2010 who are likely (unless deposed) to be the joint longest serving Labour borough leaders.

Julian Bell (Ealing), Doug Taylor (Enfield), Stephen Alambritis (Merton), Peter John (Southwark).

4. Who is the longest-serving Conservative council leader in London at the moment?

Ray Puddifoot (Hillingdon)

5. Link the council to the scandal which forced its leader’s resignation:

5.1  Council awarding contracts to the leader’s personal physiotherapist

Cheshire East

5.2 Agreeing unlawful payments to the chief executive’s pension pot

Carmarthenshire

5.3 Forcing officers to change a bypass route to make the leader’s land more valuable

Lincolnshire

5.4 Failing to solve a three month strike of bin workers

Birmingham

5.5 Failing to audit applicants for new taxi licenses

South Ribble

6. Which city has a boundary which extends many miles outside the urban area along the banks of a river – including just the river and no land?

Norwich, down the River Yare. It’s a legacy of centuries of mediaeval disputes between Great Yarmouth and Norwich about river traffic; the right of Norwich to control the river was confirmed by a Charter of Queen Mary in 1556.

7. Name the TV series which feautured these fictitious local councillors.

7.1 Freddie Patterson

An Independent Man

7.2 K. Edwards and Vijay Shah

Little Napoleons

7.3 Augustus Bent and Mrs Smallgood

Swizzlewick

7.4 Austin Donohue

Our Friends in the North

7.5 Cox and Evans

The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer

8. What factor links the following councils in recent years? Rotherham, Isle of Anglesey, Northamptonshire, Tower Hamlets, Doncaster?

All have been partly or wholly run by appointed commissioners due to failures by the political leadership.

9.  In what way did the Local Government Association take over from the Labour Party, and the European Parliament take over from the Conservative Party?

They have taken their Smith Square headquarters buildings. Transport House (18 Smith Square), formerly the Labour Party HQ, is now the headquarters of the Local Government Association. 32 Smith Square, formerly Conservative Central Office, is now the London base for the European Parliament.

10.  Since 2016 the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition are both former members of local authorities. When was the last time that both main parties had leaders who had served in local government?

May 1940, when the Conservatives were led by Neville Chamberlain (former Birmingham City Councillor) and Labour by Clement Attlee (former Mayor of Stepney, although never elected as a councillor).