Could Sadiq Khan lose London?

00:00 05:09

James Heale has narrated this article for you to listen to.

With Labour 20 points ahead in the national polls, a lot of Tories have already written off next month’s mayoral contest in the capital. London, they maintain, is a Labour city that occasionally votes Conservative. But supporters of Sadiq Khan and his Tory challenger Susan Hall agree: it’s going to be closer than many think.

Three factors are held by both camps to be at play. The first is the incumbency factor versus ‘time for a change’. Khan’s re-election team has consulted other campaigns which won three in a row; all agreed this was the hardest contest to win. A hat-trick eluded Ken Livingstone, who lost in 2008 despite nearly a decade of prosperity for the city. 

Khan boasts a less impressive record. Half the capital’s residents say in polls that he has performed ‘badly’ or ‘very badly’ on knife crime, gangs and homelessness since 2016. One pollster tips him to underperform his party by up to ten points. ‘In these times,’ remarks one GLA candidate, ‘the only incumbent certain of re-election is Mr Putin.’

This leads to the second reason: an expected rise in split-ticket voting, with many Londoners backing the Tories in May before switching to Labour later this year. One Tory candidate tells of a typical doorstep encounter. ‘I’m going to smash your party at the general,’ said the voter. ‘But I’ll back you in the mayoral to get that man out.’

The Mayor’s image is as likely to be found on Conservative leaflets as Labour, with some in Khan’s own party choosing to airbrush him from their messaging. In Wimbledon, the Hall campaign was met by one voter furiously tearing up one of their leaflets because they saw Khan’s face on it, only to realise, belatedly, it was from the Tories.