Mayor Polanski? It’s more likely than you think…
With their polling surging and their membership growing rapidly, the Green Party could be contenders to take control of City Hill in 2028, argues James Ford
The Green Party are having a moment. In the few weeks since their feisty new leader, Zack Polanski AM, was elected, the Greens have been making waves. Party membership has grown to over 140,000 members. And the surge is arguably strongest in London. Last year the Greens came second in 18 London constituencies and there are rumours that the party might even take control of Hackney in next year’s borough elections. Just this week, YouGov polling found that the Green Party was the second most popular political choice for Londoners. Whilst support for Labour in the capital has plummeted to 29 per cent, the Greens have risen to 21 per cent – ahead of Reform (17 per cent), the Conservatives (17 per cent) and the Lib Dems (11 per cent).
One of the unique quirks of London’s mayoral voting system is that only the candidates who finish in the top two spots get their second preference votes counted. Therefore, if the latest YouGov polling numbers were replicated in 2028, the Green and Labour candidates for Mayor would be the only contenders in the final run-off to take control of City Hall. If Polanski wanted to take full advantage of this unique opportunity, he would do well to consider making himself the Greens’ mayoral candidate.
Now, I would hardly be a very good political adviser if my prediction/warning of elections to come were not accompanied by several important caveats. Simply becoming major political contenders might attract unwelcome scrutiny that the Green Party is ill-equipped to withstand. Voters may yet baulk at the prospect of electing a former hypnotherapist that happily boasted that he could enlarge women’s breasts through the power of his mind. Others will be alarmed at the apparent endorsement of loony left commentators like Owen Jones. Many Londoners will, like CityAM’s own Editor-in-Chief, be repelled by the sheer economic illiteracy of the Greens’ policy agenda.
Twin challenges
The twin challenges for Zack Polanski and his horde of hopeless hippies over the next two and a half years are clear: to get serious about a run at City Hall, and to get tactical when it comes to voting.
On the first, Mr Polanski will need to direct much more of his political fire at Labour generally and Sadiq Khan in particular. Continual digs at Nigel Farage will help him win support across the progressive left generally – but the Greens’ real enemy wears a red rosette. Mr Polanski’s recent interventions on the London Assembly – urging the City Hall canteen to stock vegan products – unfortunately reveal a disturbing lack of gravity, relevance and political ambition. The Mayor’s decision to build on the Green Belt and to abandon his commitments to build affordable housing – coupled with the Labour government’s plans for major airport expansion – should give the Greens ample ammunition to mount better, more effective attacks on Labour.
As well as getting better at landing policy punches on Labour, the Green Party will need to be much more ruthless about embracing tactical voting. A recent MRP poll by Electoral Calculus for communications firm PLMR found that effective tactical voting could cost Reform a staggering 78 seats in the next general election. The Caerphilly by-election demonstrated that voters are more than willing to band together to deny Reform seats. In London, the Green Party will need to be the progressive flag around which an anti-Reform bloc can coalesce. That means not just trying to win first preference votes from Labour, but urging Lib Dem, Your Party and independent supporters to give their second preference votes to the Greens (rather than their usual habit of lending those second preferences to Labour in an effort to keep the Tories out of City Hall) is an urgent priority.
In the same way that Reform has arguably displaced the Conservatives as the leading political force on the right, the Greens under Zack Polanski have a once-in-a-generation chance to replace Labour as the dominant progressive force in London. The ball is at Zack Polanski’s feet just outside the box; it only remains to be seen if he can put it in the back of the net.
James Ford is a former adviser to Mayor of London Boris Johnson.