Sadiq Khan faces a double whammy of a switch to the first-past-the-post system and new voter ID rules
Mayor of London Sadiq Khan at the launch of a poster campaign for the London mayoral election on 2 May Mr Khan isn’t shy about stating the risk he faces when London goes to the polls and has repeatedly downplayed his chances in recent interviews.
The first thorn in Mr Khan’s side is that, following the 2021 mayoral elections, the government announced that all future direct mayoral elections would be held under thePreviously, voters would tick their first and second preference for London mayor on the ballot paper. If no candidate got over 50 per cent in the first preference votes, the second preferences were counted and whoever had the biggest share was the winner.
The party predicts that their voter share would have been five percentage points lower if these rules had been in place in 2021. So it would have wiped out Mr Khan’s lead over Mr Bailey and if there were no second preferences counting then that would have been that – Labour would have lost. While first-past-the-post could make it tighter for the mayor, it also removes the possibility of Ms Hall winning the election on second preference votes if things go to the wire. It also increases the likelihood that people might decide to vote tactically now that the voters can only pick one option on the ballot sheet.
It’s this low popularity that the Conservatives hope to capitalise on when London goes to the polls in May. “It would be a spectacular shock for Labour and a spectacular shock to the Conservatives if Susan Hall won,” the expert in London politics told“There’ll be people who vote Susan hold because they just don’t want Labour to win. But, everything points to Sadiq Khan winning, though by nothing like the gap the polls currently show.”
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