Losing control of this council would be the end of Labour as we know it

The pavements are being pounded by activists of the Green Party of England and Wales who have seen a surge in membership – and fresh-faced council candidates – under the leadership of Zack Polanski. They, along with the Liberal Democrats, have their eyes on Labour votes.

‘If you fight the right local campaign, you can win’

Reed – now the Housing Secretary – told The i Paper he still believes the council can be retained.

“I know from my own experience in local government it is difficult in the early phases of governments or when the national government of your own party isn’t doing so well. But I know too that even when things are tough, if you fight the right local campaign, you can win,” he said.

“Me and Morgan won back Lambeth by a landslide, on a night where we lost other councils up and down the country. We were the only gain for the Labour Party from the opposition, because we fought the right local campaign on the right local issues and, whatever people felt about the government nationally, they came out and voted for Labour locally because we were talking about the right issues.”

Polling conducted by JL Partners, on behalf of the London School of Economics (LSE) between 17 and 27 April, predicts Labour could hold on to the council with 40 per cent of the vote.

But it puts the Greens, surging under new leader Polanski, in clear second place, with 34 per cent support – making the party a dangerous electoral threat to Labour in the borough. The Liberal Democrats are listed third, at 13 per cent.

LSE analysis of the data highlights the extent to which Labour’s support has collapsed, with the Greens the clear benefactor not just in Lambeth, but in the capital.

And there is nervousness in Labour at the unpredictability of local election projections – particularly around the difficulty predicting how much support this new-look Green Party could muster.

Labour’s council majority under threat

Labour currently dominates the council. It holds 54 of its 63 seats, with the Greens and Lib Dems holding four each and one independent. All four of the area’s MPs are also Labour, including Reed who has a majority of more than 15,000.

But Labour is braced to lose thousands of council seats across England, including in Lambeth. And although it may still retain control of the council, the scale of a Green challenge will give both parties a good indication of how things may go at the general election in 2029.

The Greens are prepared to capitalise on this and are not taking any success for granted.

One local party source said: “Lambeth represents the epicentre of what is going wrong in Labour governance, which we are all seeing now on a national level, and we are hearing that on doorsteps. There are a lot of local issues coming up – particularly concerns over social housing – but also there are people who don’t like Keir Starmer.

“We are winning support from Labour voters who are actually quite emotional about feeling left behind by the party, are feeling the pinch over the cost of living and don’t feel Labour is prioritising them.”

They said the demographic of their support base is changing from the traditionally wealthy, white voters to those “from all walks of life”. And they described a sense of local excitement and momentum around their campaign.

Greens are highly motivated

Local candidates – some of whom were asked to stand just weeks after joining the Greens, often having left the Labour Party – said they are getting messages on their social media from people who want to come out canvassing to support them.

Councillor Scott Ainslie, the Green group leader and representative for Streatham St Leonard’s ward, who came a distant second to Reed in the 2024 general election, described seeing particular enthusiasm among young voters motivated by Polanski’s effective use of social media.

“I think young people in particular are saying, ‘we have had enough of this’ and they are coming out en masse. People are finding agency and a kind of collection of their voices,” he said.

He claimed that the current Labour administration has run the council “like a fortress” and “governed from top down” – something the Greens say is reflected in Starmer’s national Government – and are “not bringing the public along with them”.

One party priority would be to bring around 600 empty properties back into council use, to ease demand, and prioritise repairs on existing council-owned buildings – something Labour has been accused of neglecting by both the Greens and Lib Dems.

The latter have also been campaigning robustly across Lambeth.

Neither the Lib Dems or Greens would speculate publicly about whether they would join forces in a coalition, if the Labour vote is diminished enough for them to capitalise.

But given both are laser focused on ousting Labour it would not be a stretch of the imagination to consider an alliance.

Donna Harris, Liberal Democrat councillor for Streatham Hill West and Thornton, said: “It’s very clear where we are targeting where we know we have a good chance and it is pretty clear where the Greens are focusing. There are some crossovers and there is no election pact. But we have been in opposition together and the most important thing is that we get rid of this [Labour] stronghold.”

She told The i Paper residents in the borough are unhappy with how the council has been run and what she said was a lack of engagement from the local Labour Party to resolve issues.

She highlighted social housing repairs as well as private owners who are leaseholders living in council properties who, she said, were being “charged huge amounts for works that haven’t been done”.

Lambeth Council has been contacted for comment on these issues.

Lib Dems have high hopes too

One key priority of the Lib Dems is to reform the consultation process, Harris said. “The biggest issue here is that no matter what the consultation brings out it’s disregarded. So one of the things we have promised is that residents’ views are heard.”

Harris added that there is a “discontentment” among voters across the country regarding the national political picture – as well as in London in particular.

“Certainly in London there’s lots of Labour councils that are very similar and they have just been sitting back on their laurels basically taking everyone for granted and not letting anyone in to help reshape things,” she said.

“When I was first elected, I hoped that views from other parties would be taken into consideration and we would work collegiately but it has very much been Labour do what Labour want and I think being in control and being a one party state for so long means I think they have lost perspective and take for granted their support.”

One Labour MP said they believed there was still a sense of denial among some of their Westminster colleagues about how bruising the party’s performance in the local elections could be.

“I think it is probably going to be worse than many of my colleagues are prepared for, I think they might be in slight denial about that. But we will be squeezed on all sides by other parties,” they said.

But a local Labour insider, based in the borough and close to the campaign, said they believed the party could still hold on to power because the Green Party and Liberal Democrats would be battling it out for the same votes in some parts of the borough.

Pressed that it looks like Labour stands a real chance of losing the council that he held up as a campaigning success story, Cabinet minister Reed said: “I still think, and this isn’t just me speculating I know from personal experience, that if you fight the right local campaign, even when things are difficult for your party nationally, you can still win, and you can win by a landslide. Because that’s what I did. So that’s not speculation. I literally did it.”

The Labour Party was approached for comment.