Is this Tory Labour’s secret weapon?

The Conservative Party has chosen its candidate to fight in the election of the mayor of Tower Hamlets in May. At the first mayoral election, in October 2010, the Tories came a distant third – netting half the votes of Labour’s candidate and less than a quarter of the votes of winning candidate, the then Councillor Lutfur Rahman. This time around, they are the last of the major parties in the Borough to announce their candidate. The candidate, Tower Hamlets newcomer Chris Wilford, is not currently a councillor and therefore does not bring a personal vote or a high profile to the campaign for the Conservative Party. He may be a very nice man, but he is not the strongest candidate the Tories could have fielded. Have the Tories just written off the mayoral contest? Maybe: but commentators who have been watching Labour and the Tories work closely together on the Council since Mayor Rahman was elected have another theory. The theory is that although Mr Wilford will mount a serious campaign and try to attract Tory votes, his main focus will not be to win (not a realistic prospect) but to gather as many second preference votes for the Labour Party candidate as he can. In other words, the Labour Party hopes he will be a “stop Lutfur Rahman at all costs” candidate, and that their candidate, if he falls short of Labour votes, will be able to rely on the Tories to help him get elected.