LABOUR has ruled for 16 years, but today the Green surge has swept them out. The Green Party candidate for Mayor, Zoë Garbett, did not so much win the election for Mayor – she smashed it.
Full result Zoë Garbett, Green Party, 35,720 (47.2%) Caroline Woodley, Labour Party, 26,865 (35.5%) Tareke Gregg, Conservative Party, 6,345 (8.4%) Vahid Almasi, Reform UK, 4,013 5.3% Eva Steinhardt, Lib-Directly Elected Mayor, 2,731 (3.6%)
The turnout was 40.7%, indicating that a number of electors who had fallen out of the habit of voting were dragged from their apathy by a party which looked like it could break the mould of mainstream party politics.
It remains to be seen if the Greens will reward the trust voters have placed in them. The basis of the Party is green issues, which are a small percentage of the work of a local council. The Party will have to agree on how to handle all the other parts of the Council’s work. It will also have to break through the dead weight of cumbersome Council bureaucracy to get things done – which, for inexperienced councillors, is a big ask.
The Greens won the Gorton & Denton by-election with an excellent candidate, and this has fuelled (no pun intended) much of their recent rise in popularity. Running a Council for four years is a different matter. How successful they are likely to be will depend in great part on how many councillors are elected. That result is awaited.
●Read more about it: Greens win – is it curtains for Starmer? Newham wants to keep a bit of green going