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Lewis Baston: Labour narrowly recaptures seat in Camden by-election

The debacle of a Green winner in Regent's Park ward in May having not been qualified to serve led to a fresh contest in which an Independent had a big impact
Lewis Baston

The Regent’s Park by-election in Camden on Thursday, 9 July was the last of those to be caused by Green Party candidates who won in London on 7 May having to immediately resign because it turned out they weren’t eligible to take their seats. Following contests in Hackney and Haringey held two weeks ago for the same reason, it marked the end of the muppet show, as it were.

The by-election had its own fair share of zany events, together with a slightly odd outcome, though that is not the only reason this article is devoted to it alone – despite two by-elections having taken place in Lambeth on the same day, which On London will cover separately – and being given a particularly deep dive. It also because Regent’s Park ward is where your correspondent lives.

***

Regent’s Park itself is a large expanse of green just north of Marylebone and the Cavendish estate. It was laid out by John Nash in 1811, and the land has been controlled by the royal family since it was appropriated under Henry VIII. Until 1835, the park was so exclusive that only residents were allowed in, and then only to the eastern (now Camden) side.

Today, the outsider might assume that a ward called Regent’s Park is all high-income and plush, as tends to be true of its namesake ward in Westminster, into which the western side of the park falls. There is a thin veneer of wealth along the Camden side too, distinguished by the bold neoclassical residences generally called the “Nash terraces”, though they were largely the work of Nash’s business partner Decimus Burton. Nash hated Burton’s Chester Terrace block so much that he wanted to demolish it. At the north end of the terraces is the Danish church of St Katharine and an attractive little precinct of houses, one of which is home to Peter Mandelson.

But Camden’s Regent’s Park is for the most part a working-class community despite its proximity to London’s central business district and the section of the park on its western side. Most of the population lives in the Regent’s Park Estate between Albany Street and Hampstead Road. This is a composite of two social housing developments in what has been a poor area since the mid-19th Century.

The Cumberland Arm of the Regent’s Canal (filled in in 1938-41) was a functional stretch, carrying commodities such as ice and hay into the trading area around Cumberland Market. After the railways carved up inner north London and displaced thousands, this area became overcrowded and unhealthy. The Crown Estate redeveloped part of it in the interwar period and, following heavy bombing, the rest was comprehensively rebuilt into blocks of flats by St Pancras Borough Council (predecessor to Camden).

It is a well-built estate, but there are inevitably issues such as maintenance and leaseholder charges. The ward is 51 per cent social housing and only 19 per cent owner-occupied. Many of the private renters are in former council flats. The population is hyper-diverse, with Bangladeshis the largest single community after the White British. Twenty-two per cent of its residents are students.

The ward also covers a stretch of the north side of Euston Road, including Euston station, and a row of office blocks. These would be bigger and taller were it not for the 1970s battle by journalists and squatters to preserve the low-rise Tolmers Square. It also contains a chunk of the south side of Camden Town, where most of the traditional terraces in the ward are to be found, and is served by the Northern line at Mornington Crescent station.

The approach route of the final stretch of the HS2 rail line to its Euston terminus has been blasted through the ward since 2017. It has become difficult to remember a time before the work began. Hampstead Road is now a permanent building site, the cut-through from the station to the historic Indian restaurant district of Drummond Street is a passageway between hoardings, and the Camden Council part of the estate lost several buildings to the new railway line.

The council has built replacement blocks, but there is no doubting the loss of amenity, the diminished air quality and the impact of delivery and removal traffic, much as HS2 Limited has tried to send heavy consignments by rail. For years now, if I get up at night, I have seen through the stair window the unblinking red eye of a light on top of a crane so tall that it is an aviation hazard.

***

Camden was one of nine London boroughs retained by Labour in May, but the party suffered serious losses there compared with the outcome in 2022. In that year, it won 47 seats out of 55, but its total in 2026 was only 30, reducing its majority to a narrow five. Labour lost to the Liberal Democrats in West Hampstead, held on well in the centre of the borough, but suffered unexpected losses to the Greens in previously safe wards in the south, including the three seats of Regent’s Park.

The party tried particularly hard in Camden, because Sir Keir Starmer represents one of the borough’s constituencies. It also did rather better there because, as with Islington where Labour also held on, there are more settled, older professionals than in Hackney and Waltham Forest, where voters are more likely to be younger and more economically precarious.

Regent’s Park ward and long been one of Labour’s safest in Camden before the shock losses in May. It voted Conservative in 1968, the Tory annus mirabilis that saw the party win its only majority in Camden ever. And in 2006, a Tory-Lib Dem coalition took control. Otherwise, Camden has always been won by Labour since the very first borough elections in 1964.

Going into May, it had an experienced team of councillors defending: Nasim Ali and Heather Johnson had represented the ward since 2002, and Nadia Shah since 2010. Ali served as Camden’s civic mayor in 2003 – the first person in the UK of Bangladeshi origin and Muslim faith to hold that position – and as leader of the council in 2010-12. Johnson, who had also represented Kilburn from 1994 to 2002, was one of Labour’s most experienced councillors, herself a civic mayor in 2000 and chair of the planning committee from 2013. Shah had been mayor in 2016 and was serving as cabinet member for communities when the elections came.

The three defeats in Regent’s Park told a representative story about Labour’s local elections in May 2026, both in London and beyond: a “safe” ward whose candidates had 72 years’ combined experience was suddenly taken out by an insurgent party. But the Green slate won only narrowly – their third-paced candidate was only 37 votes ahead of Ali – and the outcome was tainted when it emerged that one of their trio of winners, Muhammad Abu Naser, was employed by Camden as a teacher and therefore unable to sit as a councillor.

This broke a basic rule that both party and candidate should have considered thoroughly before Naser’s nomination papers were submitted and it is not the responsibility of the borough’s elections staff to check whether the candidate can take their seat. The by-election was the inevitable consequence.

The new Green candidate for Regent’s Park, Alice Brown, had stood in Highgate ward in May and was surprisingly defeated. Highgate is peculiar in having elected one Green and two Labour councillors at every set of full borough elections since 2010. She was a strong candidate, an architect whose preferred work is refitting existing buildings rather than demolishing them. She had worked on refurbishing the Regent’s Park Children’s Centre back in 2015, and more recently campaigned against revived plans to rebuild Tolmers Square.

Labour overlooked the trio who’d lost their seats in May, selecting instead Nanouche Umeadi, who had lost her seat in Kilburn at the other end of the borough in May but was keen in the by-election campaign to stress that she grew up in Mornington Crescent. She was chosen by the party’s London Region in an accelerated process that left some local members unhappy.

Independent candidate Mohammad Junayd Khan had a strong pedigree as an active member of the local community for decades. He was born in Munster Square on the Regent’s Park estate and has worked as manager of a care home and volunteered as a SEND school governor and Dementia Befriender. He secured an impressive range of endorsements from community leaders, including one of the leading GPs at the practice at which I am registered, along with a local vicar. His election address was about local issues and care for the elderly and vulnerable. He cannot be termed a “Gaza Independent”.

Not content with having caused the by-election, Naser made his voice heard during the campaign by writing letters to the excellent Camden New Journal and through a leaflet that was put through doors in the ward without bearing any official election imprint. He put his side of the disqualification story, disclosed that he had left the Greens, and argued that the party owed both him and the electorate an apology. He also criticised Labour and party politics in general, which one might interpret as expressing support for Independent councillors.

The other three main parties stood candidates too. Conservative Vladimir Chorniy, who had been part of the Tory team in May, is a risk manager with a Cambridge PhD. He contributed the most erudite election address of the contest: not many candidates would refer to their “mathematical expertise”. He argued that Camden should concentrate on climate change mitigation rather than net zero. Reform candidate Beverley Martin, who also stood in May, criticised Camden’s financial management. Lib Dem Henry Potts was new to the ward, which is near the bottom of the party’s target list.

Regent’s Park has several distinctive local issues. Social housing management and tenant representation were important concerns. There was also the continuing disruption from the HS2 works. In May, the Greens’ position on the latter was, in contrast to national party policy, against HS2 and in favour of using the cleared sites to build housing, although how this was to be achieved by a party scornful of wicked developers remained unclear.

In the by-election, Brown had a more realistic approach, emphasising participation in planning the neighbourhood and avoiding further demolitions. Every candidate was keen on as much mitigation as possible, but there was a classic difference of emphasis. For Labour’s Umeadi, it was about working with the Labour council and the Labour government to deliver housing and reduce traffic. For the others, it was about campaigning and making a fuss so that the powers that be would think it worth taking action.

***

When I went to vote on by-election morning, turnout could not be described using the journalistic cliché “brisk”. But not far from the door of the polling station building, supporters of Independent candidate Khan had set up a street stall with a trestle table, placards and leaflets. Political parties avoid doing this, as it pushes at the edges of electoral law. It also invites early morning “beach towel on the deckchair” competition for spaces, with the risk of consequent argy-bargy.

This is different from having “tellers” collecting numbers outside the door, which is long-established and does not involve campaigning. There is usually a friendly spirit between the tellers, as there was at my polling station between the Labour, Green and Conservative volunteers – a good effort from the Tories in a ward they had no hope of winning. But the street stall struck a sour note. It was gone by the time I returned to take a look in the evening.

It wasn’t the only jarring feature of the day. A neighbour of mine when canvassed by the Greens complained that they hadn’t heard from the ward’s new councillors since their election. The activist’s reply was, “What do you want, a thank you card?” Some councillors, particularly Lib Dems, do actually send such cards, and it is not unusual for new councillors to supply local voters with their contact details. But the Greens won’t have to bother with thank you cards following the by-election.

Labour’s Umeadi came out ahead in a divided field with 576 votes (32 per cent). Brown finished second with 482 (27 per cent) and Khan a very respectable third with 407 (23 per cent). The other parties lagged behind: Conservatives 137, Reform UK 123, Lib Dem 51. All the parties’ vote shares fell, particularly those of the Greens and Reform, benefiting the Independent. Turnout at 22 per cent was par for a local by-election.

Labour’s gain was somewhat lucky, arising from the fall-out from Naser’s disqualification and the Independent probably taking more votes from the Greens than from anyone else. Other than in Crofton Park in Lewisham, Labour’s results in by-elections since May have been similarly mediocre. Nonetheless, the Camden Labour group will welcome Umeadi back and take pleasure in the boost to their majority from five seats to seven.

Follow Lewis Baston on Bluesky. Photo from X/Twitter feed of Richard Olszewski, who is shown with winning candidate Nanouche Umeadi. 

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. If you don’t already receive it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack or follow any Support link on this website.

Categories: Analysis
Tags: Camden Council, Green Party, Labour

Talk About London podcast: What powers do civic societies have? With Ben Derbyshire

The president of the London Forum explains, advocates and defends
Dave Hill

Civic societies and community groups are often depicted – and from various directions – as nimbys, blockers and stubborn conservationists. They are accused of wielding too much influence over planners and politicians, and of being dominated by affluent older people intent upon impeding change of whatever kind.

Architect Ben Derbyshire begs to differ. A former president of the Royal Institute of British Architects and current chair of architectural practice HPA, he is also president of the London Forum of Amenity and Civic Societies, which represents the views and interests of more than 100 such organisations in the capital.

Speaking to London Society chair Leanne Tritton and I in our latest Talk About London podcast, Ben was both clear and very candid about the role of amenity and civic societies.

Pointing out that they have no formal powers over local planning policies or their implementation at all, he described the campaigning efforts of some as leaving much to be desired – the words”hyperbolic” and “mendacious” were used – but that some others have made valuable contributions, often by drawing attention to possible breaches of planning policy or weaknesses in planning applications.

After taking us through the early history of civic societies in London as boldly progressive forces (the contributions of reformer Octavia Hill and industrialist Robert Owen were mentioned) he emphasised that their purpose today should be to “serve the public good”, which means most of all encouraging the provision of more housing in London.

Watch the whole of the podcast below or enjoy the audio version at the London Society website.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To start receiving it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: Analysis
Tags: planning, The London Forum, The London Society

The Soho Society strikes back

The long-established local charity has responded to recent hostile media coverage of its work
Dave Hill

Recent media coverage has portrayed The Soho Society, a 56-year-old community organisation recognised by Westminster Council as an amenity society, as a threat to the Soho area’s hospitality sector and as a collection of miserable nimbys, determined to spoil other people’s fun.

In response to these depictions, the society has produced an 11-point statement, in which it challenges some claims made about it, sets out its objectives, explains how it goes about its work and points out that it has “no power to grant, refuse or review licences”, only to make representations – along with individuals and many other organisations – based on a licensing framework that is set by the council.

The statement begins with a declaration that Soho’s “hospitality, entertainment and cultural life are central to its identity” and that the society is “not opposed to hospitality or the night-time economy,” while stressing that “Soho is a mixed neighbourhood, not simply a late-night entertainment district”.

It argues that the area’s cultural and economic life also comprises “independent shops, non-hospitality businesses, schools, churches, theatres, music venues, workers, visitors, families and residents” and that its concern is the impact of what it calls an “unmanaged cumulative impact of a high concentration of licensed premises in a small area” on Soho’s broader ecosystem, citing recent growth to “over 500 licensed premises” in Soho.

The implications in terms of “crime, anti-social behaviour, public safety, public nuisance and the day-to-day functioning of the area,” are stressed, along with the “practical consequences” of a recent increase in late-night activity creating a need for “adequate public toilets, cleansing, waste management, policing, dispersal arrangements, public safety and street management”.

The statement also appears to contest claims made in The Guardian followed by The Standard and the BBC that the society voted in May to “challenge” all new applications for bars and restaurants in the area and efforts to renew existing ones, saying it “does not operate a blanket ‘no’ to hospitality” and adding that “in many cases” its representations to the council’s licensing committee “are not objections to the principle of a licence, but requests for enforceable conditions to manage impact”, such as noise and public safety.

Negative coverage of The Soho Society and its scrutiny work has formed part of heightened interest in Soho and the West End more generally due to Sir Sadiq Khan’s plans to have all motor traffic removed from a section of Oxford Street by the end of the summer as the start of a larger transformation of the Oxford Street area, and impending new powers to be given to the Mayor to make his own representations to London local authorities about licensing decisions and, later, to “call in” some deemed to be of “strategic” importance to the capital as a whole.

Khan recently wrote on X/Twitter that “complaining about nightlife when you *checks notes* choose to live in Soho is like living in South Kensington and complaining about museums”.

Around 2,000 people live in Soho today, compared with some 30,000 at the end of World War 2. About a third of them are social housing tenants. In 1976, The Soho Society established the Soho Housing Association to provide affordable dwellings for local people. A growing number of residential properties are being turned over to short-term lets, leading to complaints about rowdiness and crime.

Follow Dave Hill on Bluesky and at LinkedIn. Photo: Inside the Soho Theatre.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To start receiving it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: News
Tags: Soho, Soho Society, West End

Julie Hamill: On fear alert in late night London

The city has so much to offer, but for women there is no escape from anxiety about personal safety
Julie Hamill

Recently, I attended the impressive Tracey Emin exhibition at Tate Modern. It’s confessional, brutal, upsetting and powerful. The handwritten words in her diaries displayed on the wall affected me most, and I found myself living her life with her, feeling her confusion and fear, and falling into her tears. It’s incredible how she has turned a history of abuse and pain into art. I left feeling such admiration for her bravery. I bought a set of her prints. One of them, in her distinctive handwriting, stitched onto fabric, simply asks: “Why be afraid?”

The words repeat over and over again, making me really think about the question, and how it shifts from comfort and reassurance towards vulnerability, trauma and the haunting reality of fear. At home, I put it on my desk and looked at it for long periods. It made me think of the fear I feel when I’m out alone late at night in London. All of my evenings begin with the same question: What’s my plan for getting home?

London has a fantastic public transport system. I use it constantly. But I won’t travel on it alone after ten or eleven at night. And that is just an arbitrary line I’ve drawn – it’s not as though the city suddenly becomes unsafe only after those hours.

Back in April, I went to see The Damned play at Wembley Arena. I was determined not to miss them, even though there was a Tube strike on. My night out was to continue with heading for The Dublin Castle in Camden with my friend Tony, who was due to DJ there. All went according to plan and it was excellent fun, but by midnight I was exhausted and decided to leave early while Tony carried on spinning til 2am.

I intended my journey home to be by Uber, but my order was rejected three times due to a shortage of drivers caused by the strike. I hadn’t expected it to be that busy. I tried other cab apps with no luck. The Northern line, serving Camden Town station, wasn’t working at all and there wasn’t a black cab in sight, so I headed for the bus stop on Camden High Street. My idea was to catch a bus to Swiss Cottage station, because some Jubilee line trains were running and I would be able to get home from there.

I told myself to be brave. There were plenty of people about. All would be fine. Why be afraid?

I waited at The Black Cap bus stop for 15 minutes before the bus arrived. I jumped on and settled in, but stupidly got distracted by my phone. Looking up, I saw Swiss Cottage station disappearing into the distance behind me. I’d missed my stop, and the bus then swung down an unfamiliar road and continued for what felt like ages all the way down a long hill. It was approaching 1am. The street lighting was sparse and there was barely another person in sight.

I asked a fellow woman in a seat near mine if it was safe to walk back up the hill to Finchley Road alone.

“Just walk as quickly as you can,” she said. She knew why I was asking. I was the only person to get off at the next stop. I started back up the hill as fast as I could. I thought of my friend Marie, who has a “don’t let them beat us” attitude and will happily walk through an unlit public park at night to get home. That idea fills me with absolute terror. I makes me think of Sarah Everard, and how she too cut through a park when walking home.

Women have every right to move freely through London. Yet the possibility of harassment or attack leaves many of us on high alert. I do have, and am thankful for, many wonderful male friends who, when I’m out with them, will wait until I’m safely in a taxi or text me to check that I’ve got home. Sadly, there are other kinds of men too, and the possibility of something happening makes me follow my little rituals of self-protection:

  • If there’s no traffic, I walk in the middle of the road. It keeps me away from dark entrances, alleyways and garden walls, while giving me room to move in either direction if I need to.
  • If a man is walking close behind me, I cross the road. I might then pretend to be on the phone saying things like, “I’m just around the corner” or “I’ll be there in a minute”.
  • I wave into the distance, as though someone I know is waiting for me up ahead.
  • I walk close to groups that include women.
  • If I’m on the Tube, I look for a carriage with a woman in it and sit near her.

London gives me so much. Galleries, gigs, pubs, theatre, friends, chance encounters and tons to explore. I love living here. But after dark, the city can feel entirely different and I, like many other women, carry the fear around with me like an extra bag.

Continuing my journey with anxiety and adrenalin for company, I hurried back up the dark road, constantly checking behind me and scanning the shadows. When I got to Swiss Cottage station, it was deserted. The stairs down to the platform looked really creepy. By then, my imagination had taken over.

I clocked the CCTV camera and immediately thought of its footage being used on telly as part of a “last seen” reconstruction. When a train came, every carriage was empty apart from two or three men. I risked it and got on. I kept an eye to see if the men were getting off at my stop and as it approached I hesitated, not wanting to rise from my seat first. Leaving the station, I ran across the road and sped along the middle of two dead streets, feeling as if I would never get home.

I closed my front door behind me at 1.35am and immediately blamed myself for being frightened: I shouldn’t have gone out, the Tube strike, I should have planned better, never again.

“Why be afraid?” asks my Tracey Emin print. Nothing happened to me that night. I got home safely. But I don’t carry fear because something is happening, I carry it because something could happen, as I have learned from Sarah, Tracey and other women before me. Being afraid is part of being a woman. We never quite know which night, if any, will be different.

Follow Julie Hamill on Instagram. Image shows print by Tracey Emin.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To start receiving it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: Culture
Tags: Camden, crime, Swiss Cottage

Hackney: Greens approve next stage of ‘exemplary’ Woodberry Down regeneration

The party has been scathing about the scheme in the past, but the council's new leadership has waved through phases likely to force tenants to move twice, citing viability concerns
Dave Hill

Hackney Council’s new Green Party leadership has given its go-ahead for the next stage of the long-running regeneration of the Woodberry Down estate in the north of borough. It has done so expressing enthusiasm for the scheme and despite its approval almost certainly entailing current social housing tenants on the estate having to first live somewhere else before they can move into their new homes.

The Woodberry Down scheme is a huge council collaboration with developer Berkeley Homes that, since 2009, has slowly been replacing nearly 1,800 council flats built in the 1940s and 1950s with around 6,500 new homes of assorted tenure types.

Begun when the council was under Labour control, the project has been frequently derided from the Left, including in recent years by Green Party activists. One claimed that the council’s approach to Woodberry Down was to “kick people out of their homes and break up communities” when it should instead have been renovating its dwellings. In 2019, Zack Polanski, today’s Green Party national leader, claimed the regeneration was taking place “at huge expense” to the estate’s residents of social housing which he said “must be protected”.

In May, the Greens swept Labour out of power in Hackney having made a manifesto pledge to “review and monitor ‘partnerships’ between the council and property developers, including all estate regeneration projects, ensuring the needs of the community are always the priority”. This sounded ominous for the Woodberry Down programme as it had been pursued under Labour. Rumours have circulated in London government and property sector circles that some sort of showdown between Berkeley and Hackney’s Green new brooms was on the cards.

That is not the impression given by the introduction to a council officers’ report on Woodberry Down considered at the first meeting of the council’s new Green cabinet on Monday evening and attributed to Alastair Binnie-Lubbock, its cabinet member for regeneration, planning and inclusive neighbourhoods.

In it, Binnie-Lubbock describes himself as “pleased to provide an update on the Council’s progress in delivering high quality, sustainable homes for our residents, and an exemplary new neighbourhood in the north west of the borough”. He adds: “We will now start building Phase 4 of the scheme and commence the re-housing process for Phase 5 by bringing Phase 5 officially ‘in phase’.”

Before commending the report to his fellow cabinet members, who include Hackney’s new Green Mayor, Zoë Garbett, Binnie-Lubbock states that, “the continued regeneration of Woodberry Down supports the Council’s long-standing commitment that every secure council tenant on the estate has the right to a brand-new, high-quality home at social rent in Woodberry Down.”

Further on, officers set out how the next two phases of the eight-phase regeneration will be delivered. Phases 1 to 3 have already been completed, with over 2,900 new homes, of which 1,130 are for social rent or shared ownership. Planning consent for Phase 4 was given by the council’s planning committee in July 2024 and the site now awaits development with a further 511 homes, of which 90 will be for social rent and 132 for shared ownership.

Many of these are earmarked for social tenants currently living in old estate homes within Phase 5 of the regeneration programme, on a different part of the estate. The report concerns itself with that too: it says that Phase 5  is to be brought “in phase”, which means the process for moving out those living there, so that new homes can later be built in place of the old ones, will get under way.

The Woodberry Down regeneration has so far avoided what is known as “double decanting”, whereby residents who’ve accepted offers of new homes within the estate footprint to replace the ones they’ve had to leave can move straight into those new homes, as they’ve been ready for them in advance. However, it looks as though the choreography between Phase 4 and Phase 5 won’t be so neat. The report says:

“The current programme for Phase 5 requires vacant possession of the existing homes by December 2028.”

That means the Phase 5 households will have to have left by then. The next paragraph of the report says:

“However, new social rented homes in Phase 4, which are intended for current Phase 5 secure tenants to move into, will not be completed and available for occupation until summer 2030.”

Sometimes things move faster than expected, but it looks as if there will be something like an 18-month gap at least during which the Phase 5 secure council tenants will have to be found somewhere else to live until their Phase 4 homes are completed.

Why the mismatch? Why the lag? Couldn’t the “decant” of Phase 5 be done later, so that the Phase 4 homes are ready before the old Phase 5 blocks are vacated and knocked down? Again, the report is informative:

“Delaying the demolition of Phase 5 properties has been explored as an alternative option, to prevent residents from potentially needing to move twice. However, this approach would delay the delivery of new affordable homes in Phase 5 and could increase scheme development costs by a minimum of £13.5 million for Phase 5 (calculated as of November 2025). This could make Phase 5 unviable and would negatively impact the viability of future Phases 6 and 7.”

The financial viability of development schemes is a fraught area. Politicians and housing campaigners of the Left frequently contend that big developers, such as Berkeley Homes, could and should afford to include higher numbers of “affordable” homes within their projects than they do.

When Green politicians promise to “stand up to developers”, contesting assessments of viability and demanding that more below-market priced homes are included as part of any planning consent deal is often what they have in mind.

Here, though, a Green-run London council is accepting that a group of its tenants will have to move twice before settling into their new home, quite possibly off the estate, with all the disruption that entails. The report says that as of May, 188 of the 225 Phase 5 properties are occupied, including by 32 secure tenants households, many of which are understood to be families with children. (There are also 10 resident leaseholders and 132 homeless people who are living there on a temporary accommodation basis. The leaseholders will be offered “shared equity” alternatives. Those temporarily housed are not guaranteed a new home on Woodberry Down).

Hackney’s new Green administration, has, of course, inherited the Woodberry Down programme from Labour. Even so, the praise for it by the cabinet member for regeneration, planning and inclusive neighbourhoods, and the cabinet’s seemingly ready acquiescence with a viability judgement that explicitly entails a “double decant” for secure social tenants is striking.

Also striking is the section about Woodberry Down in a report Mayor Garbett published in March, when she was a member of the London Assembly and chair of its housing committee. She criticised Berkeley Homes, saying it had been “running rings round the community”, and decried the “private densification” of the development site, saying residents had complained to her about “incredibly tall blocks stacked close together”. Also decried were “broken promises and a lack of transparency”.

Can it be assumed that the Greens’ manifesto pledge to “review and monitor ‘partnerships’ between the council and property developers, including all estate regeneration projects, ensuring the needs of the community are always the priority” has been enacted? Asked about this, the council provided the following response from Alastair Binnie-Lubbock:

“We remain committed to reviewing and monitoring partnerships between the Council and property developers so they work in the best interests of Hackney residents.

“By continuing with the delivery of Woodberry Down, the scheme will deliver a new high quality social rented home for all remaining secure Council tenants living in the older properties on the estate, as well as additional affordable housing. 

“Around 21 secure tenants living in Phase 5 may need to move to a temporary alternative home on the estate before moving into their brand new social rented home. This is due to a timetable change as a result of a necessary redesign of the Phase 4 scheme to ensure it meets current building regulatory requirements. 

“We are continuing to speak with these residents on a one-to-one basis to ensure that the process of moving home is as easy and smooth as it can be in all cases. The needs of the community are our top priority, and our focus is ensuring future phases deliver the new homes residents need.” 

Further reading on Woodberry down here.

Article updated on 5 July 2026 to include past claim by Zack Polanski. Follow Dave Hill on Bluesky and at LinkedIn.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To start receiving it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: News
Tags: affordable housing, Green Party, Hackney Council, regeneration

Richard Brown: The devolution tide seems to be turning

If so, it will be a good thing, though getting it right will require careful judgements to be made
Richard Brown

Devolution is a good thing. Delivering services locally or regionally can make them more responsive to the needs and circumstances of places and communities, as well as enabling innovation and experiment. It can support integration and prevention, so that people do not fall through the cracks between services, and so that early action can tackle problems before they turn into crises. And bringing services closer to local people (“subsidiarity”, to use the European Union jargon) should aid accountability.

Fiscal devolution adds to the possibilities. It allows local councils and regional Mayors, such as Sir Sadiq Khan, to raise more taxes from their areas or to keep more of the taxes that would otherwise go to national government. Done well, this type of arrangement can create a virtuous circle: if the local economy grows, taxes grow, supporting services for local communities and enabling investment in transport and other infrastructure that will support continuing growth. This benefit has already been illustrated in London by the way the city and its businesses paid for the Elizabeth line and the Northern line underground extension to Battersea Power Station.

Speaking in Manchester this week, Andy Burnham had quite a lot to say about the first aspect of devolution, but rather less about the second. There were harsh words for the “adversarial culture” of Whitehall “departmental silos battling each other and battling the Treasury rather than getting things done”. Even the capital, the PM Presumptive assured us, needed more “powers…over education and housing, so that London can do more for itself and remain the world’s greatest capital city.”

On funding, his language was more opaque. “Power and resources” will be redistributed across the UK, and government departments will be expected to “support strategic and local authorities with funding and resources”. What exactly did that mean? The devolved powers needed in order to raise or retain taxes locally? Or just a new round of grant-funding from the centre?

Such vagueness is understandable: devolving taxes is complicated and campaigns for reform have struggled to make headway for decades. But the tide seems to be turning. In her Mais Lecture in March, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves pointed out the awkward asymmetry of accountability and reward: “While local leaders are asked to plan for the long term, to be accountable for regional outcomes, the fiscal reward for local economic success flows straight to the Exchequer”. Since then, meetings have been taking place to plot the “roadmap for future fiscal devolution” that she promised.

People involved in these discussions suggest the Treasury is receptive to the idea of using tax revenues to create incentives and conditions for growth locally. But other parts of Whitehall still regard the idea with horror. Departments have become used to managing local expenditure through a fiendishly complex set of formulas and grants that top up Council Tax (raised and spent locally) and redistribute Business Rates (raised locally but mainly distributed nationally). This charade of local tax-raising masks one of the most centralised tax regimes in the developed world. In the words of the LSE’s Professor Tony Travers, this “infantilises” local government, by making councils supplicants for centrally-allocated grants.

Tricky issues persist. As well as being highly centralised, the UK has high regional inequality (which may or may not be related to centralisation). Could allowing some taxes to be retained actually exacerbate the problem? If retaining taxes results in areas that are already doing well doing better still, will it also lead to others losing out?

A recent Centre for Cities report set out one approach to squaring this circle. Regional authorities, including the Greater London Authority (GLA) and the 15 mayoral strategic authorities (MSAs) across the country, could receive a share of Income Tax and Corporation Tax equivalent to their current grants from central government. This would amount to between two and six per cent of the local tax take. If the tax take grew, MSAs would keep some or all of the gains, but above a certain level these would start being clawed back to support areas that were not doing so well. But the hope would be that most areas could benefit. Growth should not be a zero-sum game.

The Mayor of London already uses retained local Business Rates to fund services, as do other MSAs, so this type of model has been tried and tested. The Centre for Cities research suggests that retaining two per cent of income tax raised in London would cover the GLA costs currently funded by government grants (reflecting both the scale of services funded by the GLA and the size of the tax base in the city).

But there are still other difficult questions. One is how much tax growth London should retain if revenues rise. London’s share of UK Income Tax and Corporation Tax has been growing quite sharply in recent years, so there might be an argument for the capital to retain a smaller proportion of growth than other cities, not least as some Corporation Tax raised in London relates to profits generated across the country by corporations whose head office is in the capital.

London (and other cities) would also need to be on guard against periodic attempts by central government to “reset” the proportions of taxes that can be retained as a way of redistributing the proceeds of economic growth. Such “levelling up” (and down) resets might be thought fairer to other parts of the country, but they create uncertainty and make it riskier for organisations such as the GLA or Transport for London to borrow money against future tax revenues – and riskier means more expensive. Better, surely, to allow long-term certainty on tax retention, and to use other revenues to support places with smaller tax bases.

Fiscal devolution could go a lot further, as proposed by the London Finance Commission: Mayors could set additional Income Tax rates (as happens in Scotland) or new Council Tax bands (as has happened in Wales). Retained taxes could also be shared with local authorities, and Andy Burnham’s reported interest in land value taxes could lead to a more wholesale process of reform. But, as discussed at a Centre for Cities briefing event, the risk of arguing that fiscal devolution can only be taken forward part of a radical restructuring of the tax system is that nothing continues to happen.

Andy Burnham in his speech spoke of a “10-year mission”, but he also expressed a sense of urgency and frustration with how Whitehall has worked to frustrate the transfer of power to the UK’s cities and regions. This sense of urgency suggests that this could be a moment of change, an opportunity for Mayor Khan and the other Mayors to push for faster and fuller devolution of services and taxes, if they are really going to be able to do things differently and deliver for their communities.

Follow Richard Brown on Bluesky.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To start receiving it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: Comment
Tags: Devolution, Sadiq Khan, Whitehall

Charles Wright: How will ‘robotaxis’ work in London?

The London Assembly has been exploring the pros and cons of the the new technology that could be operating on city's streets very soon
Charles Wright

Robotaxis in London? It’s now no longer a case of “if” but “when” – and that could be as soon as this summer. With enthusiastic government backing, UK tech pioneer Wayve’s AI Driver is “ready to go”, its business partner Uber is opening a list for customers who would prefer an “autonomous” ride, and US rival Waymo is gearing up to launch too.

There are plenty of open questions about this new technology, which the London Assembly’s transport committee has been exploring over the past few weeks. Issues include safety for passengers and other road users – including cyclists and pedestrians – accessibility, data protection, the vehicles’ impact on the city’s already congested streets and, not least, the potential for catastrophic job losses among London’s 100,000 or so licensed private hire drivers.

It is not – not quite – a done deal. The operators in Britain face two regulatory hurdles: firstly convincing government agencies that their vehicles meet government and international safety standards and, secondly, gaining approval from local transport authorities. In London, Transport for London will have the final say on whether a service can get going or not.

Surmounting the first hurdle shouldn’t be difficult, although the public still seems unsure. Last October, a YouGov poll found 79 per cent of Britons trusting driverless taxis “not very much” or “not at all”, with 59 per cent saying they would not feel comfortable riding in one “under any circumstances”. The operators have responded by highlighting their vehicles’ record in the United States, their big testing ground to date, with familiarity with the tech alleviating public concerns.

Assembly transport committee chair Caroline Russell of the Green Party found herself “reassured” after a 15-minute Wayve trip earlier this month. “It was very smooth, really quite dull,” she told The Standard. “There are huge possibilities with the technology that makes sure that people obey speed limits and that they don’t drive too close to a cyclist, that they look out for pedestrians wanting to cross the road and obey all the road rules – that’s absolutely great.”

What about the second hurdle? TfL has significant scope under the legislation to consider a proposed service’s impact on its existing transport networks and City Hall policies, and to impose restrictions on where and when the service will operate and how many vehicles can be deployed. And it could say no.

“The roll out of AVs [autonomous vehicles] must support the aims of the Mayor’s transport strategy,” their spokesperson told On London. That would mean compliance with Sir Sadiq Khan’s “Vision Zero” goal to eliminate all deaths and serious injuries from collisions on London’s streets by 2041, as well as his active travel aim that 80 per cent of trips are made by walking, cycling, or public transport by the same date, his air quality and carbon reduction targets, and wider policies for delivering a more efficient and less congested road network.

The Assembly committee will put its suggestions to the Mayor following its meeting on 14 July, at which TfL representatives will be quizzed. It is set to highlight concerns about congestion – “the biggest question that TfL needs to be looking at,” according to Russell – full accessibility to the vehicles for disabled and older Londoners, and potential job losses in the current private hire fleet.

TfL will be setting out detailed guidance shortly, though time will be tight once applications come in – the regulations allow just 42 days for decision-making. At the Assembly session, representatives of AV operators were again in full reassurance mode. In what would still essentially be a further pilot phase, the number of “Robocabs” unleashed onto the streets would a be relatively low “dozens, not hundreds” according to Wayve. They would operate in selected boroughs across outer as well as inner London, and at first with experienced licensed drivers on board, keeping them within the scope of existing private hire vehicle and driver licensing rules, according to TfL.

Agreeing to hold down numbers and support current drivers into backroom roles would limit the impact of the new tech on existing jobs, and fares would be set at current levels too, the operators said. As well as being safer, the AVs could help address “unmet need” in outer London and potentially replace car club vehicles, according to Wayve’s Sarah Gates. Keeping to the speed limit at all times would have a “calming” influence on other drivers, added Waymo’s Ben Loewenstein.

Not everyone is convinced. “London’s transport network is a delicate eco-system and a lot of people’s jobs depend on it, and you’re basically asking us to take a big gamble and see where it goes,” Labour’s Elly Baker told the operators. Momentum seems to be with the operators and their taxi-based market solutions, which TfL may find easier to regulate than to ban. But even if the initial impact is mitigated, the long-term remains uncertain, as technology that is expensive at present becomes cheaper.

Transport consultant and former TfL innovation director Thomas Ableman warned the committee at its first session that the real opportunity “and the threat” of this innovation would emerge “if and when the cost of this technology falls significantly”.

The question then, he said, would be whether robotaxis “are useful for what we want to achieve as a city. Do they do what we want all transport to do – connect as many people as possible to as much opportunity as possible? Is this the right model?”

Instead of an “unconstrained” taxi fleet, the capital could consider the approach used in Oslo, where the public transport network was procuring small AVs for fixed routes connecting low density suburbs to transport hubs, he suggested. “That could be utterly transformative to connectivity in outer London suburbs and for people who currently do not have access to either public transport or private mobility,” he said. Or perhaps an “AV shuttle across Hammersmith Bridge?”

Competing visions then, and big questions for the city. The technology may look unstoppable, but how it is deployed remains very much in contention.

The full London Assembly transport committee sessions can be viewed on the City Hall website here and here. Agendas and minutes of committee meetings are available here. Follow Charles Wright on Bluesky. Photo from Wayve website.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To receive it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: Analysis
Tags: autonomous vehicles, London Assembly, transport, Transport for London

Tim Donovan: Interview with Lewisham’s new Mayor Liam Shrivastava

A year ago he was an unhappy Labour councillor, today he is the top politician in a borough he believes deserves better
Tim Donovan

Five minutes after sitting down with Lewisham’s new Green Mayor, we are talking about Ghana versus England. The World Cup works in mysterious ways. Ghana is an unexpected part of Liam Shrivastava’s journey. Not long after joining Labour a little over a decade ago, he went to work as media manager for an elite football academy in the east of the African country. “It was in the middle of nowhere, like a tiny village. I used to take the canoe to work,” he says.

It was a move he describes as “totally random” – recommended by his then boss at Leeds University Student Union where he was doing the marketing. Some of the boys coming through the academy are now in Ghana’s senior squad which held England to a 0-0 draw last week.

Shrivastava says it was Brexit that first politicised him and Jeremy Corbyn who inspired him. That, for some, might seem contradictory, given the then-Labour leader’s unenthusiastic campaign to remain in the European Union. In 2017, as Labour won 40 percent of the vote and 262 seats in the general election, resulting in a hung parliament under Teresa May, Shrivastava watched coverage via a projector and a bedsheet in a town east of the Ghanaian capital Accra.

“I was, oh, man, I’ve got to get back involved in this,” he recalls. “So at that point, I was like, even though I was sort of having this sort of very amazing adventure, I was like, no, I need to go back to the UK and fight for socialism and more progressive politics because things are really bad.”

Shrivastava’s arrival in the south London borough he now leads was via a master’s degree in political communications at Goldsmiths College, where he first got immersed in local politics. He became the communications officer for a charity, the Institute for Race Relations, which he credits for honing his understanding of the media and the evident comfort he feels in the presence of journalists. “The experience very much sharpened my politics and my values.”

By the time the 2022 borough elections came around and despite the moves by Labour under Sir Keir Starmer to purge the party of its Corbynite elements, Shrivastava was selected for New Cross Gate ward. He won, but being a Labour councillor was never a comfortable experience for him. He was out of step with the majority of Lewisham’s ruling group.

Almost exactly a year ago (25 June 2025), facing disciplinary action over his criticism of Labour’s stance on Gaza and welfare benefits, Shrivastava defected to the Greens. In a withering resignation statement, he said the Labour Party he had joined was “unrecognisable” and the way to fight the rise of Reform UK was “not to pander to it, but to confront it with a positive, eco-socialist vision”. He tells me he has no regrets and that it was right to leave rather than to fight for the direction and soul of Labour from within.

Shrivastava is now one of four former Labour councillors who head Green administrations in London councils after being in the party for only a matter of months. The other three are James McAsh in Southwark, Martin Abrams in Lambeth and Mark Blake in Haringey

Shrivastava insists defecting was a “roll of the dice”, hardly a sure-fire political bet given the Greens had not had a councillor elected in Lewisham since 2014. “It definitely can’t be said that you’re doing it as something that is a guaranteed banker to being the Mayor within a year. Absolutely not. It was beyond our wildest dreams.”

He adds, “I wasn’t even sure if I was going to continue in politics. Genuinely, I was basically thinking, for various reasons, being a councillor is stressful, it takes over your life, you know, all these things.”

It soon becomes clear how strongly Shrivastava feels that Lewisham has gone under the radar and been let down by decades of Labour administrations facing scant opposition and scrutiny. He says it has been “massively overlooked” in terms of transport investment and connectivity, and his over-arching priority is to get the Bakerloo line extended and coming through the borough. He welcomes the Labour government’s commitment to the devolution of fiscal powers which could unlock funding and loosen the stranglehold of the Treasury.

Days after his election, Shrivastava surprised some observers by attending UKREiiF in Leeds – the biggest event in the national property calendar and not obviously natural Green territory. He was determined to get in the room with developers, planners and investors, and some present said he argued forcefully and impressively for the regeneration, economic opportunities and reduction in car use which could come from such a “transformative” project as the Bakerloo reaching further south and into his borough.

He says, “This part of southeast London is disconnected and there are high levels of deprivation, and we aren’t seeing this borough developing the way that maybe other boroughs are developing, and we’re not seeing that investment come in, and that is because of the lack of transport infrastructure.”

But at a private dinner at UKREiiF, Shrivastava also got an early taste of the potential challenges – and lingering resentments – which lie ahead. In a short speech to the assembled investors, fellow guest Anthony Okereke, Labour leader of neighbouring borough Greenwich, criticised Shrivastava over his election campaign.

This was about a video Shrivastava put out, attacking his Labour mayoral opponent Amanda De Ryk for having previously done consultancy for the development giant Muse, and in which he said he would never take money from a developer.

Lambeth’s outgoing leader Claire Holland also said pointedly that Shrivastava would be “standing on the shoulders” of his Labour predecessor in Lewisham.

Shrivastava tells me, “It’s disappointing that political opponents resort to these playground tactics. Some Labour leaders are clearly still sore about the election results, but the election is over and we need to be a bit more grown up and show Londoners we’re serious about working constructively across our differences.”

It would seem fair to assume that housing and development could be the defining test of Lewisham’s first Green Mayor, with all eyes on whether he comes to be viewed as “anti-developer and anti-homes,” as some opponents maintain.

He is one of the three London boroughs Mayors who’ve launched a legal challenge against the “emergency measures” agreed last year by the government and City Hall to boost house-building. The others are his fellow Green, Zoë Garbett of Hackney and Aspire’s Lutfur Rahman in Tower Hamlets. They are objecting primarily to the acceptable proportion of affordable homes proposed by private developers being reduced from 35 percent of the total to 20 percent on a temporary basis.

Shrivastava tells me, “It is incredibly disappointing…allowing developers to fast-track projects that only deliver 20 per cent [affordable] housing is not going to solve the housing crisis.”

He claims he will deliver at least 1,000 new homes for social rent over the next four years and wants to move away from purpose-built student accommodation and co-living schemes, which he says are proliferating, to more family homes that get people out of temporary accommodation. It is a tall order.

He says it is self-evident that the small number of homes currently being built by the private sector indicates “market failure” and that when developers are not prepared to take the risk, it shows how important it is for the public sector to step in.

He will not be precise on his plans at this stage – they will be revealed in due course – but wants more council and community-led building, working with chosen private sector partners. He disagrees that talk of moving away from a “developer-led” model will lead to developers moving away and looking to build elsewhere.

“I think we can find people that are willing to work with us. If some developers say, okay, we’ll go elsewhere, fine. We’ll work with other people because, you know, I’m sure there’ll be other people that we can work with. What is the point of approving a scheme that delivers no affordable housing? And is of, say, poor quality, which does not meet the needs of our communities? It’s only going to drive up prices. It’s only going to push people out.”

Shrivastava admits he wants to reduce dependence on developers’ own plans shaped by market conditions and bring forward more of the council’s own schemes. The key challenge is finding the right finance arrangements. “We believe that there are options out there. There are ways in which we can borrow, finance, build our own homes.” This may include pension funds.

His election manifesto talked of putting people before profits, the sort of rhetoric likely to raise the hackles of the built environment sector. He will not say what is an acceptable level, but accepts builders need to make profit. He insists he will be open and pragmatic. There will be negotiations so that “two parties can arrive at a point where they’re happy” and the amount of good quality affordable housing is maximised.

He is enthusiastically inheriting a project piloted by the Labour government in Lewisham which bundles small plots of brownfield land together to make development more attractive to small and medium sized developers.

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If housing is the central long-term challenge, a visible blitz against fly-tipping is imminent, to underline the Mayor’s pledge to be more responsive. Hotspots are to be reclaimed for the community as has happened already in one place, Lewisham Green. “We cleared the space, we put down some wood chips, planted a few seeds. The community saw it, the residents saw it, and they’re like, oh, brilliant. Can we turn it into a community garden?

In several parts of London, Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) have become politically toxic. While Shrivastava commits to safer streets and reducing air pollution, he will not pledge to create more LTNs nor say whether he personally would like to see more. There will be better engagement and consultation than previously, and decisions will be evidence-led, he insists.

It has not taken long for talk to emerge of the dangers of factionalism within the Greens, with tensions between the Corbynite newcomers and traditionalists long embedded in their communities and focused on core environmental issues. Shrivastava says such talk is over-done and that shared values unite more than they divide.

“I don’t think there’s much disagreement when it comes to policy and things like that. There might be differences in terms of like culture, right, because there are very different traditions, very different ways of doing things, ways of working.”

In the past year, Green membership in Lewisham rose from 500 to 3200, making its the second biggest local party after Hackney’s. The Mayor says the party must develop new systems and processes to reflect its large membership and newly-held power.

He dismisses suggestions that, given the Greens’ dramatic rise to power in places like Lewisham with 40 out of 54 council seats, inexperience will soon reveal itself. On the contrary, he argues that a widely-drawn new skillset will bring fresh energy and ideas.

“We’ve got three councillors that have got architecture degrees. We’ve got journalists. We’ve got lawyers. We’ve got serious talent. It is bringing in new perspectives and different ways of working.”

There have been many defections from Labour to the Greens, but few who have gone the other way. The most prominent was Darren Johnson, a former London Assembly member and councillor in Lewisham for the Greens. He describes his old party as “morally bankrupt.”

“It doesn’t bother me,” says Shrivastava. “I think the fact Darren has joined the Labour Party and was actively campaigning with Labour during the election. I think it’s clear that he has moved. We don’t want, in my view, people like that in the Green Party.

“The Labour Party is morally bankrupt when it comes to Gaza and when it comes to trans rights, different things like that. And these are things that Darren feels, you know, more comfortable with. So it’s nice that he has a new political home.”

Scrutiny of Greens during their local campaign across London brought accusations of antisemitism, including social media postings by a Lewisham candidate who was removed. Shrivastava does not deny it’s a problem, but says it’s hardly exclusive to the Greens. From his experience at the Institute for Race Relations, he says there is a “heightened responsibility” for all councillors to be careful about the language they use, mindful of the potential impact on communities.

“I think clearly there’s work to do around vetting and also setting expectations from candidates. I think antisemitism and other forms of racism are a problem for all of society, and it’s present in all political parties, and that’s been, you know, clearly evidenced.”

Given the big Green break-through is widely viewed as a protest against Sir Keir Starmer as Prime Minister, I suggest Labour under Andy Burnham might reverse Green progress and Shrivastava could prove to be a one-term wonder. He doesn’t rise to the bait.

“I think if Andy is going to succeed, if he does become Prime Minister, it will be by being consensual,” he says. “It will be by recognising that we are in the era of five party politics, and that the Green Party’s rise, and obviously Reform’s rise, are not temporary. If he wants to be Prime Minister after the next election, he is going to have to cede some ground. He’s going to have to work with other parties.”

This is not, the Mayor insists, a high water mark for the Greens in Lewisham “This isn’t going to fizzle out,” he says. “I think this is only going to get better.”

Tim Donovan is the former political editor of BBC London and now a trustee of Centre for London and political adviser to Kanda Consulting. Follow him at LinkedIn. Photos from Lewisham Council.

OnLondon.co.uk is funded by sales of publisher and editor Dave Hill’s twice-weekly newsletter On London Extra. To receive it, become a paying subscriber to Dave’s personal Substack. Thanks.

Categories: Analysis
Tags: Green Party, Lewisham Council, Liam Shrivastava