The Tories 'can't win a fair election in London'
A bombshell poll which suggests the Tories could win next year’s London Mayoral election with just 30% of the vote has sparked fresh outrage over the government’s decision to change the electoral system to first past the post (FPTP).
Every previous London Mayoral election saw voters get two preferences. If a candidate didn’t receive 50% of the vote in the first round of counting, all but the top two candidates were eliminated. Second preferences were then counted for every voter who backed another candidate.
However, the Tories last year legislated to make mayoral elections use the same system as is used to elect MPs and local councillors in England.
Redfield and Wilton’s poll – published today – suggests that if Jeremy Corbyn were to run as an independent, 15% of voters would back him. According to the survey, he would peel enough voters away from incumbent mayor Sadiq Khan so that the Tory candidate Susan Hall would emerge victorious with 30% of the vote to Khan’s 25%.
Under the old system, it is likely Khan would ultimately win, with a sufficient number of Green, Lib Dem and Corbyn voters giving him their second preference, allowing him to get across the line.
Commentators and voters have responded to the new poll by accusing the Tories of seeking to change the rules in their favour because they couldn’t win under the old system.
Writer Sam Freedman tweeted: “A very clear explanation of why the Tories switched the electoral system back to FPTP for purely partisan reasons. Khan would win comfortably under PR.”
Novara Media’s Michael Walker, accused the Tories of ‘deep opportunism’ over the change to the voting system. He tweeted: “Separate to the Corbyn issue, this shows the deep opportunism of Tories abolishing second preference voting in mayoral elections.”
His Novara colleague James Butler agreed, and said that the Tories changed the electoral system because they couldn’t win a “fair” election. He tweeted: “This is why the Conservatives, who can’t win a fair election in London, reverted the voting system to FPTP. That said, I suspect Khan is at the nadir of his popularity over ULEZ, and expect he will rebound before the next election.”
Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward
Image credit: Simon Walker / Number 10 – Creative Commons
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