George Osborne said on Thursday that Conservative headquarters appears to have “given up” on Susan Hall’s struggling campaign for London mayor.
The former Chancellor’s comments came after a new poll in the Standard showed Ms Hall suffering a 24-point deficit to Labour’s Sadiq Khan for the May 2 election.
“The complaint from the Susan Hall campaign is that they're not getting enough support from the Conservative HQ, that the Conservatives HQ have given up on the election,” Mr Osborne said on his Political Currency podcast.
“ I find it just a bit odd that more effort has not been put into this,” added the Tory grandee, who is also a former editor of the Standard.
He said that with the Tories struggling in the polls more generally, Rishi Sunak should have seen the London contest as an opportunity to regain the political initiative ahead of a General Election.
“Sadiq Khan is actually more vulnerable than he looks,” Mr Osborne said, noting that the election will be decided by first past the post rather than second preferences, which helped the Labour mayor last time.
“[Sunak should be thinking] ‘you know, we can run a very good campaign on crime and the like. The first past the post system does open up the chance of defeating him’.
“’If we had the right candidate who perhaps is totally identified with the Conservatives in the way that Andy Street isn't in the West Midlands, and builds up a kind of personal vote, we could win this and if we won this, my God we would send a shockwave through those expectations about the General Election’.”
Ms Hall’s campaign declined to comment on Mr Osborne’s remarks, but Tory insiders disputed his account.
The candidate’s policy focus on issues such as the Ultra low emission zone is not shared by most Londoners, according to the latest poll, while she has been tripped up by verbal gaffes and social media posts in the past.
The campaign was hit by new controversy this week when Conservative HQ put out an ominous video attacking Mr Khan that lifted footage from an incident in New York.
Former London minister Paul Scully, who was frustrated in his bid to win the Tory mayoral nomination to go up against Mr Khan, joined in criticism of the video on Thursday.
“There's plenty of things to focus on the mayor and call him out on [...] without just, sort of putting out a scare video about New York,” he told Times Radio.
"You have to have someone that you can see as a chief executive of London, you need to run a campaign on that basis. So it's not just about trying to scare the bejesus out of people because they don't like the incumbent or something like that,” Mr Scully added.
"You've got a whole lot of people investing in London. London is also vies with Bangkok and a couple of other cities for being the most visited city in the world. You put people off on that basis."
A spokesperson for Ms Hall said: "Susan is listening to Londoners. Her campaign is about putting more police on the beat, ensuring women feel safe, scrapping the ULEZ expansion and building more affordable family homes. That is our sole focus between now and May 2nd."
