A mayoral election campaign appears to have broken out. Less than eight weeks until polling day, the two main candidates for City Hall have been filling their media grids with policy announcements and photo opportunities.
First, there's Susan Hall. The Tory hopeful today pledged to appoint a “women’s commissioner” and target sexual harassment on the Tube if she becomes mayor. The woman’s commissioner would “work with Londoners to create a fully-fledged women’s safety strategy”.
The announcement was also well executed. Hall's plan was endorsed by Instagram influencer, Georgie Clarke, who as our Transport and City Hall editor Ross Lydall reports, was left terrified after being sexually harassed on the Tube – and who received an apology from Transport for London after being merely handed a leaflet when she tried to report the incident.
Second, there's Sadiq Khan. The Mayor has hailed the completion of the main circle of his Superloop network of express bus services. As our local democracy reporter Noah Vickers notes, the loop’s final three routes were all launched in the last few weeks, meaning that the network now forms a 138km circle through London’s suburbs. Whether the Superloop will succeed in either getting people out of their cars, or placating voters angry about the Ulez extension, remains to be seen.
Despite this flurry of activity, the question lingers. How long can this eruption of local politics last? It seems as if the London mayoral election has been wholly subsumed by national politics. Much of this isn't the fault of Hall or Khan. The mayor himself was involuntarily drawn into the melee, following the comments made by now former Conservative MP, Lee Anderson.
The timing also has something to do with it. This contest is taking place in the final months before a general election, when the incumbent Conservative government appears to be taking its final breaths while Labour looks on course for victory. With the result in London viewed by many (and I suggest wrongly) as a foregone conclusion, attention is very much elsewhere.
This, I think, is a shame. From transport and housing to crime and the cost of living, London has specific strengths and needs that deserve greater scrutiny. The capital is the engine of the UK economy yet also home to boroughs with some of the highest levels of deprivation in England. The bright idea of levelling up has dimmed following Boris Johnson's departure, but a Labour government is equally if not more likely to tend to the seats it retakes in the Red Wall than those it retains in London.
Should he win, Khan may have better relations with Keir Starmer than Rishi Sunak, but he will still have to fight tooth and nail for additional funding. TfL may be turning its first operating profit, but anyone who relies on the Central line to get around will tell you things aren't going well. And that is before we even get to grander ambitions, such as the Bakerloo line extension or Crossrail 2.
A mayoral election campaign with a greater focus on London would be a welcome development.
