Think back nearly twelve months. Sadiq Khan stands in front of a podium, the mayoral election in full swing, and he issues what becomes his refrain as he seeks re-election. Imagine what is possible, in a London backed by the “winds of a Labour Government”, Khan declares.
It was a handy political tool to use at the time. The real reason he hadn’t done much was because of those dastardly Tories, it was — as ever — someone else's fault. A few months later, after he’d danced over the Millennium Bridge in a fluorescent green suit, triumphant in the mayoral election, he was arm in arm with the new PM — the wind was about to fill London's sails.
Since then, what's happened?
As it should have been, crime and policing, the bread and butter of any mayoralty, was front and center of the election. Sadiq stood with then shadow Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, to pledge thousands more coppers, and that a new golden age of policing was on the horizon.
A year later, this all seems a distant memory, with news this week that the Met plans to axe 1,700 staff, with a £260 million black hole in its finances. After spending eight years presiding over falling police numbers, shuttering police stations, and seeing violent crime, burglaries and sexual violence skyrocket across the capital — it would seem policing is still a secondary concern for the Mayor.
Is this what the “winds of a Labour government” was meant to deliver?
Far from being empowered, London is listless in a storm of law breaking, while its Mayor is desperately hoping nobody will notice.
A £260 million shortfall in funding is unprecedented, especially less than a year after Londoners elected a man who promised this wouldn’t happen.
And as a result civilian staff are being axed in their thousands. Back office staff are the call handlers, the case workers, forensic analysts, domestic violence officers. They keep the Met running, and without them officers could be pulled off the beat to do back office work.
More paperwork, more admin, less front line policing. Khan should be fighting tooth and nail to stop this. But instead, he’s paralysed by his blind loyalty to a party that’s hung him out to dry.
Knife crime, theft, assaults — all are on the up.
Why has the funding he promised not materialised, why are cuts still being made?
And public confidence in the police continues to suffer from repeat scandals. There was one thing Khan needed to do, rebuild trust and improve safety. Now that seems more distant than ever.
Normally, our publicity happy Mayor would be in front of the cameras demanding the funding our city deserves, but this time around we have complete radio silence.
When he was seeking our votes, Khan claimed that the only thing holding him back was the Tories in Westminster.
But that excuse no longer holds. Labour are back, the Mayor got what he wanted. So why has the funding he promised not materialised, why are cuts still being made?
If Labour can spend billions on splashing the cash for foreign governments over an island most people haven't heard of, why is the greatest city in the world taking the axe to its own police force?
Because Khan didn’t actually have a plan. As ever, he had a slogan and a press release, safe in the knowledge he could always just blame someone else.
London needs a Mayor who will stand up to his own party when we need him to.
One who will put safety over spin and fight tooth and nail for the city he represents. Not one who stays silent as the party he supports hammers it to save a few quid.
To me it seems Sadiq Khan has always preferred the optics of being a leader over the obligations of leading. The promised wind has disappeared. With Labour in power, the city is left drifting under a Mayor who has no idea what direction to take, and nobody but himself left to blame.
Unless the Mayor finds his backbone—and fast—the capital will continue to drift.
Aaron Newbury is a former Conservative party adviser
