Shocking figures released today show that 20% of Londoners – 1-in-5 – don’t have a Scooby Doo (it’s rhyming slang…) that next Thursday, May 2, is election day in the capital. Among younger Londoners – those under 30 years old – the lack of awareness is even greater, at 33%, or 1-in-3.
Standard issue: the capital’s evening paper no longer has the readers it once had to get an election message across
Worse still, it appears the Tory scam to disenfranchise large sections of society appears to have worked because the research, conducted by pollsters Savanta for the Centre for London, found that nearly a quarter of Londoners have no idea that they will need photo ID to be allowed to vote next week.
The London elections are taking place next Thursday. Most Londoners will have three votes: one to choose the Mayor of London; the second to choose a London Assembly Member by constituency – in our case, for Croydon and Sutton; and the third to vote for a party or candidate on a London-wide basis (our columnist, Andrew Fisher, explained how the voting systems work, and how they have been changed for 2024, in his column last week).
The gaping chasm between the importance of the election – the Mayor of London spends £20billion a year of public money – and the level of awareness that any election is even taking place ought to be a serious concern.
The poll findings include:
- 6% of Londoners say a London Mayoral election is not happening in 2024
- 20% are unaware that elections are taking place on May 2
- 23% of those asked were unaware they needed to bring photo ID to vote at a polling station
- 33% of younger Londoners, aged 18 to 34, are unaware an election is happening
The polling revisited some of the questions posed in March and found that Labour’s Sadiq Khan, who has been Mayor of London since 2016, has not necessarily won over voters as convincingly as other polls have suggested.
Savanta found that only 33% of Londoners say they are “quite satisfied” or “very satisfied” with Mayor Khan’s performance, while 40% say they are “quite or very dissatisfied”.
On knife crime and gangs, 60% believe Mayor Khan has done badly, while 58% believe he has dealt badly with both tackling homelessness and improving the availability of housing. More than 300,000 London households are on the waiting list for social housing.
Mayor Khan’s approval ratings are better (more than 50%) on his management of London’s transport network and protecting London’s green spaces.
‘Breaking point’: Antonia Jennings of the Centre for London
When asked what the most important issues facing Londoners are, 53% said inflation and the cost of living, 48% the NHS (both issues firmly in the influence of national government), while housing and crime both registered concerns with 36% of those polled.
“Between new rules on voter ID at the polling booths and simply not knowing the elections are going ahead, it remains to be seen if and how many Londoners will cast their votes on May 2,” said Antonia Jennings, the chief executive at Centre for London.
“Despite mixed opinions on our current Mayor, it’s clear that many feel not enough has been done to tackle the city’s housing crisis, which has reached breaking point.
“A quarter of Londoners are left in poverty after paying their housing costs, and so many are concerned about both the cost of housing and the cost of living more generally. It’s sadly not surprising that the cost of living and inflation was highlighted as the most important issue facing London.”
For more information on where to vote and who is standing for election, use our widget here:
Find election information at
WhoCanIVoteFor.co.uk
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