A different opposition: Jeremy Corbyn appeared before 30,000 music fans at Brockwell Park in south London last Friday
As Britain’s long-established political duopoly fractures, ANDREW FISHER looks at what that could mean for Croydon at its next local elections in 2026
For the past 100 years two parties have dominated British politics: the Conservatives and Labour.
55 quid for Wes Streeting?: Croydon Labour has gone all black tie to raise funds
Since the inception of the London Borough of Croydon in 1965, our council has also been dominated by the Tories and Labour. In those 60 years, the Conservatives dominated the Town Hall Chamber for the first 30, while Labour started to gain the upper hand in the last 30 years.
Currently, Labour has the most councillors in Croydon (34 out of 70), but crucially the Conservatives narrowly won the inaugural mayoral contest in 2022, giving them control of the council.
Those elections three years ago showed the first cracks emerging in the Croydon duopoly, with the Greens winning two council seats and the Liberal Democrats one – both at Labour’s expense.
But national politics has fractured even more since then, with Reform and the Liberal Democrats making serious inroads into the Conservative vote, while the Greens have made some gains, too. At the 2024 General Election last July, Labour’s vote actually declined, but the Conservative implosion masked the party’s own weakness.
According to national opinion polls, and the English local elections at the start of May, since last year’s General Election, Labour’s support has fallen further. The party is now polling around 10% lower in the polls. In the local elections, Labour lost nearly two-thirds of the council seats it was defending.
Over the past couple of years, the country has become more pluralistic in its politics, with a raft of independents elected at national and local level. The most prominent of those successful in the General Election last May was former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, now an independent MP for Islington North.
Last Friday Corbyn was in south London, receiving a warm welcome from 30,000 revellers at the Wide Awake Festival in Brockwell Park, as he highlighted the importance of live music, condemned Israel’s war crimes and (in a not-too-subtle dig at his successor as Labour leader, Keir Starmer) attacked those whipping up division with talk of “an island of strangers”.
There have been intensifying rumours that Corbyn may be about to launch a new political party, or be its figurehead. But we have heard such speculation before.
Either way, Labour is losing the votes of its urban-based progressive voters – with the Greens and LibDems, as well as credible independents, the beneficiaries.
Two-party system breaking down: the wide split of votes at the West of England polls earlier this month allowede Labour to hold on to a mayoralty with a very modest vote share
How much this growing political pluralism will affect Croydon when it holds its local elections in May 2026 will be key to deciding who becomes our borough’s next Mayor. Between the Conservatives and Labour, It’s a case of whose vote splinters least.
Across the country, Conservatives are losing support to Reform. Until now, Nigel Farage’s party has lacked strong organisation in our borough – but elsewhere in the country, it has still made advances without a prominent ground operation.
And could the LibDems or Greens make further headway in 2026?
This suggests the possibility of Labour getting back into power at the Town Hall, as it did to retain control of the mayoralty in the West of England despite winning just 25% of the vote on a 30% turnout.
Back in 2022, the Conservatives were the opposition in Croydon, but with an increasingly unpopular government in Westminster – as Boris Johnson became rapidly tarnished (he resigned less than two months later). Next year, the roles will be reversed, with Labour in opposition locally, but with an increasingly disliked man in Downing Street.
In Croydon in 2022, Jason Perry, the Conservative candidate for Mayor, promised to “Fix the finances”. He hasn’t, despite hiking Council Tax and slashing services. The Labour candidate who was narrowly beaten that year, Val Shawcross, was generally remembered as having led a positive administration in Croydon in the early 2000s, and she had serious credentials as a former deputy Mayor of London.
Not looking good: less than a year since a landslide General Election victory, polling suggests Keir Starmer has never been so unpopular
Labour has again selected a credible candidate in Rowenna Davis, the councillor for Waddon ward who proved to be effective in the council chamber as chair of scrutiny. Like Shawcross, Davis benefits from not having served in the last Labour administration in Croydon.
However, one downside for Davis will the hollowing out of Labour Party membership, and the party’s finances. Since Starmer became leader, national membership of Labour has fallen by 200,000, from 532,000 in the 2019 annual report to the 329,000 reported to the January meeting of Labour’s National Executive Committee. Since then, the NEC has been informed that they will no longer be told the latest membership figures “due to leaks” (or the embarrassment).
Under-funded: Labour’s financial difficulties have come at the worst time for their Croydon mayoral candidate Rowenna Davis
Locally, that also means less funding, as the central party allocated money to local parties based on membership figures. In the old constituency of Croydon Central (now mostly Croydon East), between 2017 and 2022, membership halved. Given the national picture, that is likely to have fallen even further since – which means fewer people to knock on doors and deliver leaflets, as well as less money to meet the campaign costs.
The private and corporate donors that buoyed the Labour Party when they were in opposition have receded in the past year. So much so that the party is now reportedly unable to balance the books this year – which does not bode well ahead of a huge set of local and (for Wales and Scotland) national elections in 2026.
As both main parties struggle for cash and footsoldiers, the race in Croydon has rarely felt more open. But the number of Croydon Labour members willing to don black tie and pay £55 a pop to have dinner with Wes Streeting cannot be a reliable funding stream.
The old adage is that a week is a long time in politics. With 49 weeks to go until May 7, 2026, there will be many more twists and turns before the polling stations are open. The best place to follow the turmoil is Inside Croydon. Stay tuned!
- Fisher is also the author of The Failed Experiment – and how to build an economy that works, and now writes columns for InsideCroydon, the i newspaper and is a regular pundit on BBC and Sky News programmes
- As well as his column, Andrew is also conducting podcast interviews, in-depth and informed with specialists and national figures, sharing their expertise with Croydon, and available on Inside Croydon’s Spotify channel
Andrew Fisher’s recent columns:
- Starmer alienates support by adopting the language of Powell
- It’s bad for Starmer’s Labour and worse for Badenoch’s Tories
- What a load of old rubbish! And that’s just inside the Town Hall
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content. Our comments policy can be read by clicking here
