With Tamar Barrett’s deselection in Thornton Heath earlier this week, 13 of Labour’s 34 councillors won’t be up for re-election next May. And one shadow cabinet member fears he will lose his Town Hall seat come polling day. By WALTER CRONXITE, Political Editor
Having his collar felt: some in Croydon Labour suggest that some of the conduct of Cllr Chris Clark (centre) in the past seven years has been verging on the criminal
There could be an actual Croydon Labour council candidate selection meeting tomorrow, but one where one of those being considered probably wishes he won’t get picked.
Chris Clark would never admit to it publicly, of course, but it is widely acknowledged that he would far prefer to stand at next May’s local elections anywhere other than Fairfield, the ward where he was first elected to Croydon Council in 2018.
That’s because Clark is now the only Labour councillor for the town centre ward where, since 2022, two Green Party councillors, Ria Patel and Esther Sutton, have been showing how the job ought to be done. In May 2026, the smart money is on a Green cleansweep of the Fairfield seats, with Paul Ainscough, a Labour parliamentary candidate in his youth, favourite to take the third seat.
Labour’s likely “slate” of candidates in Fairfield in 2026 looks badly flawed and out of kilter with what members in the ward would prefer to see.
Some have alleged that there’s been a fix going on. Another one.
In 2025, there have been further suspicions aired over how Joseph has been blocked from selection by the NEC.
Prominent figure: Jose Joseph has been rejected as a council election candidate by Labour
It certainly seems strange that a high-profile and much-liked local figure, the chair of the Croydon Business Association who runs a stall on Surrey Street, and who has been providing a soup kitchen for the homeless and vulnerable for 10 years, should somehow be regarded as not good enough to represent Croydon Labour.
Sources within the party suggest that Joseph was given an adverse report by local branch officials, although no reasons for him being blocked from seeking selection have been provided.
Labour’s London region officials are running the charade that passes for selections in Croydon, with the backing of the all-powerful National Executive Committee. Since bankrupting the borough in 2020, Croydon Labour has been in “special measures” with its own party.
Clark, meanwhile, sensing his time on the council might be coming to an abrupt end next May, was suspected of wanting to seek selection in another, safer ward, such as Addiscombe West, where he has always lived since moving to Croydon a little over a decade ago.
“Sitting councillors are expected to fight their current seats,” a senior source in Croydon Labour told Inside Croydon, denying that this was a deliberate effort to dump Clark, who has been chair of the planning committee and is now his party’s Town Hall spokesperson on planning and regeneration.
Addiscombe West had its “selection” meeting on Wednesday, when Nick Beall took the third slot in the three-seat ward (replacing the retiring Clive “Thirsty” Fraser) alongside sitting councillors Sean Fitzsimons and Patricia Hay-Justice.
Full-time politician: Nick Beall, selected by Labour in Addiscombe West
Beall is a part-time runner (a member of Stiders of Croydon) and a full-time politician. Beall spent more than six years working in various capacities for Steve Reed MP, and since last October has been the senior parliamentary researcher for Dartford MP and developer lobbyist Jim Dickson.
Dickson, like Reed, is part of the Brixton Town Hall “chumocracy” which dominates Starmer’s Labour Party. Reed and Dickson are both former Lambeth councillors. So it’s hard to imagine how Beall managed to get selected for what ought to be a safe Labour seat on Croydon Council.
Hay-Justice is another Croydon Labour councillor who appears to have been persuaded to stay on, despite having wanted to step down as long ago as 2022. “Patricia was told we need all hands on deck to get Perry out,” a source close to the councillor told Inside Croydon.
Another current Labour member put it a different way: “There’s a real dearth of people coming forward to be candidates next year… Once you take out half a dozen sitting councillors whose faces don’t fit, they’ve been forced to plug some holes. That’s why they asked Brigitte [Graham] to stay on in Woodside. That’s why they’ve dragged John Wentworth out of retirement.”
The controversy over candidate selections is unlikely to inspire more grassroots Labour members to get out on to the streets of Croydon campaigning for the party’s mayoral candidate, Rowenna Davis.
But given the opportunity to take part in a sort-of democratic process, Labour members in Thornton Heath this week demonstrated how they really can make their votes count.
Not even close: Tamar Barrett, deselected by members this week
Inside Croydon reported on Tuesday how Tamar Barrett, a councillor for Thornton Heath since 2022, had never managed to make a proper, legal declaration of her directorship of a limited company.
In a meeting held remotely, using the Anonyvoter system, Barrett was deselected by what one observer described as an “overwhelming” number (although the actual votes were never declared).
Things became heated (or as heated as they might ever become in a remote meeting) when it was claimed that Barrett was the only candidate to live in Thornton Heath. That back-fired when members were advised that Barrett actually lives in Selhurst ward.
As a woman, Barrett had two opportunities to be selected: first in a head-to-head with the other woman up for selection, Vicky Newton, which she lost “by a landslide”, according to one observer, and then when the remaining two places were contested by three people: Barrett, Jose Fernandez and Ben Taylor. “She didn’t even come close,” was the verdict.
“Members were angry about Karen Jewitt’s deselection,” according to our source, referring to one of the six councillors, five of them women, who were blocked from standing by the NEC. Charity worker Jewitt has been on the council for more than 30 years, and is widely liked and respected for her efforts on behalf of residents.
Even a public endorsement for mayoral candidate Rowenna Davis had failed to seal the deal for Barrett. And our source said that Barrett had caused more discontent among members. “The law-breaking by failing to declare interests since her election caused even more anger.”
Barrett’s deselection brings to 13 out of Labour’s 34 councillors who won’t be on the ballot paper next May – six who have opted to stand down, seven who have been deselected.
The Thornton Heath ward selection reunites a pair of council wannabees – Newton (from New Addington) and Taylor (from Coulsdon) – who in 2022 between them managed to deliver Labour’s worst result in a council election in more than 50 years.
Out of order: Labour selecting in South Croydon, a ward it has never won, ahead of Crystal Palace and Upper Norwood and the two New Addington wards suggests to some that those previously Labour-voting areas are considered to be beyond winnable in 2026
After two further lost elections, including as Labour’s parliamentary candidate in Croydon South last year, Taylor might at last actually win a vote next May.
There is some doubt whether the Fairfield selection meeting, due to be held tomorrow, will actually go ahead.
Yesterday, one of the five shortlisted candidates, 17-year-old A-level pupil Kacper Borkowski, withdrew. There is speculation that one of the others up for selection, Davina Brown, has been quite half-hearted in appealing to members in the ward and making a case for her selection.
That could leave just Clark, Cliff Colvin and Laila Mohammed (another who wanted to be allowed to stand in another ward, South Norwood) on the Fairfield shortlist, with no need for a vote.
Just as the NEC prefers it.
Read more: Councillor has been breaking law on disclosures since 2022
Read more: #TheLabourFiles: MP Reed, Evans and the Croydon connection
Read more: Local Labour members angry at ‘travesty’ of selection process
Read more: Tawdry affair of Fairfield candidate coup and the double agent
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Machinations of third-rate politicians from big political parties in Croydon……………zzzzzz !
Chris Clark as Chair of the Planning Committee, pushed through approval of a block of flats that even the own Council’s own documents (released under a Freedom of Information request and about which he was aware) said was overbearing, harmful, and overdevelopment and failed even mandatory planning policies. Equally troubling was his visible discomfort when it emerged that the developer had relied on a backdated letter to submit notice—an irregularity that should have triggered deeper inquiry, not his silence.
The development itself was riddled with red flags: it was crammed onto such a small plot that it could not accommodate a lift, and the developer, Silverleaf Developments Ltd, even proposed paving over part of my drive to provide a walkway for residents. Ross Gentry misled councillors about the true height of the block, claimed the site qualified for further development under policy H2 even though it did not meet PTAL or proximity to town centre requirements, and insisted that planters would protect privacy despite visualisations proving the opposite. Documents proving that my privacy would not be protected were unlawfully withheld and kept from the committee, yet knowing this Chris Clark pressed ahead and supported the application not once, but twice (the application was returned to the Committee and despite his efforts to push it through a second time, it was turned down for failing policy and for the harm it would cause).
Chris Clark not only disregarded the committee’s duty to scrutinise applications independently but actively instructed members to fall in line with the planners’ recommendation as they were the ‘experts’. His role, funded by public money, is not to act as a rubber stamp for developers but to ensure proper oversight, fairness, and adherence to policy. Instead, he subordinated scrutiny to a developer’s profits, undermining both public trust and the credibility of the committee itself.
He claimed, in response to concerns raised on the Next Door app that he and the Committee only considered applications against policy and would be happy to meet residents. He went quiet when I said I would come along to seek his explanation for the list of failed policies that ran into double figures.
When elected officials appear to act in the interests of developers rather than the public, the entire democratic process is placed at risk, and the fundamental expectation that decisions are made transparently and fairly is fatally weakened.
Nothing would surprise me about Dodgy Gentry and Thirsty Clark. Both on the public sector gravy train. Surprised Gentry didn’t go and work for his wife. I’m sure she could do with an assistant. Perry should have done what Kerswell wouldn’t and cleaned up planning. Let’s hope the next Mayor will.
Having a Planning department that will allow your applications to go through can be quite handy, like building flats in the back garden of your party’s HQ:
https://insidecroydon.com/2025/07/29/how-chief-nimby-philp-built-in-tories-own-purley-backyard
The Planning department, Planning committee members of both parties, and that very dubious process of devolved authority with no notes or records is worrying at best. Just as worrying are the number of people that have links or are involved with building and development related firms at Croydon Council Local government has not only to be fair and transparent it must be seen to be also and have very high standards. Time for the Planning department and committee’s to be start doing read due diligence and stop accepting owners and deelopers letters at face value They should also stop calling Developments perfectly legal when provided evidence that conditions said to have been met were not are not and still not met. It just leaves a smell behind that does not come from the lack of Bin storage or waste on the streets from those ‘perfectly legal developments.
The planning department at Croydon Council really don’t care about residents unless the complaint makes front page news. Money talks and HMOs are being converted at light speed without the consideration of innocent residents like yourself it seems. With your comment to the lack of bin space , landlords are stuffing ex cons, asylum seekers, ex druggies ,h omeless ppl into tight spaces in residential areas and overflowing bins into the wrong compartments are the result unfortunately.
Clark should have been expelled in 2019. He lied to me (Branch Chair at the time) and lied to everyone about Jose Joseph. I wouldn’t trust him further than I could spit him.
Clark doesn’t get fulfilment from his day job – he’s some kind of low-grade sub-manager – instead he seek out solace and power from his councillor role. Sad little character and extraordinarily dull to be with for anything longer than 20 seconds.
Given that the council was informed that my name was fraudently used as a so-called ‘supporter’ on a planning application without my knowledge and yet failed to do anything about it. The story was covered by Inside Croydon. Nothing the planning department does can come as a surprise to anyone.