By WALTER CRONXITE, Political Editor
The Labour Party in Croydon is struggling to fill all 70 candidate slots for the local elections, which are due to be held on May 7.
Labour members throughout the borough received a notification this week from the party’s London region office, declaring that 2026 selections have been “extended”. It is little more than 12 weeks to election day.
The email was sent the day after the Labour Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, stood up in the Commons and admitted that he had known about Peter Mandelson’s continuing association with paedophile sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein before he appointed the Blairite peer as the King’s Ambassador to Washington, one of the most prestigious and important jobs in diplomacy.
Candidate selections are being run by Labour’s London HQ because Croydon officials are still not trusted to manage their own affairs, following a series of scandals, including an attempt to fix parliamentary selection, since the then local leader Tony Newman and his Numpties crashed the council finances six years ago.
Now, as one exasperated party insider said: “Members are being asked to put their names forward to represent the party of Mandelson, Steve Reed and McSweeney, the party of U-turns and the most disliked Prime Minister in history.”
Election blow: Rowenna Davis, Labour’s mayoral candidate, requires votes from the whole borough
In some national opinion polls this week, the Green Party has overtaken Labour’s ratings.
Croydon Labour launched its local election campaign in September. Announcements of candidate selections have at best trickled out since.
Six sitting councillors, including four black women, have been deselected by Labour.
Until this week, Labour had not announced any candidate selections since November. This week, it unveiled a new candidate in Crystal Palace and Upper Norwood, after one of its previous picks dropped out. Given the state of Labour Party morale over the Mandelson scandal, there’s a real risk that they may yet have to re-select elsewhere, too.
- So far, Labour has named candidates in only 17 of Croydon’s 28 wards.
- That has left 25 vacancies on its roster of council candidates.
Labour has yet to name candidates for Sanderstead, Kenley, wards in Purley and Selsdon, both Shirley wards and the whole of Coulsdon – usually regarded as staunchly Conservative voting districts, and wards that are unwinnable for Labour.
Yet while Labour used to be able to ignore the south of the borough – much as the Tories ignore the north – and simply field “paper” candidates in those wards, that is no longer the case.
Since 2022, control of the council in Croydon is determined by the borough-wide vote for the executive Mayor. And that makes Labour’s struggle to name candidates for the whole of Croydon a serious blow for the election prospects of Rowenna Davis, Labour’s mayoral candidate. Every vote, whether cast in Coulsdon or Crystal Palace, Thornton Heath or Kenley, counts.
Before the end of the year, when questioned over the hiatus in naming even paper candidates for 11 of Croydon’s wards, Labour officials said that everything was under control and the names to fill the vacancies would be revealed in the new year. London region being “very busy” was given as the excuse for ignoring the election selections for almost half the borough.
The political duopoly which has controlled Croydon for more than 60 years usually tries to ensure that its better and more senior candidates, those it wants to form the next council, are picked in wards where they have the best chances of being elected. Both Tories and Labour have policies that oblige them to at least be seen to field a full slate of candidates.
North-south divide: how Croydon voted, by council seat, at the last local elections in May 2022. In 2026, Labour hasn’t bothered to pick candidates for 11 of Croydon’s 28 wards
The reality, however, is that in voting districts where their party has little chance of success, party activists volunteer to have their names included on ballot papers, for appearance purposes only.
So it is that Labour has still to reveal the candidates for the 11 council wards where they don’t think they have any chance of winning.
In the email to members this week, London Labour announced, rather over-excitedly: “Applications to stand as a councillor in Croydon have been re-opened!”
And they confirmed the arithmetic: “So far, 45 candidates have been selected in 17 wards.”
They added, trying not to sound too desperate: “If you want to be a part of the Labour team that can make a difference, please put in an application.”
The email included several attachments, including “Essential information”, “Councillor job description”, “Code of conduct” and “Qualifications and disqualifications”. The latter document probably requires some serious updating after the last week.
There is no need to read between the lines, though, in one of the last paragraphs of the email to members. Labour is really desperate for people to make up the numbers. Usually, to be selected as a candidate, people have had to be a member of the party for at least 12 months.
Not in Croydon in 2026 they don’t: “In special circumstances, an exemption can be made to the membership length requirement.”
Our demoralised activist, speaking to Inside Croydon on condition of anonymity (“As you know, they can be vindictive”), said: “If we had enough candidates to stand in all the wards, they wouldn’t be making this late appeal for people to come forward now.
“This ought to have been done and dusted months ago.”
Croydon Conservatives named their candidates for all of Croydon’s 28 wards last month. In 2022, Tory Jason Perry took control of Croydon Council by a margin of fewer than 600 votes from Labour’s Val Shawcross.
This year, local elections, for Croydon’s executive Mayor and 70 councillors, are due to take place on Thursday, May 7.
Read more: Surrey Street market trader Joseph quits Labour in race row
Read more: Four black women among six councillors rejected by Labour
Read more: Council pays £10,000 grant to councillor’s undeclared business
Read more: #TheLabourFiles: MP Reed, Evans and the Croydon connection
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