Can the Greens and Reform win big in London? podcast

This is the Guardian. Hello, as we gear up for the local elections in England and devolved elections in Wales and Scotland this week, politics weekly has been on the road. It looks like London could see the Greens and Reform sweeping across councils in the capital as people switch away from labour and the Conservatives. In the first half of this episode, our producer Frankie is in Bromley, where in 2022 the Conservatives retained control of the borough but lost 14 seats. Since the election, two councillors have defected from the Tories to reform UK. She spent the day with councillor Alan Cook reforms first ever directly elected London councillor and see if you can guess the name of the Reform Supporters son who's in the Shadow Cabinet. What does this sign say? To your sport vote reform. Thank you. Well, reform UK is known for being a little bit different and we do want to be different so this is one of the ways where we are different in campaigning. We're out here on the side of the road on the 821 which is the most busyest road in Bromley pretty much. We have the union flags, we have reform flags, we have reform banners and core exports. We even have a cardboard cut out of Nigel Farage in case anyone wants to stop for a photo shoot. I am councillor Alan Cook. Well, I am the only elected reform UK councillor in the whole of Greater London. I won the Bromley Common and Howard Ward last year July 25 and basically this used to be a Tory heartland and it was a very safe Tory seat but we we beat the Tories there by 15.6% and they even sent camey down to a provincial by-election to help fight it for them and they lost and now we're getting a similar bit better feedback locally as well. You know, Bromley really should come to reform UK if there is a parliamentary election here any time soon. We are pretty much now a swing borough and there's no such thing anymore here as a safe Tory seat. My name is Kim, I'm a U-Furker and I run a domestic abuse program. I have joint reform, I'm part of the party, you know, I donate £3 a month. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. And I'm like a blank canvas with politics but I kind of got myself into it and I looked at what parties were, I could vote for on the seventh and I identify more with reform. Even though also I would say that being a U-Furker working with a U-F services, Labour has been a big part of that and they do do a lot for infant communities. I do know that around funding and stuff but I kind of align with reform more than I do Labour as it stands today. Why? Because obviously you're dealing with the local council. I've always listened to him from way back on LBC, I quite like him as a person and also I do see the problem in terms of the migration crisis, I do see the problem of that, you know, being a South London woman and also, you know, I do think that there needs to be a point where they do stop the boats, there needs to be more vetting, there needs to be more things that are going to basically stop this kind of migration wave I suppose, you know, I want British values and I don't want them to be the abolished basically and yeah that's where I align with reform. The reform had been so successful at that, stopped the boats message but that's national. If you look at local government which were about to vote on in London, what's reformed off of for you there? Because it wouldn't be necessarily about immigration, what would be appealing to you from a local government level? See this is where I feel like I don't have enough knowledge if I'm being completely honest and that's why I say, you know, I'm only just, I've not been a voter, I'm not what someone that votes, the only time I've ever voted is when we voted at the EU, that's the only time I've voted. So this would be the second time I'm voting and now I'm voting for reform. I think I like Nigel Farage. They do too. No one before has ever appealed to you. No politician. No, no, really no. It just speaks out for me, it just seems a bit more relatable. I don't see reform as racist party. I see reform just wanting to take control of our borders and I mean I don't believe in absolute no migration. I understand that people flee for safety for whatever reasons that there are. However, I know you can't guarantee on media coverage but what you see in from the media coverage is a big pattern of fighting age men. That's a bit worrying. It's like a movement. It's like what's going on here is a little bit more going on than meets the eye and that's what gets my vote over for. Oh John, actually should, oh, John is my campaign manager. Please mention your project. A lot of the guys and ladies who are participating in reform are people like me who have never thought about participating in politics but they're really, really concerned. Right? It becomes when you've got that sufficient body of people, it becomes almost self-regulating because people with the more extreme views are not tolerated in the group. And I think we're now, particularly of the growth in our membership over the last couple of years, getting to that point. I can certainly say you know from a Bromley branch point of view, which I accept is a slightly more comfortable area. Right? You know, if people came with extreme views, they just would be ostracised completely. No one here is here. I'd like to introduce you. Yes, Kira. So, Kira Gabba is one of the people that came across from the Tory party to reform in Bromley. So she's a sitting Bromley councillor currently in the Biktian Sandwich ward, but she is now standing with myself and Alfie in Bromley Common and Hollywood. So I got elected in May 2018 and I crossed the floor in December. So almost eight years I've been the Tory councillor serving good people of Biktian Sandwich. It's a very safe Tory seat. So if I wanted to, I could have very easily been reelected. I think it's still probably leading Tory that seat we will have to see. But I just thought that the party's principles did not represent me any longer. I'm originally from Ukraine. I came to this country 25 years ago, lived in Bromley for 15 years. Feel very much at home here and love the barrow, love the country. And this is my way of giving back. It was a school governor and sort of naturally came into politics. Local government has been, I think, forgotten by the central government of all colours for many years, for a decade now. So yeah, that needs to change absolutely. And I think that people know that, you know, this is why you have people like ex-police men, ex-fight men and school governors coming and trying to help in this way. And we've seen people come from all parties, Lib Dems, Labor, Tories and even people have never voted before. So yeah, we're seeing a complete mix of people from all political spectrums. Traffic count, just on the traffic count, 2,300 an hour, one in three or two team of wavy. Brilliant. Brian is instrumental. He's been running these since the UKIP days and no one does a road show better than Brian. I'm Dr Brian Philp, MBE. And Philp is a name that some people might recognise. Are you happy talking about your son? We came for lunch yesterday. Were you a former conservative? Yes, I stood as an independent conservative in the election many years ago. The conservative has disgraced themselves for 14 years, which by the way, they are the party of mass migration and the general electorate have protected them. The conservative has betrayed us, the socialist to rubbish, the Greens are dangerous to our last chance. These are normally good, but the levels are poor now. It's just going crazy. But yes, we're basically just finishing off the last patch of the 8000 plus houses in the ward. And we've literally just got a few hundred more to do and then we're done on the leafletting. So these are these are what we're delivering today. We've got a big picture of Nigel Frage, reform will fix broken Britain, tackling the cost of living crisis, stopping legal immigration, cut energy bills by scrapping net-stupid zero, as Richard would say, and lawlessness on our streets, which is a very big issue in central London, but actually it's signed its way out to broadly as well, and put the British people first, which is something, you know, that every government should have been doing, but clearly they haven't. And on the other side, it's Alan Cook, Kirich Abbott and Alfie Stokes, who are the three candidates running in Bromley, Common and Hollywood, and a little bio for each of us. They're five pledges, but you know, some of them are national, we've got other leaflets with more local pledges on as well. And obviously a nice picture of Nigel, because this is where Nigel's [BLANK_AUDIO] And I normally get a phone call, at least two a week from his mum, but actually bumped into his sister this morning when I was walking out of the train station. So, you know, the Faraj family are still in this area. And he's very much loved by the people of Bromley. -Councils are in Dioce, straight. -The, you know, about 80% of the cost of Bromley council is statutory. So, it is adult social care and so, yeah, but it's how you actually offer those services where you can look at. So, you can actually save money without lowering. Indeed, you can actually improve all of the services. So, it's, yeah, it's going to be our biggest ask when we get into power is to actually look at, you know, we've got the doge team all help us, but we've got some good business heads going in as well. So, we don't know what we're going to find yet, but we know that it's projected to be bankrupt by 2028. So, yes, we have a lot of work to do. -Hi, hi. -That couldn't park at the top. -Okay, okay, we'll come and meet you in the middle, okay? -All right, we'll do. -See you in a moment. -No, bye. -One of the things that love most about leaflettings, I get to see how beautiful people's front gardens are. -That's really nice. I love flowers. I've met so many people and, you know, having done this for eight years, do you get the sense that people's day to day has got harder? -Absolutely. Cost of living crisis affected everyone. Many people complained that they had to change their costs for the angular's introduction, so that, of course, heat families very, very hard. I know many people had to pay, and that is absolutely awful, because public transport isn't as fragile available here as it is in central London, especially in more rural areas. People do rely on their costs to get to work, so it's been absolutely awful. Britain is broken and reform is needed. We need reform to make sure that Britain is great again. -What we're doing is growing in membership, but we're growing in support, in volunteers, and in councilors, you know, we had to find 58 good people in Bromley. And I thought it was going to struggle, but no, in the end we had more people, so really meant we could actually cherry pick and choose the right people for the job. But I remember when Trump was first elected, no one would actually admit that they voted for him. The term secret Trump was coined. And to a certain degree, I think, in the past, that was people they wouldn't necessarily be vocal about their support for reform. But now, people are happy to openly talk about politics and about actually supporting reform. -However, you feel like reform do with very strong feelings either way. They're not a sort of middle of the road party. People either feel very passionate. -Well, I think that's politics rather than us, because, you know, we are a party of policies which fit on the centre less than to write. There's nothing extreme about us, you know, and we're root at loan now, setting up his party. It does seem that he's got some extremists who are actually joining him. So what that does is highlight to people that actually wear a moderate party. -So would you call reform moderate? -Yes. -Absolutely. -What name one extreme policy we have? -I don't know. I want immigration. You go further than a lot of people, if you're comfortable. -It did come up when I was at the train station, I was talking to some people and they were worried London is a really diverse place. It's multicultural. -Some people have referred to us as being divisive, but I actually see the complete opposite. And what we are doing is celebrating our history heritage and culture and celebrating what actually draws us all together and what we have in common. -You know, I absolutely love London because of its history and best restaurants in the world. You can be literally in any country when you're in a restaurant in London. And that's all thanks to basically the commonwealth and the empire. -These are all positive things, but what the press tend to actually concentrate on are always the negatives, but they never actually give the full story. -Yes, we want to get rid of the indefinite leave to remain. -But what the press never talk about is what we're going to replace it with, which is a work based visa system. -Yes, we want to leave the ECHR, but we're not just going to leave avoid, again, or replace it with a UK based system, which is one which benefits this country and the people of this country. -You know, calling us racist is something that used to happen a lot, less so now. -And it took a while for me to actually realise why people did that because we're not racist and our policies aren't racist. -So it's their way of shutting down conversation. And that's why they've done it. -Oh, in the window there's a black and yellow, a four-posted, which they support reform, get Starma out, which is basically our slogan, because no one likes him. -And where the only ones that literally could actually engineer a situation to get him unseated and got rid of. -That's a really big issue, isn't it? Not just in London, but around these local elections, that they're about essentially your bins, your parents, social care and sort of local issues. -But actually people are using Starma, and is it an election on him? Do you think? -Well, that's what Nigel has said. This is a referendum on Starma, so we won't reform, get Starma out. -I don't mind that local elections are also focused on national issues, because what it has been said, again, by Nigel, is that after the 7th of May, the Tory party will cease to be a national party. -What he means by that is that they literally have no support in Wales, no support in Scotland, and they're going to have one or two councils up and down the country, so they will no longer be a national party. -So, to solve Bromley's problems, we need to tie Bromley Council up to the next government as well. -People who are voting for us, it's hopefully a start of a journey, and they're not just going to vote for us here in Bromley for the council, but also for the May or election, but also for the general election next time as well. -If we, you know, is it holy Trinity really, if we align those three administrations, then we can do. there's nothing we can't do for Bromley really. -Oh, done! -Welcome back. In this half of the podcast, producer Frankie is in Hackney following the Greens. Sam Mathis has worked with Hackney Council and the Great and London Authority for years, and used to be a Labour supporter, but she grew fed up with Labour, and is now running to be the Green councillor for Clisold in Hackney. Hackney has been Labour since its creation in the 1960s, but could Sack Polanski's own home borough be about to be painted green? -We can't shop with Sam and the team at a cafe in Stoke, Newington. -I was a Labour member for over a decade, and then I switched over to the Green Party in November. People have been experiencing that exact same journey. I think a lot of the doors we knock on are X-Labor voters who feel a bit disillusioned with the party, so I don't think that's the only reason driving people to the Greens. I think we actually have really solid policies. -Yes, I'm here. I'm Sam Mathis. I'm one of the candidates in the Clisold Ward for the Green Party. We're joined by Tom here. He is active in the Green Party and does a lot of our organising behind the scenes, and then we have Scott here, who is a new volunteer that has come out, came to sing with us once before, and he's really keen to get involved in the party. We also have Anne here. She handles our comms for the Green Party locally, and she's been really helpful getting the messaging and everything ready for us to hit the doors, essentially. -If I can share what I'm angry at Labour locally and why I joined the Greens, it's because last year, well, Labour nationally was rolling out free child care hours and really boasting about it, which was a policy introduced by the Tories. In Hackney, there's 11 different council-run nurseries, and the local government kept funding to it and hiked all the fees. I'm a single mom and I'm friends with a lot of other parents who just destroyed their life plans, like so many people were just priced out of Hackney, priced out of nursery, priced out of work, and it was really devastating. We got together and we tried to petition the council and tried to meet with them and had protests, and we had like PhDs in our group, who organised an entire alternative fee-band structure that wouldn't lose the money as a council. I just ignored us, but then the Green Councilor, again, one that wasn't in my ward, he helped me so much with trying to navigate the systems here in Hackney. All of that to say that so many people have stories just like mine where they've been trying to get the council to help them with a local issue, and they've just been beating their head against the wall. The Greens, even though there's few of them, have shown up and helped them, and then as they've seen the momentum pick up with the Green Party, they're like, "You know what, let me just be part of that." I think someone like Zapolansky actually believes in something, so when I was interested in Labour, I was because of Corbin at the time, because for all his faults, he was a man who I honestly thought believed in things and stood up for what he believed in, and wouldn't change when he got voted in, whereas I think Starm has completely changed. You know, you can look at his track record, he's just flipped flopped on everything. Labour have been in control here since the borough was created, and I think for the majority of that they've had overall control, they've, you know, had the mayorality since it came into effect in the 30-2000s. young people are just aware they'veurer undryd a'r rh rob doedd nhw'n gwestче i hyn # use mewn le Eduardo II stating i 'Lerynuaith o ég hip restaurgery} Dyl yn mewnな dau i fhi orient 508 My family have been worked from my life It's not doing me any favours any more. It's a point. Oh my god. The amount of volunteers we've been getting has been phenomenal. We're constantly getting new people coming and joining us. We've been having a solid 50 to 60 people out every week. Hackney had back in January of 2025 just over a year ago Now Hackney had 650 members and last we checked which was I don't know this side of 2026 but not that recently. It was over 3,000. We've could droopled past our membership and we have a lot of those people really active. We also have people come out of who aren't our members I think. I really don't have a clear number on how many volunteers we have but it's in the hundreds for sure. Okay great. It was cold this morning and now it's sort of warmed up. I'm scared to put my jacket on. It's very windy though. Right so Sam's here with a laptop and a bunch of paper in front of her and she's about to tell us where to go through the Clistle Ward. I think that means knocking on a few doors to see where people are if they know that the election's coming, what they might be voting. And also a whole bunch of people keep asking us to bring them posters and we just cannot keep up with delivering them. So we need to try to find people in there. So very good. So this is our three reasons to vote for us, Lee Flitz. So the first reason was obviously we're standing up for residents. We want to be the party that listens to people and takes like that sort of bottom up grassroots approach to policy. We want to kind of inspire people that another hackney is possible. The things that people want for their everyday lives are achievable. We just need to listen to local expertise, listen to our residents, listen to our local businesses. And I think we can do it. I was the nighttime economy manager for Hackney. So the story behind that is I used to run a local, actually a few local pubs in Hackney. And there were so many issues with the council that we had started communicating with my counselors with the local licensing. I found that other businesses sort of stood behind me. I started became the advocate for a lot of these local businesses. And then I became so active that they decided to hire me into the council. I've worked under labor for the last eight to nine years. I'm very familiar with the culture within the council. And that's something that I'm definitely up for changing. In my experience, it takes a very long time to change anything within a labor council. I don't think we can be complacent. People are really starting to see past that two-party system. And I think that's been so interesting to see how people are deciding and what the crucial issues are that are going to sway them to the green party. What are they? Ah, I'm glad you asked. So, I mean, we talk about housing, obviously, affordable council homes, building more council homes, but also looking at private renting as well. We're getting a lot of people that are being priced out of Hackney. There's also, obviously, I have a cultural policy background. People are really struggling to find space in Hackney. So whether that be, you know, space for the creative industries, for artists, studios, space, space for family workshops, you name it. These community uses have disappeared. Gentrification is a massive issue here. You've got very long-standing communities. You've been here for years and getting priced out. Has that come up much? That is one of people's top three issues. Hackney is, you know, such a vibrant and diverse place. Like, we've seen an influx of big business coming into Hackney. And snatching up spaces that used to belong to the community. You know, we've seen a lot of like gales and prats and fancy coffee shops. But these are all corporate companies coming in and taking space off local people. And actually, it drives up the price of everyday life for people actually living here. What can you do in local government about gentrification? So it's all about keeping money local. So there's a big pledge in our manifesto around finding out who owns Hackney. Who are the main interests controlling property? One of the things I'm really excited about is setting up this new Citizens Assembly for Hackney. Getting local people really have a real voice in the way we create policy. So housing is a huge thing. Obviously, Palestine is a huge issue for people. I think, you know, our whole manifesto point around divesting the pension funds and redirecting that towards housing. Not investing in any sort of entity that has human rights violations. Or, you know, like Israeli arms companies, for example. I think that's been really resonating with people. It's massively diverse. Do you find in the same issues coming up? Or is it quite hard to appeal to everyone? I think the green policies appeal to everyone. And I think that's why we're seeing a surge in our popularity. That's what we've read in the street. So we go and we chat to residents. We've chat to a lot of people here already. So we already know how they're feeling about the green party. We scale that on a one to five, a one being. Love the green party, love everything you're doing. I'm definitely voting for you on May 7th. Free being unsure. But like, could see myself at the green. But I'm making my mind up. And a five being. No, I'm a Labour member. I'm definitely not voting for you. I mean, streets like this. It's mostly ones and frees. Obviously, there'll be like a five or a four mixed in. But right now, it's a very positive. And we'll try and also obviously get, are they a convert? Or maybe someone that we've never spoken to before, but actually has already been voting for us for years. That's a sort of voter data. And also what's affecting you, you know, the district. We have like a council block at the end. But then we also just have like a normal, like a rest central street. But a lot of these will be HMOs. And people will be like, oh yeah, my landlord doesn't fix the mould. Or my landlord who's the council doesn't fix the doors. Or something like that. Try and get that data as well. Today is Tuesday 28th. Or is it 10 days today? Or 11 days today? Or 11, I think. Yeah, 11 days today. And so we're obviously in the like final push now. We're like, every wards that is out every day. We're all putting all the energy that we have spare into this because like now's the time to make the difference. And it's also the time when we see the people who were previously frees begin to break and begin to say, I'm coming over to you. And I would say, like, it does seem, it feels very much like those frees, those people that previously we didn't know how they were going to vote are breaking for us. If we win on May 7th, it's like a chance to do something differently. The people here, their faith in politics is really shook. And if we don't deliver over the next four years, then like we'll never win again. So we're taking this very seriously. We have some fantastic candidates. People with real lived experience, professionals who have been working within the system, who know it, just like myself, but there's so countless other people who have, you know, spent 10 years in their field and who are now want to apply themselves to fixing what's broken. There was too much risk aversion from labour and not enough courage to fix these broken systems. You need expertise, you need people who are competent and you need people who are going to fight and work really hard to deliver that change. Local governments, the books don't look good for most of them. How will you cope when, if you get in, you see like actually, there's limited amounts we really can do? Look, I think there's a lot of streamlining that needs to happen in prioritising. And I think, you know, a lot of the time what you see in councils that's that, the whole council kind of works in silos, different departments, sort of, you know, they don't sort of align and have that sort of strategic alignment between them. And I think that's something that we definitely want to bring to the table and look at things and how, you know, what's our priority in our manifesto and what are the other things that aren't delivering for resonance and hack me that we can cut? You've had to scale up massively and you've spoken about outstanding candidates. But I know it's an issue with the vetting with some of them. I think there's been like half a dozen if not a few more complaints or things found on social media, specifically anti-Semitic, you know, here. There's a big Jewish population in the ward. How are you reassuring them that the Green Party aren't anti-Semitic to go kick down a labour? I mean, I'm just going to go back to the point saying we have amazing candidates. I have, you know, I have no reservations on how they will be able to deliver for locals here. But I mean, has that come up the vetting? It's not coming up on the doorstep. I try not to focus on that. I'm completely focused on talking to residents right now. And, you know, that's where my focus is. Like, I'm not trying to get sucked into the media storm about, you know, these things. It's really focusing on hack me. I mean, I've been very happy to get behind. I've gone out in like many different teams. I'm very happy to get behind every candidate we've had. And like Sam said, I've never really had it come up on the door. I think most people are just aware that when they get a Green councillor, they get a councillor that actually works for them. and I think people are pretty aware of that actually that it's good to have a green counselor. Oh, where am I going? We'll go together maybe? Yeah, actually we mostly have even so it's only the other side of the. it must have been split like that. Uh, just a quick extra here because that's just been against it. Do you want to try 70. what's 70? How did it go? Good, yeah she actually works for environmental characters. Yes, she's a team. Excited about reanimating spaces as well. This seems to be really resonating on the doorstep, bringing spaces back into use for the community. Yeah, she actually had a great idea didn't she? Yeah, your step counts must be off the chair in this one. I've actually lost six kilos since I started this campaign. That's how much walking we've been doing. Thank you so much. Previously you'd say I'm with the Green Party, do you know much about us? And people would go, "I've heard of you but not really." Whereas now people are like, "Oh yeah, yeah, the Green Party, I have seen some stuff around then." And sometimes I say, "Oh, because you know like we're having a bit of a moment right now when people go, "Oh yeah, we know we've seen." So like it just means that like the ground has been laid for us in a way that had never really been the case before. Tell me about the Zack Palantzki effect. How much has that been a factor? Obviously people mentioned Zack, they know Zack. But we try to keep it low core I think. And people really want to hear from like, "Who are the people that are actually going to lead my area?" But yeah, obviously Zack has massive appeal right now and he's really speaking to a lot of people. As the Green Party we kind of have a perfect storm because we have this massive new national figure in Zack Palantzki. We have this really impopular national government in Labour. People have had up with it and we have really hardworking councillors. If Zoe Garbert wins and becomes a Mayor of Hattonig on May 7th, that's obviously a huge breakthrough moment for us in London. It will be us leading the first council. But in Hack, we've already had our breakthrough moment when we got Zoe elected and Alistair elected in their respective councillors seats. So there's already been a growth of movement towards us. And we saw that again at the general election where like, despite having to incumbent Labour MPs, one of whom being Diannavitt, who is very popular locally, we still saw our vote go up. The movement towards us was happening anyway. This has just put like rocket beasters on it. Is there a fear that this is an election on Kierstown, this popularity? And chances are he won't be there for the next election. Do you worry that a lot of people that have come to you from Labour would go back to Labour if only the leader was different? Well look, I think we need to work really hard so they don't. The next four years, if we get elected, are going to be crucial. That's why we have to take every piece of feedback seriously. That's why we need to be out here listening and delivering for local people. If we don't do that, then yes, there is a risk that they will go back to Labour. But I certainly believe deep down that they won't. So that's all from us this week. Thanks for listening and thanks to Frankie for being out on the road. And thanks also to Alan Cook from Reform UK and Sam Mathis from the Greens for speaking to us. If you haven't already, please like and follow politics weekly to make sure you keep getting our episodes in your feed and keep your emails coming. Please email us on politicsweeklyuk at theguardian.com. We'll be back on Friday 8th May for a post-election special with me and Kierin, lots to discuss then, I'm sure. But this episode was produced by Frankie Toby, music by Axel Cucutie and the executive producer is Maz Eptahash. This is The Guardian.