Labour Faces More London Council Defections

Southwark councillor Sam Foster revealed on Friday that he had joined the Greens, while Fiona Mulaisho, a long-serving Labour representative in Brent, resigned by stating the party no longer represented her values.

Ms Mulaisho was due to be a Labour candidate in May’s local elections but said she had now joined the Liberal Democrats and will be standing for them in Queen’s Park.
She cited a "toxic culture" in the Brent Labour party and claims she was told that she was the wrong ethnicity to stand for election in her own constituency before being selected for a different ward.

Mr Foster resigned from Labour last month following a year of “chaos” in Southwark, which saw Labour councillors accuse their own party of a "stitch-up" when they were forced to re-run the election of a new borough leader after a left-wing candidate was chosen and the cabinet member for housing resigning for failing to get a rental licence for his letted properties - a mistake Chancellor Rachel Reeves made in the same borough.

He said: “Last month, I resigned from the Labour Party. In the weeks since, as if to reinforce my decision, Labour has doubled down on betraying its historic mission as it announced a fascistic policy towards asylum seekers, scrapped jury trials, and watered down its workers’ rights agenda.

“Today, I am joining the Green Party and will represent them as a councillor in Southwark’s Faraday ward. I stood for election in 2022 as a socialist fighting for a redistribution of wealth and power.

“Where Labour is now the enemy of this struggle, the Greens have embraced it.”

London Labour has seen more than a dozen councillors in the capital defect to other parties and faced a string of by-election loses since Sir Keir Starmer became Prime Minister.

The party has been haemorrhaging councillors in the capital to the Lib Dems, Greens, Tories and independents for several months.

Hounslow councillor Vickram Grewal announced in November that he was joining the Conservatives, accusing Labour of financial “mismanagement.”

Mr Foster joins Rotherhithe councillor Kath Whittam who defected to the Southwark Green Party last month.

Lewisham councillor Liam Shrivastava and Haringey councillor Mark Blake over the summer blamed what they described as the Labour’s shift to the right under the Prime Minister for their defections to the Greens.

Ex Lambeth Labour councillor Martin Abrams also defected to the Greens in September. He was suspended from Labour last year for supporting a Green motion calling for a ceasefire in Gaza.

Three Barking and Dagenham councillors formed the first political opposition to Labour in Barking and Dagenham in over a decade in September.

Moin Quadri, Victoria Hornby and Faruk Choudhury said they had become uncomfortable with Labour “refusing to take a principled stand on Gaza” and “adopting divisive anti-immigration rhetoric" as they joined the Greens.

Two Hammersmith and Fulham Labour councillors - Trey Campbell-Simon and Liz Collins - also resigned from Labour in July and joined the Greens, citing Sir Keir’s rightward shift.

Westminster councillor Paul Fisher quit the party and joined the Conservatives, blaming London Mayor Sir Sadiq Khan's Oxford Street pedestrianisation “vanity project”.

While Jas Dhot last month left Hillingdon Labour to become a Tory member.

Councillor Toby Benton, who represents Colville Ward in Kensington and Chelsea, joined the RBKC Independent Group last month.

Labour has also lost several council by-elections in the capital since Sir Keir won a landslide general election victory last July.