Sadiq Khan edges ahead in new YouGov Poll
The first poll since November on voting intentions in the upcoming mayoral election has been released by YouGov for LBC Radio. It sampled just over 1,000 London adults in early January and showed that Khan has increased his lead over Goldsmith by five points since November. Khan is up to 31% from 26% in November whilst Goldsmith remains on 24%. UKIP at 11% poll are ahead of the Lib Dems at 4%.
Political commentators blamed Goldsmith’s lack of policies for his position in the polls. However, the release of his Action Plan for Greater London on 19th January may help to address this issue.
Although Khan’s camp will be bolstered by the news, it is still very early in the race and nearly a third of voters surveyed were undecided. Furthermore, Asa Bennett from the Telegraph, told LBC that Goldsmith should not be too concerned, saying that Khan’s lead is very “surmountable.”
Zac Goldsmith’s Action Plan for Greater London
This week Conservative candidate for London Mayor launched his ‘Action Plan for Greater London'. His action plan lays out four pledges that he’ll work with the Government to achieve in the coming four years if he is elected as Mayor.
1. Start fixing the capital’s housing crisis
Goldsmith has already made an amendment to the Prime Minister’s Housing Bill that will guarantee two ‘affordable homes’ to be built in London for each council house sold. The mayoral candidate has now pledged to double house building to 50,000 a year by 2020. He has also said that he will give Londoners the first chance to buy new homes built in the capital with his “Londoners First” rule. With this rule, any homes built on mayoral land – as many as 30,000 – will only be sold to Londoners. For one to qualify as a “Londoner”, they must have lived or worked in London for at least three years and don’t already own a home.
2. Improving the capacity and reliability of London’s transport system
Transport is setting up to be a key area of contention amongst the mayoral candidates, with Goldsmith saying that Labour’s Sadiq Khan’s fare freeze pledges are “rash” because George Osborne is turning off the transport grant tap – cutting £2.8bn over the next four years. Ensuring the Night Tube goes ahead is a top priority for Goldsmith, as is improving and increasing suburban rail services.
3. Improving London’s living environment
Goldsmith is aiming to win the support of green voters from his pledge to protect the greenbelt from development, tackling air pollution and to create more green spaces.
4. Making London’s streets safer
Getting to the root causes of crime is how Goldsmith is promoting this pledge. He has said that he will protect neighbourhood police teams, keep them on the street and put more police on public transport at night.
Khan keen to show he means business
The recent publication of the Beckett Report (link is external) on Labour’s general election loss in 2015 will be a clear reminder to candidates going into elections this May about the trouble the party had convincing the business community. One candidate giving the party’s attitude to business considerable thought is Sadiq Khan. The former human rights lawyer and transport minister turned London mayoral candidate has thus far visited the Federation of Small Businesses, the Institute of Directors, London First, CBI, London Chamber of Commerce & Industry, the City of London Corporation and TheCityUK in his campaign.
The response has been largely positive. Despite much comment being off the record with the aim of not endorsing a particular candidate, one city source said Khan “has been getting round and meeting people. Business leaders are coming away impressed”. Another added that “Zac’s engagement has been less than impressive.”
Perhaps most importantly for Khan is his attempts to distance himself from Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. Despite nominating Corbyn for the party leadership during last summer’s contest, one business lobby group said Khan was calming fears that he might peddle the hard-left views of Corbyn. “I don’t think business is at all worried about him. He has very much put clear water between him and the party leader,” said a spokesman off the record. However, Tory peer and The Apprentice star Karren Brady has criticised Khan for being the man behind Ed Miliband when he “turned Labour into an anti-business party”, adding that Labour still “see business as the enemy.”
Slump in new home planning approvals in the capital
According to data compiled by estate agents Stirling Ackroyd, new home planning approvals in London slumped in the third quarter of last year. According to records so far, approved applications are falling far short of the 42,000 annual figure needed to meet government housing targets for the capital.
With 11,865 new homes approved in the first quarter, 8,063 in the second quarter, and just 5,740 in the third, there are warnings that the London housing crisis is expected to worsen. Andrew Bridges, managing director of Stirling Ackroyd, said to the Guardian that “[a]pprovals simply aren’t stacking up. No, no, no is being heard far too often and it can’t continue.”
The number of new homes granted approval did, however, vary across the boroughs in London. Boroughs in the south outpaced the rest, with Southwark, Croydon and Lambeth accounting for 41% of all planning approvals in the capital.
Whilst application approvals are falling short, the government pledged last week to create 13,000 homes in southern England to alleviate the UK’s housing crisis.