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| Sadiq Khan: on the Tooting trail with Labour's London campaign man | Sadiq Khan: on the Tooting trail with Labour's London campaign man |
| (about 7 hours later) | |
| Inside the Sadiq Khan campaign HQ were parcels of flyers and posters half unpacked, milling volunteers, many stacks of sandwiches, a woman making a joke about “a paper plate crisis” and a great deal of pent up energy. It was Saturday lunchtime in Tooting constituency, the only one of three in the firmly Conservative borough of Wandsworth that Labour holds, and not by all that much. | Inside the Sadiq Khan campaign HQ were parcels of flyers and posters half unpacked, milling volunteers, many stacks of sandwiches, a woman making a joke about “a paper plate crisis” and a great deal of pent up energy. It was Saturday lunchtime in Tooting constituency, the only one of three in the firmly Conservative borough of Wandsworth that Labour holds, and not by all that much. |
| Labour MP Khan’s winning margin in 2010 was just 2,524 votes, though the narrowness of his triumph didn’t lessen the scale of the setback for the Tories. His was one of a bunch of London targets they failed to hit, as the capital declined to swoon over David Cameron’s charms in the numbers he required to secure a Commons majority. | Labour MP Khan’s winning margin in 2010 was just 2,524 votes, though the narrowness of his triumph didn’t lessen the scale of the setback for the Tories. His was one of a bunch of London targets they failed to hit, as the capital declined to swoon over David Cameron’s charms in the numbers he required to secure a Commons majority. |
| This time, Labour is on the attack in London and Khan is in charge of its campaign here. The party has around a dozen seats in its sights and two recent polls say they’re on course to capture eight of them. As well as being a big help to Ed Miliband’s chances of moving into Number 10 this would be richly vindicating for Khan, not only as the capital’s Labour strategist, but also as the man who ran Miliband’s leadership campaign. | This time, Labour is on the attack in London and Khan is in charge of its campaign here. The party has around a dozen seats in its sights and two recent polls say they’re on course to capture eight of them. As well as being a big help to Ed Miliband’s chances of moving into Number 10 this would be richly vindicating for Khan, not only as the capital’s Labour strategist, but also as the man who ran Miliband’s leadership campaign. |
| So there is a lot at stake for him. And that still includes his own back yard. Last time, activists from safe London seats came to Tooting to help hold the Tory tide back. This time, any spare London Labour feet will be pounding the streets of such as Croydon Central or Harrow East, while Khan’s volunteers will be helping out across the border in Battersea. His Conservative challenger, Dan Watkins, will be alive to any sign of wandering attention or complacency. | So there is a lot at stake for him. And that still includes his own back yard. Last time, activists from safe London seats came to Tooting to help hold the Tory tide back. This time, any spare London Labour feet will be pounding the streets of such as Croydon Central or Harrow East, while Khan’s volunteers will be helping out across the border in Battersea. His Conservative challenger, Dan Watkins, will be alive to any sign of wandering attention or complacency. |
| The stacks of sandwiches were on the move. Just up the road, opposite the 1920s, Charles Holden-designed Tooting Bec tube station, stands the handsome Wheatsheaf pub, whose proposed closure Khan has opposed in a high profile local campaign. There, he rallied a room of around 40 volunteers who munched politely between cheers. In a 15-minute off-the-cuff speech he talked a great deal about health, a red hot Labour issue locally with St George’s hospital feeling the financial strain. He also railed against low pay and zero hours contracts: “These are people who every day have to ring their boss and ask if there’s work for them to do. Sometimes they’ll say yes, sometimes they’ll say no. How can you pay your bills, pay your mortgage, organise childcare, make plans?” | The stacks of sandwiches were on the move. Just up the road, opposite the 1920s, Charles Holden-designed Tooting Bec tube station, stands the handsome Wheatsheaf pub, whose proposed closure Khan has opposed in a high profile local campaign. There, he rallied a room of around 40 volunteers who munched politely between cheers. In a 15-minute off-the-cuff speech he talked a great deal about health, a red hot Labour issue locally with St George’s hospital feeling the financial strain. He also railed against low pay and zero hours contracts: “These are people who every day have to ring their boss and ask if there’s work for them to do. Sometimes they’ll say yes, sometimes they’ll say no. How can you pay your bills, pay your mortgage, organise childcare, make plans?” |
| There was some history and a stress on Labour as a movement, which in government had done transformative things: the NHS, social security, and, said Khan the human rights lawyer and shadow justice secretary, legal aid. Labour gave independence to India and Pakistan, said the man whose father came to Tooting from Pakistan and drove a London bus. He mentioned (to applause) Labour in the 1960s abolishing the death penalty and bringing in the first Race Relations Act to combat things that many Tooting residents might have thought little of at the time. Now Tooting had elected, since 2005, an immigrant’s son of Muslim faith. “No one can out-local me,” he later remarked. | There was some history and a stress on Labour as a movement, which in government had done transformative things: the NHS, social security, and, said Khan the human rights lawyer and shadow justice secretary, legal aid. Labour gave independence to India and Pakistan, said the man whose father came to Tooting from Pakistan and drove a London bus. He mentioned (to applause) Labour in the 1960s abolishing the death penalty and bringing in the first Race Relations Act to combat things that many Tooting residents might have thought little of at the time. Now Tooting had elected, since 2005, an immigrant’s son of Muslim faith. “No one can out-local me,” he later remarked. |
| The speech was interesting both for what it said about the candidate and as a metropolitan articulation of we might call the Ed Left: liberal, ecumenical, seeking to embrace a spectrum of citizens who want to get on, give something back and look out for those many who aren’t enjoying much of a share of London’s sometimes spectacular wealth and relentless economic growth. That growth is driving change, social and demographic, which has implications for politicians of all shades. | The speech was interesting both for what it said about the candidate and as a metropolitan articulation of we might call the Ed Left: liberal, ecumenical, seeking to embrace a spectrum of citizens who want to get on, give something back and look out for those many who aren’t enjoying much of a share of London’s sometimes spectacular wealth and relentless economic growth. That growth is driving change, social and demographic, which has implications for politicians of all shades. |
| It has both pros and cons for Labour. The advantage has been a gradual strengthening of its underlying position in many suburbs, especially in the north and west, where the percentages of residents who aren’t well off, are of ethnic minority groups or both has risen this century. Hence a more favourable terrain in such as Barnet, Harrow and Redbridge. The challenge comes in Inner London areas once thought essentially working class and in parts rather run down moving up and up as prosperity has spread and more middle class people have arrived. | It has both pros and cons for Labour. The advantage has been a gradual strengthening of its underlying position in many suburbs, especially in the north and west, where the percentages of residents who aren’t well off, are of ethnic minority groups or both has risen this century. Hence a more favourable terrain in such as Barnet, Harrow and Redbridge. The challenge comes in Inner London areas once thought essentially working class and in parts rather run down moving up and up as prosperity has spread and more middle class people have arrived. |
| This has played out in different ways in different parts of the city: in Hackney, for example, Labour’s grip has stayed as strong as ever even as it’s become more desirable; across town in places like Hammersmith, Fulham and Ealing, where “uplift” has been around for longer, Conservatives have gained ground and many political battles have become closer, fiercer and subtler. | This has played out in different ways in different parts of the city: in Hackney, for example, Labour’s grip has stayed as strong as ever even as it’s become more desirable; across town in places like Hammersmith, Fulham and Ealing, where “uplift” has been around for longer, Conservatives have gained ground and many political battles have become closer, fiercer and subtler. |
| Where does Tooting, south of the river, fit into this picture? “I’ve been coming to Labour Party meetings since I was 15,” said Khan at the start of his speech, “and this is the first time we’ve had smoked salmon sandwiches.” There was laughter. Someone said “gentrification”. Someone else said “Lidl’s”. The comment and the quip displayed awareness of the way Tooting has changed and will go on changing. | |
| Khan says the it lies around the middle of the London gentrification spectrum. Unlike marginal seat areas where property prices are higher, he knows of no Tooting homes that fall into the mansion tax bracket, although a few might not be all that far away. Neither is he too concerned, as colleagues elsewhere might be, about Greens eating into Labour’s vote and letting Tories in through the back door: “I think people here know that it’s a Labour-Tory fight and vote accordingly.” | Khan says the it lies around the middle of the London gentrification spectrum. Unlike marginal seat areas where property prices are higher, he knows of no Tooting homes that fall into the mansion tax bracket, although a few might not be all that far away. Neither is he too concerned, as colleagues elsewhere might be, about Greens eating into Labour’s vote and letting Tories in through the back door: “I think people here know that it’s a Labour-Tory fight and vote accordingly.” |
| Fortified for the fight, the Khan team piled out of the Wheatsheaf and dispersed in groups for an afternoon’s canvassing. Khan himself led his detachment of troops up a hill and into Wandsworth Common ward, which comfortably returned three Conservative councillors last year. The party is hoping to pinch a second seat in neighbouring Earlsfield, where a council by election will be held on general election day. But this was a raid behind enemy lines. | Fortified for the fight, the Khan team piled out of the Wheatsheaf and dispersed in groups for an afternoon’s canvassing. Khan himself led his detachment of troops up a hill and into Wandsworth Common ward, which comfortably returned three Conservative councillors last year. The party is hoping to pinch a second seat in neighbouring Earlsfield, where a council by election will be held on general election day. But this was a raid behind enemy lines. |
| Many doors of pleasant mews dwellings were knocked and a few were opened. The response was pretty encouraging. A woman spoke to Khan of her recovery from a recent, serious illness under NHS care. This was Labour meat and drink: a promise of a vote was in the bag. Another woman confirmed that she would once more support Khan, but was less sure about putting a Labour poster in her window – her neighbours, she thinks, lean the other way. From behind a third door came a man who cheerily announced he thought Khan ought to run for London mayor. | Many doors of pleasant mews dwellings were knocked and a few were opened. The response was pretty encouraging. A woman spoke to Khan of her recovery from a recent, serious illness under NHS care. This was Labour meat and drink: a promise of a vote was in the bag. Another woman confirmed that she would once more support Khan, but was less sure about putting a Labour poster in her window – her neighbours, she thinks, lean the other way. From behind a third door came a man who cheerily announced he thought Khan ought to run for London mayor. |
| “Don’t say that,” joked the candidate. “There’s a journalist here!” | “Don’t say that,” joked the candidate. “There’s a journalist here!” |
| Khan’s interest in succeeding Boris Johnson is well known but not yet publicly declared. Labour’s process for picking its candidate for May 2016 will formally begin just one week after the general election. Khan’s local paper ran a piece a few days ago quoting Tooting voters saying he should make his intentions clear, but the response from Khan himself repeated the line he’s been using now for many months: that his priority is winning Tooting and running Labour’s London campaign; anything else is for after May 7. | Khan’s interest in succeeding Boris Johnson is well known but not yet publicly declared. Labour’s process for picking its candidate for May 2016 will formally begin just one week after the general election. Khan’s local paper ran a piece a few days ago quoting Tooting voters saying he should make his intentions clear, but the response from Khan himself repeated the line he’s been using now for many months: that his priority is winning Tooting and running Labour’s London campaign; anything else is for after May 7. |
| It’s a politician’s answer, but it seemed a bit less slippery when watching Khan in action at close hand. If part of his mind is on City Hall, it wasn’t apparent on Saturday. He seemed to be fizzing for the general election fight. Looked at more cynically, a solid Labour hold in Tooting and eight or more Labour gains elsewhere in the capital could only help him should he indeed decide to seek to become Labour’s mayoral candidate a few days after the big vote. “Yes we Khan” is his Tooting team’s rallying cry. Could be. |
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