Southwark has more than 14,000 households on the waiting list for a council home and 3,000 in temporary accommodation.(1) The Labour-led council’s plan to tackle its housing crisis includes building new homes on green spaces and other communal areas on its council estates, a practice known as “infilling”.

It’s now over three weeks since the Green Party’s record results in the London elections, and we’ve been reflecting on what the gains mean for us as a party, and on the changing political landscape in our city.

Green Party candidate for Lambeth & Southwark celebrates a game-changing result with GP Lambeth Councillor, Scott Ainslie.

First and foremost a massive thank you to Green Party campaigners and candidates across Southwark and London. These monumental efforts saw voters seize their chance to vote Green outside the usual first-past-the-post system, where Labour and Conservatives inevitably dominate. The London List vote in the Assembly elections is proportional, making a Green vote far more than a gesture of support. Greens came second on this ballot paper, ahead of the Tories and with more than double the votes of the Lib Dems. This helped to give us a third member on the London Assembly: Zack Polanski now joins Siân Berry and Caroline Russell at City Hall, where he’s hit the ground running, pushing mayor Sadiq Khan on proposals for a Citizens Assembly for London.

Even in the first-past-the-post constituency vote, the Green Party in Southwark and Lambeth secured brilliant results. Our candidate, Southwark Greens’ Claire Sheppard, gained 19.7% of the vote, overtaking the Conservatives, to come second to Labour. Ours was one of only two constituencies where the Labour-Tory stranglehold was broken, the other being North East London, where Caroline Russell was in second place to Labour.

% of votes for the Green Party Constituency Candidates in London and in S&L constituency, 2012 - 2021

% votes for Green Party ('List Vote') in London and in S&L constituency, 2012 - 2021

The vote for mayor – under the supplementary vote system – consolidated the Greens’ position as London’s third party. Siân Berry received 11.5% of first-choice votes compared with 8.8% in 2016, and a massive 28% of second-preference votes – the most for any candidate, clearly indicating that Siân and the Green Party can and do get support from across the political spectrum.