My stance doesn’t really make sense from the outside: I’ll give you that. Objectively, it is odd that I am delighted that James Cleverly will, unless something dramatic and entirely unexpected happens, be the Conservatives’ candidate for the London mayoral election in 2028. I’ve absolutely no interest in voting for him in two years’ time.
I’ve actually tried to think of policies he could offer in order to gain my unquestioning support – calling them “unrealistic” would somehow still not cover it. Could James Cleverly ensure that I win the lottery and buy a million-pound townhouse in a well-heeled spot in town? Would he be able to teleport every prat on a loud motorbike straight into the middle of the Sahara, where they won’t annoy anyone with their deafening brrr brrr brrrs? If not, then he simply will not be able to count on my support.
Still, I am genuinely glad he’s running, and I promise my reasoning is… well, reasonable. Firstly: as a Londoner, it pleases me that the Conservatives – once the natural party of government – are putting up a candidate who doesn’t make me want to claw my own eyes out. Both Shaun Bailey and Susan Hall were embarrassments, and showed that the Tories had entirely stopped caring about the capital anyway. How else to explain the non-existent calibre of the people they put forward in 2021 and 2024?
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That their man is now someone who spent a certain amount of time in the cabinet, and didn’t entirely make a mess of his time there, is a welcome development. It’s entirely possible to believe that, sure, our media and political sphere spend too much time focused on London, at the expense of everywhere else – but there is only a small sliver of the capital they genuinely pay attention to. London as a complicated, messy, unequal city of millions just doesn’t capture the imagination of much of our elites.
This conveniently brings me to my second point, which is that politicians are only ever as good as the opponents standing against them. I like Sadiq Khan and believe he has done an entirely decent job as our mayor, but am not convinced that his tenure has given us the best his office can offer. Sure, his achievements on Ulez and air pollution ought to be applauded, but there just isn’t a lot more to be thankful for.
Though national governments must take on more of the blame than City Hall, it’s clear that the capital just hasn’t had a great time over the past decade or so. The housing situation is dire beyond words, pubs and clubs are closing everywhere because no one can afford them, and people just aren’t as optimistic about their future as they once were. The London I moved to in 2009 felt full of possibilities, and the one I’m writing from today makes me feel absurdly grateful for being one of the few people still having a good time.
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This is something that should be talked about, passionately and at length, by people everyone else will actually listen to. By picking a high-profile candidate who actually knows how to campaign, the Tories are, I hope, going to force the Labour party to redouble their efforts, and make sure that they pull out all the stops on the run-up to May 2028. In the same vein, I believe it would benefit everyone here if the Greens were to pick someone serious and impressive as their man – or woman – in the capital.
A proper, intense contest will not solve every single one of our issues, but it may at least put an end to this vague sense of complacency, and belief that London can either be vilified or ignored, but never treated as a regular city worthy of attention. For once: I can’t wait to see what happens next.
