Of the eight candidates standing to be elected as mayor of Newham, one is in the Labour Party and three used to be.
Aside from Labour candidate Forhad Hussain, the Green Party’s Areeq Chowdhury, Reform’s Clive Furness and Newham Independents leader Mehmood Mirza are all ex-Labour members.
Not so Terri Bloore, the Conservative Party’s candidate and this, she said, is what makes her different.
In a borough that hasn’t had a single Conservative councillor since 1994, Bloore says reception on the doorstep has been “surprisingly positive”.
“I was taken aback, actually, by some of the comments from residents who have said, I voted Labour all my life, my parents have always voted Labour, yet we need change,” she told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
“There’s a realisation that some of the other mayoral candidates are from Labour, they’ve defected from Labour, and we need change.”
Locally, Bloore says Labour “is not strong on the economy, and is not strong with finances”.
“We’ve seen that with the mishandling of the finances over the last few years in Newham,” she said.
Bloore said that, in contrast, the Conservatives “can be trusted”.
She said: “The fact we’ve got a plan and it’s not just words, what we’re saying is resonating with businesses, the community and residents.”
Pledges to freeze council tax are a bold move at a time when councils across the country are struggling to fund the rising costs of services they’re legally required to provide.
Council finance staff predict that, based on current spending, the town hall will be £15.5million short of what it needs to cover spending by 2029. And that’s assuming council tax rises by 5% each year.
But Bloore says there are other ways of dgenerating cash, such as fining more people for littering and anti-social behaviour, and selling the council’s Docklands headquarters at Royal Albert Dock.
“It’s a £111m pet project from Labour, and it stands practically empty,” she claimed.
“It’s for people who work in the council who could work from home. I’ve walked past many-a-time and it looks derelict, I mean there’s not many people there.
“So, this building could be resold. That would be £111m that could be sold off to freeze the council tax.”
Another thing Bloore would like to see is “a thorough audit of where the money is going” at the council, claiming “there is absolutely no transparency over the current Labour finances”.
She said: “We need to be able to see exactly where that money’s spent, and see the ins and outs. But we’ve not seen that in comparison to other councils.”
The town hall’s current Labour administration says much of the blame for councils’ struggles is because they were “underfunded” by Conservative governments.
Demand for social care, special educational needs services and temporary homelessness accommodation has risen, as have costs. But funding has not kept pace.
Yet Bloore said this is “pushing blame to another party”.
“They’re bound to say that,” she said. “That’s politics 101.”
Instead, Bloore says the council could “prioritise” its relationship with voluntary and communuty groups that could “help alleviate the pressure the council’s under”.
Similar to other candidates, Bloore promises that a Conservative-led council would deliver “safe streets” and a “clean Newham”.
Unlike others, she has also touted plans for a “Newham First” card that could be used to access council services such as libraries, and also give older people discoints at council gyms and for parking.
Yet the parties widely-tipped to gain most from a predicted drop in Labour’s support are the Greens, the Newham Independents and Reform UK, rather than the Tories.
Bloore is sceptical. “If you look through history, there’s been Labour and there’s been the Conservatives, and there’s different smaller parties that have their moments,” she said.
“Those parties wax and wane in terms of popularity, and the fact they’ve not got the experience – they’ve not got the heritage of running a national government, running local government.”
Bloore said the Conservatives are targeting every ward in the borough.
If she does win, the Conservatives would have their first experience of running Newham in the borough’s entire history. But there’s a lot of competition.
Amended by Chaya Star
