Zack Polanski urged Londoners to “vote Green, make history” as he sought to radically redraw London’s political map.
The Green Party leader stressed he was aiming to break Labour’s “stronghold” grip on the capital where it has run many councils for decades.
With polls predicting major Green gains at the May 7 local elections, he said he was “very confident” that Green candidate Zoe Garbett would become Mayor of Hackney.
In an exclusive interview with the Standard, Mr Polanski also:
- Said the Greens would aim to end the “doom loop” of Londoners being stung by high rents and hefty bills meaning they had little money to spend in the city.
- To tackle London’s housing crisis, he called for action to stop developers “land banking” rather than building new homes.
- Defended wealth taxes, which would hit London hardest, to raise billions to reduce inequality in the city.
- Backed RMT strikers who have caused travel misery with walkouts on the Tube
- Accepted that the Greens, like other parties, needed to do more to confront antisemitism after the Golders Green stabbings and string of arson attacks on London’s Jewish communities.
Speaking less than 24 hours before the polls were due to open on May 7, Mr Polanski had a clear message to Londoners.
“Vote Green and make history,” he said.
“We have a toxic combination right now of low wages and high bills.
“People in London are really struggling and they need to know that they have councillors who are out there batting for them every single day, protecting local services, making sure we're investing in the community, that we have council homes, homes that people can actually afford to live in in London.”
While he was optimistic that the Greens would win the Hackney mayoralty, he was more cautious at predicting his party gaining overall control of any boroughs.
“It's important to say that in the last set of London elections, our best set ever, we won less than 1% of seats,” he said.
“So the Green Party have traditionally underperformed in London, and that's because Labour have had such a stronghold for so long.
“That stronghold looks like it's about to break,” he added, saying he expected Hackney Council to at least go to no overall control.
The Greens are also expected to do well in a string of other London boroughs including Lewisham, Lambeth and Waltham Forest.
Predicting record results for the Greens nationwide, Mr Polanski said: “I'm not complacent, and no party is entitled to people's vote.
“I just know everywhere that I'm going, in London, people are stopping me constantly... to say that they're feeling hopeful and they're feeling inspired and, actually, they're not voting just to stop something, which is the Labour Party and Reform.
“They're actually voting for something. They're voting for a party that wants to lower bills, that wants to make London an affordable city to live in.”
Tackling inequality in the city is a flagship Green policy.
It would be at least partly funded by higher taxes on the wealthy, under Green plans for a proposed £50 billion extra in levies raked in by the Treasury.
The Greens are proposing a 1% tax on assets of £10 million or more, or a 2% tax on assets of £1 billion or more.
They are also arguing for capital gains tax to be brought in line with income tax.
The two moves would disproportionately impact London given its wealth, as is happening with Labour’s “mansion tax”.
Defending the proposals, Mr Polanski said: “It's just recognizing that if you have an asset in this country and we have struggling public services, then it makes sense that the people with the broader shoulders face the biggest burden.”
Highlighting the huge wealth divide in the city, he added: “You could be a cleaner cleaning a building, you could be paying more in tax proportionally than the person who owns that building.
“That's deeply unfair.”
On housing, he dismissed as “nonsense” Sir Keir Starmer’s criticism that the Greens are blocking desperately needed new homes.
“If you look at the numbers, the places that have been blocked have often been blocked by other parties too, and often they've been blocked for good reasons,” he argued.
“We've seen so many examples where the housing that's being suggested is going to destroy green space, is going to be unaffordable or is the wrong tenure.”
He demanded action to stop property developers “sitting on land because they'd rather the value of the land becomes their asset or makes a profit for them, rather than actually investing in the homes that Londoners need”.
In the run-up to the election, Mr Polanski clashed with Metropolitan Police chief Sir Mark Rowley after he shared a social media post accusing officers of using excessive force when arresting the suspected Golders Green attacker.
He apologised for raising the issue on social media but stood by his stance, saying: “As a politician who's elected to the London Assembly, part of my job is to scrutinize the police.”
He said the Green Party would improve its vetting of candidates as part of moves to crack down on antisemitism, saying some would-be-councillors had expressed comments which were “utterly unacceptable” but insisting this was a “handful of cases”.
On crime, he called for a shake-up of resources.
“Far too often, for instance, police will be stop and searching people for cannabis use,” he said.
“That's indiscriminately racist, because I think the statistics are something like a young black person is eight times more likely to be stopped and searched than a white peer, whereas we should be investing that money in making sure that we are stopping things like mobile phone theft.”
He argued that the RMT strikes on the Underground were about “worker safety,” even though the Aslef union accepted the proposals from Transport for London for a four-day week for drivers, praising it as an excellent deal.
He urged TfL and the RMT to “get around the table” to resolve the dispute.
