Labour’s Brenda Dacres has been elected as Lewisham’s new mayor – but only one in five residents of the borough cast their vote.
Dacres was deputy mayor to Damien Egan, who stepped down in January to stand in the Kingswood by-election, which he won.
The Deptford councillor won 21,576 votes – 51.5 per cent of the vote – while her closest rival, the Green Party’s Michael Herron, picked up 6,835 votes. Chris Maines, the Liberal Democrat candidate, was third with 4,896.
The Conservatives were beaten into fourth, with 3,784 votes. Workers Party of Britain candidate John Hamilton was fifth with 2,378 votes.
Maureen Martin, for the Christian People’s Alliance, was sixth with 1,233 votes, while Nick Long, an independent, came last with 917 votes.
The turnout was just 20.74 per cent in a poll which had been estimated as costing £635,000. Two of the candidates – Hamilton and Long – ran on platforms to abolish the mayoral system in the borough. Egan won 58 per cent of the vote at the last election, in 2022, which had a 35 per cent turnout.
Lewisham is one of five London boroughs where residents elect a mayor to lead the council, rather than having councillors elect a leader.
Another – smaller – by-election will now need to be held in Deptford ward to replace Dacres as councillor.
Dacres is the third elected mayor in Lewisham, after Egan and Sir Steve Bullock, and the first woman to hold the role. She becomes mayor nearly 10 years after she became a councillor in the old New Cross ward. Her victory was announced at 1.45am on International Women’s Day.
In her acceptance speech, Dacres, who was joined by her parents and son at the count at Knights Academy in Downham, said she would reinstate face-to-face services at the council.
“I’ll build on our Labour legacy by driving out rogue landlords, protecting our green spaces, pushing for the Bakerloo line extension and making our streets safer and healthier for all,” she said.
Dacres told The Greenwich Wire she was “excited and ecstatic” at her victory. She said her first priority would be to “really open up the council to make sure that we are out in the community, that we’re working with our partners to make sure that we’re in and amongst our residents”.
Asked about the low turnout, she said many residents had been unaware of the election.
“When it’s a by-election it’s always difficult to get people out. It always has a lower turnout,” she said.
“I also think it’s been a little bit overshadowed by the budget this week. We’ve been knocking on doors today and people were saying ‘I forgot there was an election today, thanks for reminding me.’
“We just have to keep reminding people that there are elections and to have your say, especially when people fought so hard to get the vote.”
Updated at 11.40am. The Greenwich Wire was the only local media outlet to attend the count.
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