Five candidates are standing in next month’s by-election to find a new councillor in Motttingham, Coldharbour & New Eltham ward in what is likely to be a closely-fought contest.
The election was called after John Hills, a long-serving Conservative councillor, died last month at the age of 86.
Roger Tester, a former councillor, will be hoping to succeed Hills for the Conservatives, while local campaigner Nikki Thurlow will be hoping to snatch the seat for Labour to extend its dominance in the borough.
Mark Simpson, who stood for Reform UK in the recent London Assembly election, returns to stand in this poll, while Matt Stratford will represent the Greens. Ulysse Abbate will run as a Liberal Democrat.
The election will be held on Thursday June 13.
Details of the candidates were formally published on Thursday, but had not been added to the council’s web page about the poll by the time this story was published on Monday evening.
While Greenwich is overwhelmingly dominated by Labour, the ward, in the far south of the borough, is in a traditionally Conservative area. Much of the Mottingham area is closer to Bromley than to Woolwich Town Hall.
However, Labour has always been strong on the Coldharbour Estate and the party has found more support elsewhere in recent years. In the last Greenwich Council elections in May 2022 voters chose two Conservative councillors – Hills and party leader Matt Hartley – and one from Labour, Cathy Dowse, who beat Tester to the third seat.
Hills won the borough’s tightest election victory in those elections, winning ten votes more than Labour’s Don Austen.
Since Hills’ death, Greenwich has had 51 Labour councillors, two Conservatives – Hartley and Pat Greenwell in Eltham Town & Avery Hill – and one independent.
While the Conservatives performed poorly in the London mayoral elections earlier this month, observers said that the party had regained some ground in more suburban areas of Greenwich borough. But it is tougher to truly gauge how people might vote – the switch to first-past-the-post for the mayoral election means there will be no official data on vote shares in each ward, something that was available from past elections as they were counted by computer.
Details of the by-election come as the council leader Anthony Okereke reshuffles his cabinet for the following year, with Denise Scott-McDonald – who is standing for Labour in Sevenoaks at the general election – and Matt Morrow losing their positions.
Rachel Taggart-Ryan, a Middle Park & Horn Park councillor, and long-serving Woolwich Arsenal councillor Jackie Smith replace them. Taggart-Ryan will take on community safety and enforcement while Smith – a cabinet member under the previous three council leaders – will take on the business and skills portfolio. Their roles will be confirmed at the council’s annual general meeting on Wednesday.
Details about applying to vote in the Mottingham, Coldharbour & New Eltham by-election, as well as postal and proxy voting, and voter ID, are on the Greenwich Council website.
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