Current Projected Seat Count
LABOUR
11 -1
CONSERVATIVES
8 ±0
GREEN
4 +2
LIBERAL DEMOCRATS
2 +1
REFORM
0 new
Current Seat Count
Forecast Seat Count
Overview
The London Assembly is a deliberative body that scrutinises the London Mayor, rather than a legislative one like in Scotland and Wales. As such, the results here don't have any bearing on the formation of City Hall's Executive. However, it does impact how easy it is for the Mayor to pursue their agenda.
Labour have held 12 of the 25 seats in the Assembly since 2012 but we currently forecast them to lose 1 seat this election. The Conservatives are expected to to hold their 8 their Assembly seats, their joint worst result with 2016.
The Liberal Democrats are forecast to gain 1 seats, bringing them up to 2, and the Green Party are expected to gain 2, up to 4. This would be the best result ever for the Green Party. UKIP are expected to lose both their seats.
Seats are allocated both by First Past The Post and Proportional Representation. There are 14 constiuencies that use FPTP and with the remaining 11 seats allocated London-wide to make the London Assembly composition more representative of the vote.
Constituencies
Additional Seats
Seats Forecast to Change Hands
West Central
FORECAST: Labour gain from Conservatives
Majority: 9.5%
Past Elections
2008
CON
2012
CON
2016
CON
West Central London has historically been very Conservative, but this is an area that has seen dramatic shifts in the past few years. It includes the London boroughs of Hammersmith and Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea, and the City of Westminster. All these boroughs have been trending towards Labour since 2016, though to varying degrees. Hammersmith is generally Labour, with the Council being the most Labour it has been since 1990, and the Westminster seat Hammersmith in 2017 went the most Labour it had been since 1966 and only had a small 0.7% swing to the Tories in 2019.
Kensington and Chelsea is the most Conservative borough of Inner London with Conservatives holding both Westminster seats and 35 of the 50 council seats. However, this masks the changes going on in the borough, with Kensington famously being one of the unexpected Labour gains in the 2017 General Election on a 10.6% swing, and the Tories gaining the seat back in 2019 on just a 0.2% swing. Chelsea and Fulham spans both Kensington and Chelsea, and Hammersmith and Fulham and shows a more muddled trend. There was a 10.3% swing towards Labour in 2017, but in 2019 the Liberal Democrats went up by almost 15% into second place, primarily taking votes from Labour, and the resulting Labour to Conservative swing was 3.7%. Labour also struggled to find any breakthrough in the borough council in 2018, gaining just 1 seat on a smaller 5.4% swing.
Westminster is the final borough that makes up this seat and it is somewhere in between the other two politically. Westminster North has been a Labour seat since 1997 and, similarly the rest of West Central, saw a 10.8% swing to Labour in 2017 and just a small 0.7% swing back to the Conservatives in 2019. Cities of London and Westminster is more similar to Chelsea and Fulham, however, in that it has never gone Labour and, despite a 9.3% swing to Labour in 2017, saw a Lib Dem surge in 2019 at the expense of Labour (with a resulting 2.3% swing from Labour to the Conservatives). Similarly to Kenginston and Chelsea, however, the 2018 Westminster City Council election was something of a disappointment for Labour as they only gained 3 seats from the Tories on just a 2.9% swing to Labour.
This trend towards Labour began before 2017 in fact. West Central had a 5.2% swing to Labour in 2016, and was the best result ever for Labour in this seat and the second worst result for the Conservatives. This seat is trending fast towards Labour and with just a 4.8% swing from the Tories needed to take this seat, this should be a gain for them.
