Betting on politics

With the local elections a fortnight away, both punters and bookmakers alike remain convinced that Sadiq Khan is a near certainty to be re-elected as London’s mayor. With £530,683 matched on Betfair, Khan is at 1.03 (97%) to win, with the Conservative Susan Hall at 28 (3.6%) to pull off a shock upset, and Reform’s Howard Cox at 380 (0.02%). Similarly, the best odds that you can get on Khan is 1/25 (96.1%) on Bet 365.

I can’t see how Sadiq Khan can lose, but I’ve made it a rule not to tip bets at odds that are shorter than 1/10, so if you didn’t take my earlier advice to bet on the current mayor, it’s sadly too late. The good news is that Ladbrokes has also put up several side markets. These include a market on Khan’s share of the vote, one on who will come third and a special on whether Khan’s margin will be bigger than Ken Livingstone’s first-round margin of 11.9% in 2000.

The last three polls have given Khan large leads of 13%, 18% and 24% over Hall. Still, it’s important to remember that they ended up slightly overestimating Labour’s support in his last two campaigns, especially in 2021 when a double-digit firstround lead ended up being less than 5%. So although Khan will probably win by more than 11.9%, the 2/7 (77.8%) odds offered by Ladbrokes just aren’t tempting enough.

That said, I think Khan should do well from the national swing against the Tories and the fact that Hall is generally seen as a weak candidate. The fact that the election is being run under first past the post means that many of those who would normally have supported the Greens or Liberal Democrats may also end up voting tactically for Khan.

I’d therefore take Ladbrokes 5/4 (44.9%) on him getting between 45% and 50% of the vote.