Only with the right candidate is Sadiq beatable

There are two schools of thought about whether or not being the Conservative candidate for Mayor of London is a good job or not. Given the long odds on actually winning in the Labour-leaning capital, some view it as essentially a thankless, Sisyphean exercise in profile-building.

To others those long odds are liberating: there’s none of the don’t-drop-the-vase caution that can set in when everyone agrees the race is close. Instead, the candidate actually has a pretty fun gig. They get to tour the city, pitch imaginative policies with the relative freedom of the underdog, and are all but guaranteed second place.

Perhaps that’s why there are so many people tilting for the Tory nomination in 2024: MLAs such as Andrew Boff and Susan Hall; the MP Paul Scully; ex-special advisers Daniel Korski and Samuel Kasumu, and others from the world of business and even the Welsh Parliament.

Yet Tory members in London are not going to be selecting from this broad field. Instead, they will choose only from a three-person shortlist decided by Conservative Campaign Headquarters (CCHQ). Why this abundance of caution?

The national party has the right to screen candidates who want to fight an election under its colours. But in a devolved election, it surely ought to be making as limited an intervention as possible – doing due diligence and excluding applicants with major red flags, whilst leaving London activists as broad a political choice as possible.

Although masked by successive general election victories, one of the big political trends of the past 13 years has been the Conservatives’ retreat in London. Seats that David Cameron either won or came close to winning in 2010 are now Labour strongholds; Westminster North, my own home patch, was a target seat in that election – the Labour MP’s majority is now almost 11,000.

Boris Johnson’s victory in 2012 showed that it is possible for the right candidate to buck that trend. And given the state of the party’s national polling, allowing the London Conservatives more freedom to do their own thing can’t hurt.

Sadiq Khan ought to be beatable. Beyond the most committed Labour partisans, he has proven few people’s idea of a good mayor.

His huge expansion of the Ultra-Low Emission Zone ought to be a real shot in the arm for the Tories, falling as it does much more heavily on their strongholds in outer London than the much less car-dependent centre.

Often, he seems more comfortable playing a fundamentally oppositional role, making impossible demands for the power to fulfil his activists’ fantasies, such as rent control, rather than making best use of the powers he already has.

All that is before we get to the increasingly abject state of the Metropolitan Police, which seems to have given up on investigating normal crime whilst its officers are filmed losing confrontations with petty criminals on the streets.

There’s even scope to make a play for the younger vote. It ought to be a scandal that in the past two years Khan has handed Amy Lamé, his “night czar” a 40 per cent pay rise to £116,925 pro rata despite the ongoing collapse of the capital’s nightlife. A world city has no business closing before midnight.

London deserves a competitive race. But it won’t get one if the Tories stick to more of the same.

Happily, there’s a lot of talent vying for the nomination – and it stretches credulity to think only three of them would be solid candidates. CCHQ should relax its grip on the reins and let the London Conservatives choose their own champion.

Inept policing, Ulez expansion, rising crime: the capital’s mayor should fear the 2024 election. Londoners need to be offered a real choice

Sadiq Khan seems more comfortable playing an oppositional role, making impossible demands for the power to fulfil his activists’ demands