Heavy is the head that wears the crown.

It seems that some in the Labour Party in Newham are determined to pave the way for a Mirza mayoralty.

Clearly, having little else to do, activists have begun to engage in what they do best. Plotting and scheming!

News is leaking out that plans are being made to undermine the Labour mayoral candidate and replace him.

This is going to take some unpacking.

Even the apparatchiks in Labour’s London HQ knew that after seven years of disastrous mismanagement by the current incumbent, she had to go. She was given a face-saving exit in which she could say she was standing down, but everyone knew she had been deselected after being interviewed she was then dropped by the Labour Party.

In her place came Forhad Hussain. Youthful, a family man born and brought up in the borough; a professional with years of experience in industry and this will become more relevant shortly, a Muslim. He is known to be amiable, stable and not given to hissy fits and tantrums.

What was not to like?

Apparently quite a lot as we found out since Hussain has launched his campaign. 

To some members of the Labour Party this sounded very much like a return to the type of Labour Party under Robin Wales. The prospect of a solvent, well managed council that listened to residents seemed to be undesirable to a certain middle class segment of the party faithful.

“… In the New Year edition of Newham Voices, imposed-Labour candidate Forhad Hussain promises “fresh impetus”, but the only policies revealed indicate Labour is returning to the reactionary and car-centric policies of Robin Wales”. You might think that Labour’s chattering classes are more fitted to the Green Party. That may go some way to explaining Labour’s massive decline in popularity, locally and nationally.

Note that Hussain is an “imposed-Labour candidate”, after an interview process  in which he clearly was considered the better candidate than his competition; one Rokhsana Fiaz. For some reason they never referred to Fiaz as the “imposed” candidate in 2022 when she was the beneficiary of the same arrangement. Funny that.

In addition, Hussain had championed the incredible idea that residents in a local area should have some say in the establishment of Low Traffic Neighbourhoods. These are beloved of the chattering, waitrose going, avocado eating classes but not so popular with the majority of working class residents. However, his support for a residents’ voice was sufficient to brand him with the soubriquet “reactionary”; a damning indictment for one on the left.

But it’s all right, dogma is more important than democracy.

And now we come to the meat of the rumours.

Hussain is too much like Wales, he is not ‘green’ enough. He is not what the chattering classes want.

What they want is someone like them.

And into the frame comes Councillor Blossom Young. Her name is being touted as a replacement for Hussain.

New Councillor - Blossom Young

Young has impressed some colleagues in the 18 months since she was elected. That’s right only 18 months, she came onto the council in a by-election in July 2024, which might strike some as a little soon to be thinking of higher office. We do not know whether Young is involved in the attempt at a coup or whether she is merely the name being put forward by others.

But Newham is drifting towards the identity politics of Tower Hamlets. 

In Hussain Labour has a credible candidate and one who will appeal strongly to those in the Bangladeshi community and quite possibly to a wider Muslim constituency. Additionally, he is British born and bred; he knows Newham and will appeal to a wide cross section of the community. This is important. Newham Independents are beginning to release the names of their candidates for May 2026 and we can see that they are dominated by Pakistani men. The Pakistani community is clearly the base upon which they intend to build. 

In 2006 we saw that the anti-war/anti-Labour largely Muslim Respect Party took around 16,000 votes (21%) to Labour’s 29,000 (42%). In the mayor’s election Wales took 48% of the vote (first ballot) and Respect took 22%. When transfers were counted Wales had 68% and Respect had 32%.

Respect gained three councillors. 

Today the Independents are better organised and are untainted by the SWP; they have amassed a slate of experienced former Labour activists and councillors and should be confident of gaining around 20 seats, (they of course would say more). Mehmood Mirza is the only candidate who currently can offer a serious challenge to Labour for the mayoralty. Pay no attention to the Newham Greens trying to get involved from the sidelines. On May the 8th (the day after the local elections) the Mayor of Newham will either be a Newham Independent or Labour!

Looking cynically at the prospects, why would undecided Muslim voters choose a middle class white woman who is pursuing unpopular anti-car policies loved by the boroughs out of touch middle classes over Mehmood Mirza, a Muslim man who has pledged to get rid of them?

We can only draw one conclusion from the latest shenanigans. It seems that the Green-Labour faction would rather lose the mayoral contest than have a Labour candidate who does not share their priorities.  

The final Part of the puzzle that gives these rumours legs, is the involvement of one James Asser MP. In the years prior to Fiaz becoming the mayor, James Asser was a pro-Wales activist. This quickly changed once the Fiaz regime came to power. 

Wales was instrumental in getting Asser selected as a council candidate. It didn’t take him long to see which way the wind was blowing. We saw Asser appointed at first as a cabinet member in the Fiaz administration and then as statutory deputy mayor. As many readers will be aware Asser was appointed deputy mayor after Fiaz was imposed as the candidate by an NEC panel. James Asser at the time was a member of the very same NEC. 

We cannot say that he aided Fiaz in her bid to be re-selected in 2022 however we can say that shortly after she was reselected he got a promotion, draw from that what you will!

In recent times (since he entered Parliament) it seems that Asser has cooled to the idea of Fiaz getting a third term. 

We can not say for sure that Asser was a supporter of Hussain's bid to be selected however we do know that he did not object and seemed to be broadly supportive of the change, until now. Whispers from inside the Labour Party suggest that things have changed.

Asser was the cabinet member for Environment and Sustainable Transport, he presided over the largest rollout of LTN’s in Newham’s history additionally he at one time supported the emissions based parking charge. 

So, you can see how he would maybe not be happy that the new Labour candidate is changing course and listening to residents rather than following a doctrinaire line.

Asser has already stuck the knife into two Newham Mayors; is he about to go for a hat-trick and team up with the small group of vocal middle classed councillors and Labour activists who are opposed to the idea of Hussain giving residents a voice in decisions that affect them. 

The likelihood of Hussain being deposed are remote. But it is evident is that Labour Party members cannot restrain their impulse to scheme and plot even when they are facing the most serious challenge to Labour’s dominance in the history of the borough. It’s playing politics and Labour is likely to bear the cost.

A vision of the future? Mayor Mehmood Mirza.

The clear winner from all this plotting is Cllr Mehmood Mirza and his mayoral campaign team who will be hoping that Labour continues to eat itself from inside out.