With just days to go until the local elections, political parties across Lambeth have published their manifesto pledges detailing how they would run the council over the next four years. Across the 25 wards in Lambeth, a total of 309 candidates are hoping to win one of the 63 seats on Lambeth Council. Labour, the Liberal Democrats, and the Conservatives each field 63 candidates, contesting every seat. The Green Party has 62 nominees. Reform UK has 37 candidates, the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition has nine, and seven independents are also standing. Three candidates represent the Socialist Party, while one Christian Peoples Alliance candidate and one Social Democratic Party candidate are running as well.
Current Council Makeup
In the 2022 local election, Labour won 58 seats, the Liberal Democrats three, and the Greens two. Since then, the Greens gained two more councillors through a by-election in May 2025 and after a suspended Labour councillor joined them. Another suspended Labour councillor now sits as an independent, and one Labour councillor defected to the Lib Dems in November 2025.
Expert Analysis
Professor Tony Travers of the London School of Economics said Labour could lose overall control but remains likely to be the largest party. He noted threats from the Liberal Democrats in areas like Oval and from the Greens elsewhere. Pollsters More in Common identify Lambeth as one of five inner London boroughs where Labour faces Green challenges, alongside Hackney, Newham, Southwark, and Islington.
Conservative Party
Crime and Safety
- Lead a borough-wide campaign encouraging reporting of every crime.
- Strengthen Neighbourhood Watch, WhatsApp groups, and MetEngage platform use.
- Push for additional police officers and PCSOs, prioritising crime hotspots like Clapham High Street.
Housing
- Tackle the repairs backlog with a 'Repair Blitz'.
- Reduce non-decent homes from 22% to 10% within 2.5 years, and to 5% within 4 years.
- Reform housing service with strict accountability and time limits.
Transport and Environment
- Reinstate a Cabinet Member for Transport.
- Campaign for Streatham transport infrastructure funding.
- Lobby TfL for three extra Northern Line trains per hour at peak times.
Local Economy
- Work with BIDs to create a Small Business Action Panel.
- Support high street regeneration with better transport, cleaner streets, and targeted investment.
Schools
- Support high-performing schools wishing to expand.
- Work with schools facing falling enrolment to minimise disruption.
- Establish a new SEND school with neighbouring boroughs.
Green Spaces
- Organise regular community clean-ups.
- Repair or replace damaged sports equipment quickly.
- Limit excessive commercial use of parks, ensuring transparency and community benefit.
Labour
Crime and Safety
- End rough sleeping by 2030.
- Expand drug and alcohol outreach to seven days a week.
- Establish a Hate Crime Commissioner and Police Scrutiny Panel.
- Continue investing in VAWG services.
- Introduce neighbourhood officers to tackle anti-social behaviour.
Housing
- Build 4,000 social and affordable homes by 2035.
- Invest £200 million in council home improvements.
- Tackle bad landlords and set up a renters' rights team.
Transport and Environment
- Introduce London's first family car-sharing permits.
- Double cycle hangars and increase EV chargers.
- Protect bin collections, introduce free community skip days, and raise fly-tipping fines to £1,200.
- Introduce an enforcement van to collect e-bikes.
Local Economy
- Invest over £30 million yearly in cost-of-living support.
- Pay a grant for lower-income young people to stay in post-16 education.
- Scrap complex trader parking permits.
- Use High Street Rental Auction powers to bring empty shops back into use and campaign against gambling firms.
Schools
- Expand mentoring, support teachers, and work towards smartphone-free schools.
- Increase specialist SEND spaces, including a new site at Kings Avenue School.
- Roll out free breakfast clubs in every primary school, expand free school meals, and help with uniform costs.
Green Spaces
- Continue investing in parks and expand tree planting.
Leisure and Culture
- Free gym and swim for under-16s.
- Invest in adventure playgrounds, youth clubs, and safe community spaces.
- Invest in libraries and bring council services into them.
Social Care
- Combine youth work, children's centres, early help, and family support into a single service.
- Introduce carer parking permits.
- A £200 First Steps grant for new parents.
Liberal Democrats
Crime and Safety
- Partner with police on active CCTV monitoring in crime hotspots.
- Keep police station front counters open.
- Bring back lost youth facilities designed by young people.
Housing
- Build new social housing and bring empty homes back into use.
- Pay contractors for finished jobs with tenant sign-off before payment.
Transport and Environment
- Encourage public transport, provide safe walking and cycling routes, support car sharing.
- Expand EV charging, cycle parking, and e-bike bays.
- Impound abandoned e-bikes at operator cost.
Local Economy
- End hikes to parking permit fees with fairer charges.
Green Spaces
- Plant more trees, repair pavements, clean streets.
- Launch regular 'mega-skip' rounds and catch fly-tippers.
Social Care
- Back home carers and involve people in care plans.
- Offer home safety checks for elderly and disabled.
- Support domestic abuse refuges.
- Protect children with early family support.
Green Party
Crime and Safety
- Support a public health approach to drugs and knife crime.
- Push for end of live facial recognition by police.
- Investigate and campaign against stop and search.
- Demand justice for those killed in police custody.
Housing
- Ballot residents on estate regeneration schemes.
- Pause and review all housing demolitions, removing threats to South Lambeth, Cressingham Gardens, Central Hill, and Fenwick Estates.
- Prioritise building and retrofitting energy-efficient council homes.
- Develop a plan to retrofit all homes in Lambeth.
Transport and Environment
- Lobby for reliable east-west public transport in South London.
- Facilitate car-sharing schemes to replace Zipcar.
- Make junctions safer for the hard of seeing with audible warnings.
- Introduce secure cycle parking at all rail stations.
- Introduce school streets around every school.
- Support better EV and bike charging.
- Electrify council fleet.
- Retrofit council buildings with insulation.
- Support local renewable energy projects.
Local Economy
- Make high streets single-use-plastic-free.
- Promote employment for disabled residents.
- Support small independent businesses and local procurement.
Schools
- Reintroduce EMA-style grants for post-16 education.
- Introduce a dedicated youth worker in every school.
- Reduce traffic and improve air quality near schools.
- Support SEND children based on need.
- Invest in youth work and forest schools.
Green Spaces
- Prevent privatisation of parks.
- Plant thousands of trees and protect existing green spaces.
- Offer longer leases to community groups managing parks.
Leisure and Culture
- Invest in playgrounds, adventure parks, and sporting facilities, expand free gym and swim.
- Review licensing and planning to bring back lost venues and pubs.
Social Care
- Expand support for care leavers: free laptop and WiFi, improved grants, automatic GP and dentist registration, stable housing with minimum three-year tenancy.
- Introduce a Care Experience Accountability Panel led by care-experienced adults.
- Guarantee disabled residents access to digital technology and support.
- Review social care services to be fully accessible and responsive.
Reform UK
Reform UK has not published a local manifesto. Nationally, the party pledges to keep council tax low and place migrant detention centres in areas that vote Green, while keeping them out of Reform-voting areas. It also wants mandatory display of the Union Flag and a picture of the King in schools.
