Jeremy Corbyn’s Your Party could contest London Mayoral race in 2028

The former Labour Party leader, who now heads up the left-wing Your Party, said he will be in talks with the Green Party and various independent groups about the strategy for the election in 18 months’ time.Zack Polanski’s Greens are the only major challenging entity not to have started their candidate selection process yet. Lord Sadiq Khan is the current Mayor of LondonGettyShould the current Mayor of London decide not to stand again for a fourth term in office, the Labour Party race to succeed Lord Khan is expected to be wrapped up in the spring.In an exclusive interview with the LDRS, Mr Corbyn told My London’s new podcast The London Brief: “We’ll be in discussion with the Greens, with the various independent groups around London – and earlier this year in the council elections, we worked very closely with independent groups supporting their candidates.“We worked with the independents in Enfield, in Redbridge, in Newham, in Tower Hamlets, as well as many outside London including in Kirklees, in Blackburn, Southport, and so on.“And so I think we’ll be in discussion with them about how best to approach the Mayoral election.”Your Party candidates only contested five wards across four boroughs in London at this year’s local elections. None were elected, with the Green Party hoovering up most of the progressive vote in the capital.But Mr Corbyn said that Your Party has enjoyed steady growth in London, and will soon have branches in 20 boroughs.“That’s two-thirds of London, and then we’ll move on from there,” he said.“The principle behind the branches is they’ve got to be locally open campaigning branches, local forums with the involvement of the community.”Jeremy Corbyn speaking with Kumail Jaffer on the podcastAna Garcia Sancho/MyLondonThis includes already established independent groups such as the Redbridge Independents and Aspire in Tower Hamlets, the party of Mayor Luftur Rahman.Read MoreYour Party ranches will work with such groups to develop “pan-London policies ahead of the 2028 Mayoral election”, Mr Corbyn confirmed.Khalid Sadur, the Your Party branch officer for Enfield, said: “We’re still a new party – it takes a lot of effort and time to build up the infrastructure.“I absolutely want a Your Party candidate [to be there] for people to be able to vote for in in 2028.”In 2023, Mr Corbyn told an event at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival that he would “have a think” about standing as an independent candidate for City Hall himself.Mr Corbyn he would not rule out running for another term in office, telling the LDRS: “I’m here with the people.”