A Labour councillor seeking re-election to his local ward in Newham has reported a Green Party challenger to the police, claiming there has been “a potential case of election fraud” due to the Green candidate providing the council with incorrect information about where he lives.
In an email to the Met’s designated officer dealing with electoral law, Steve Brayshaw, who is defending his seat in Royal Victoria ward for Labour, claims that the Greens’ Rob Callender “submitted a false address in his nomination papers”.
Brayshaw points out to the Met officer that although Callender’s nomination statement – which is published on the council’s website (reproduced below) and has already appeared on ballot papers to postal vote applicants – lists him as residing at an “address in Royal Victoria”, the electoral register shows that he lives in a block of flats in North Woolwich within the neighbouring Royal Albert ward.
Brayshaw informs the Met officer that he regards the situation as “a criminal matter” relating to the Section 65A of the Representation of the People Act.
Providing a false statement on a nomination paper in England or Wales can result in an election win being invalidated, an unlimited fine, up to one year in prison or both.
Callender, who was the Greens’ candidate for Mayor of Newham in 2022 and fought the local West Ham & Beckton parliamentary seat for his party in the 2024 general election, has previously described himself as living in North Woolwich. A campaign video for his Royal Victoria campaign this year, uploaded to Instagram on 16 April (pictured above), states only that he lives “in the Royal Docks” area rather than specifying the Royal Victoria ward.
He also contested Royal Victoria ward in 2022 alongside running for Mayor. In that year his nomination statement home address information was “address in Newham”.
Speaking to On London, Brayshaw called on Callender to “immediately publicly acknowledge that he has provided voters in Royal Victoria with misleading information, correct the record with Newham Council and stand down”. He reiterated his view that “the police need to take action”.
The London Green Party has been approached for comment. Meanwhile, another Newham Green candidate, Rajeev Kumar, debating Brayshaw on a private Royal Victoria Docks Facebook page, has acknowledged that Callender lives in Royal Albert ward but added: “As I know for a fact, this is a simple mistake made when someone else finalised the form. It happened due to that person’s confusion.”
Brayshaw’s initiative over Callender is taking place amid confusion and dispute about Newham Council’s stewardship of the candidate nomination process and the rules governing information to be provided in the “home address” section of the papers candidates must submit.
Local elections rules for England and Wales state that if a local government candidate prefers his or her full home address to not be published they may instead make known the name of the “relevant area” in which they live, and that for London council elections the “relevant area” is the the borough in which the candidate resides. No other type of area is mentioned as being acceptable.
The same definition of a “relevant area” is used in the homes address guidance for candidates published on the website of the Electoral Commission, the independent agency whose duties include setting standards for how elections are run (below).
In Newham’s case, therefore, the “relevant area” for council candidates would normally be Newham itself and the words “address in Newham” appear on the “homes address” column of the vast majority of nomination statements for the borough’s 24 electoral wards, all of which are on the council’s website (under Statutory Notices).
However, On London has found 16 examples spread across eight wards where neither a candidate’s full home address nor “address in Newham” – or, legitimately, another London borough, where relevant – is listed in the “home address” box.
As well as Callender, these include Shabd Pyari, his Green Party running mate in Royal Victoria. Like Callender, Pyari’s nomination statement specifies “address in Royal Victoria” in the home address section, although On London understands that, unlike Callender, the electoral register lists her as residing in the ward of that name. Every other Green candidate for a Newham Council seat has given their home address as Newham.
Nine of the 16 deviations from the borough name rule are by standalone Independent candidates, raising the possibility that they didn’t know about the “relevant area” rule when filling in their nomination papers. Three are by the small Christian People’s Alliance party, one is by a candidate running under the banner of “Communities United” and one, in Boleyn ward, is by the local Newham Independents’ Party, which is posing a major challenge to Labour’s dominance in much of the borough this year.
In 2023, the Newham Independents Party gained one of Boleyn’s three seats from Labour in a by-election and will hope to win all three on 7 May. The other two Newham Independents Party candidates for Boleyn have “address in Newham” in their nomination statements.
In most of the 16 cases, the home address entry is the name of the ward the candidate is contesting, though three of the standalone Independents have provided the names of other Newham wards and two of them have said they live in areas of London whose names are not those of wards – respectively, “Plaistow”, a suburban part of Newham, and “Ilford”, which is a town in the neighbouring borough of Redbridge.
Brayshaw has represented Royal Victoria ward for Labour since its creation in 2022, its predecessor ward, Royal Docks, since 2009, and has lived in the Royal Victoria ward area throughout that entire period. He argues that Callender and Pyari presenting themselves as residents of Royal Victoria ward gives them an advantage they shouldn’t have, because candidates thought to be unequivocally local can be favoured by some voters over others whose home address information is less specific about where they live.
As well as running for Mayor, Callender contested Royal Victoria ward in 2022, finishing third in the two-seat ward behind Brayshaw and another Labour candidate. The recent increase in the popularity of the Greens means that this year the ward is being seen as a marginal the Greens have a chance of winning.
Two candidates running as Independents in the Labour-held three-seat East Ham South ward, Suhel Rob and Kamal Hussain, whose published home address information is the name of the ward, have jointly posted on TikTok: “Why would you vote [for] a candidate that may not be from your local area. Larger parties send candidates to different areas all the time, so it’s possible they don’t understand East Ham South as much as we do.” Every other candidate for the ward has given their home address as Newham, in line with the rules.
A number of other Labour candidates in Newham are unhappy that opponents’ address details other than their full addresses or the alternative borough address have been accepted by the council and will appear on ballot papers for 7 May. They include Rohit Dasgupta, an incumbent candidate for Canning Town South who lives in the ward and said he believes “the rules are clear: candidates should only publish the local authority area, not a specific ward. How has this been allowed to happen, and what checks or questions were raised during the nomination process?”
However, when approached by On London for comment about the Newham situation, the Electoral Commission said that Returning Officers, the local government officers who administer elections, “must accept nominations at face value” – wording that suggests Returning Officers are not required or able to correct or block home address information that doesn’t adhere to the rules or is demonstrably untrue.
Newham Council responded in a similar way when asked about its stewardship of this year’s elections. A spokesman said: “Nomination papers are accepted on face value, and an incorrect ‘relevant area’ does not invalidate a nomination paper under law.”
Brayshaw told On London that taking this approach “opens the system to confusion and abuse before a vote is cast. Candidates who follow the rules can get penalised by others taking advantage of the fact that no one will stop them from putting literally anywhere as their home address if they think it will help them get more votes. That cannot be fair, and challenging the outcome later is not easy.”
The Electoral Commission told On London, “Returning Officers are responsible for the conduct of the election for their electoral area, ensuring that it is administered effectively and in accordance with the law” and that “This includes administering the nominations process.”
But it added, “Candidates are responsible for ensuring they are eligible to stand and their nomination papers are submitted correctly” and it pointed out that “once a nomination has been accepted by the RO [Returning Officer], it cannot be challenged during the election, though it may be challenged after the election through an election petition”.
