The 2022 City of London Corporation election took place on 24 March 2022 to elect members of the

Court of Common Council The Court of Common Council is the primary decision-making body of the City of London Corporation. It meets nine times per year. Most of its work is carried out by committees. Elections are held at least every four years. It is largely composed o ...

in the

City of London Corporation The City of London Corporation, officially and legally the Mayor and Commonalty and Citizens of the City of London, is the municipal governing body of the City of London, the historic centre of London and the location of much of the United King ...

, England. The election was postponed for a year due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...

Background

Elections to the

, the main decision-making body of the

which governs the

City of London The City of London is a city, ceremonial county and local government district that contains the historic centre and constitutes, alongside Canary Wharf, the primary central business district (CBD) of London. It constituted most of London f ...

, take place every four years. In the previous election in 2017, 95 seats were won by independent candidates and the remaining five by the Labour Party. The election was originally scheduled for 18 March 2021, but was delayed for a year due to the

. It had been proposed that, due to the pandemic, the elections be combined with the 2021 United Kingdom local elections in the rest of England on 6 May. The City's Policy and Resources Committee recommended against this, and suggested July 2021 as an alternative date should the elections need to be postponed.

Electoral system

Most residents of the twenty-five wards of the City of London live in the Aldersgate, Cripplegate, Portsoken and Queenhithe. Residents have one vote each, and businesses have a number of votes that scales with the number of employees. Businesses can appoint one employee as a voter for every five staff up to ten voters, with an additional voter per fifty staff beyond that. Councillors are elected by multi-member first-past-the-post.

Campaign

The Russian state-owned

VTB Bank VTB Bank (; formerly known as ''Vneshtorgbank'', , lit. 'International Trade Bank') is a Russian majority state-owned bank headquartered in various federal districts of Russia; its legal address is registered in St. Petersburg; as of 202 ...

, which had been sanctioned by the UK government over the

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. ...

, nonetheless received a share of votes.

Overall results

The election resulted in Temple and Farringdon Together and the Labour Party winning the same number of seats as they had done in the previous election, with Temple and Farringdon Together on ten seats and Labour on five. The new Castle Baynard Independents won seven seats, with the remaining seats being won by independent candidates. The

Women's Equality Party The Women's Equality Party (WEP) is a feminist political party set up in the United Kingdom in 2015. The idea was conceived by Catherine Mayer and Sandi Toksvig at the Women of the World Festival, when they concluded that there was a need ...

stood candidates but none were successful. One of the victorious independent candidates was Emily Benn, whose grandfather was the Labour MP

Tony Benn Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn (3 April 1925 – 14 March 2014), known between 1960 and 1963 as Viscount Stansgate, was a British politician, writer and diarist who served as a Cabinet minister in the 1960s and 1970s. A member of the Labour Party, ...

Ward results

Statements of persons nominated were published on 1 March. Incumbent councillors are marked with an asterisk (*).

Aldersgate

Aldgate

Andrien Meyers, Tim McNally, David Sales, Mandeep Thandi and Shailendra Umradia stood together under the name "Aldgate Team".

Bassishaw

Billingsgate

Nighat Qureishi and Luis Tilleria stood together under the slogan "Build a Better Billingsgate".

Bishopsgate

Bread Street

Emily Benn stood jointly with Giles Shilson.

Bridge

Broad Street

Shahnan Bakth, Christopher Hayward and Antony Manchester stood jointly.

Candlewick

The incumbent councillors James de Sausmarez and Kevin Everett stood jointly; the other candidates, Christopher Boden and James Bromiley-Davis likewise stood as a pair.

Castle Baynard

Candidates for the Castle Baynard Independents Party are marked CB Independents. Change in voteshare for CB Independents candidates reflect their previous voteshare when running as independents.

Cheap

Coleman Street

Cordwainer

The three candidates, elected unopposed, stood jointly.

Cornhill

Cripplegate

Simon Walsh and Ceri Wilkins stood together jointly.

Dowgate

The incumbent councillors Henry Pollard and Mark Wheatley stood jointly.

Farringdon Within

Farringdon Without

The ten incumbents stood for the Temple and Farringdon Together party, the label they had been elected as in the 2017 election.

Langbourn

Alexander Craggs, Judith Pleasance and Philip Woodhouse stood together jointly.

Lime Street

Portsoken

The election that took place in Portsoken Ward recorded the highest turnout in the entire 2022 Common Council Elections with 57.6% of the electorate casting their vote. The average turnout across the City of London was 36.5%. Two incumbent councillors, Munsur Ali and Jason Paul Pritchard, who were elected as Labour candidates in 2017, stood jointly. John Fletcher and Henry Jones stood jointly. Changes in voteshare are by party for the Labour candidates and by candidate for independent candidates who previously stood as independents.

Queenhithe

Tower

Roger Chadwick, Marianne Fredericks, James Tumbridge and Jason Groves stood jointly as the "Tower Ward Team".

Vintry

Rehana Ameer and Richard Burge stood jointly.

Walbrook

The incumbent councillors, Peter Bennett and James Thomson, stood jointly.

References

{{2022 United Kingdom local elections City of London Corporation elections