Jackson Caines is the latest independent candidate to stand for the council

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IF there is an election in Islington, the trend now shows that there will be independent candidates on the ballot paper – and that will be the case again when residents go to the polls later this month to pick a new councillor.

Jackson Caines, affiliated to no political party, has stepped forward as a contender for the Junction ward contest on November 28. He is backed by the group of Islington independents who form the official opposition to Labour’s dominant majority at the Town Hall.

He told the Tribune that he felt Labour councillors would “not be willing” to challenge Sir Keir Starmer’s government.

Mr Caines described himself as a disaffected Labour supporter who left the party in 2021 and said that residents should be looking for more in their council representatives.

“Labour councillors in Islington are not politically able or willing to stand up and demand things from the Labour government,” he said.

“The need for independents to freely hold the council and central government to account is really important.”

The vacancy in Junction ward opened up after Kaya Comer-Schwartz, the now former leader of the council, stepped down to take a job with Mayor of London Sadiq Khan last month.

Mr Caines will be one of two independents on the ballot paper. As the Tribune reported last week, long-standing leaseholders campaigner Dr Brian Potter is also standing.

Mr Caines was selected by a group of Junction residents at a meeting last week, and said that the current independent movement in Islington is a “grassroots reaction to Labour’s transformation into a more right-wing party”.

Here, Mr Caines pointed to the Labour government’s decision to cut the winter fuel payment, disability allowance, and its response to Israel’s assault on Gaza, adding “They’re doing lots that people are upset about. They are already a very unpopular government and we get a sense on the doorstep that there’s not much love or enthusiasm for Labour”.

Asked whether his campaign relied on voter disappointment with national government rather than addressing problems closer to home, Mr Caines was quick to say he was running on a platform of “local and hyper-local” issues as well.

He said his priorities include taking on rogue landlords, pushing for housing repairs, opposing the proposed 27-storey tower block in Archway, and defending the Whittington Hospital.

On housing, Mr Caines said the council should be doing more for private renters and council tenants, and that a Labour central government meant the council were now “out of excuses”.

He said: “With council homes, the housing ombudsman found that they were responsible for ‘severe maladminis­tration’.

“A year later, and we’re still seeing severe cases of mould and damp across the borough. Where’s the transformation?”

Having previously been a frontline housing officer at Hackney Council, Mr Caines is now working as a housing campaigner for charity Harrow Law Centre.

“I really believe in fighting alongside ordinary people and empowering them,” he said. “This could be a test run for a broader movement which is about building a really vibrant, grassroots, democratic movement that fights for these values of justice, equality and human rights.”

Ms Comer-Schwartz had started her spell at Islington by winning a by-election in the ward in March 2013 – gaining the seat from the Liberal Democrats, who at that time had enjoyed a decade with elected councillors in the area.

You have to go back to the end of the 1960s since the Tories had any success there.

Independent candidate Alison Stoecker claimed second place to Labour in the Hillrise by-election in August.

Junction by-election candidates’ list

Jackson Caines (Independent)
Rebecca Jones (Liberal Democrats)
Bill Martin (The Socialist Party of Great Britain)
Devon Osborne (Green Party)
Brian Potter (Independent)
James Potts (Labour)
John Wilkin (Conservative)

Vote takes place on November 28