Tomorrow, the Green Party’s leader, Zack Polanski will unveil the party’s candidate for the Manchester mayoral by-election – Geraldine Coggins. This comes after the party lost its deposit in Makerfield, garnering just 0.7 per cent of the vote. Coggins is the leader of the Green Party group on Trafford Council. Earlier today, the Greater Manchester Combined Authority announced that the mayoral vote will take place on 30 July, leaving Westminster watching and waiting for the result of yet another by-election.
“Makerfield has felt weird,” Polanski told me when we spoke last weekend. The Greens got off to a false start. The candidate initially selected by the party – Chris Kennedy – was forced to withdraw from the race after 24 hours over previously reposting comments on X which suggested that attacks on Jewish ambulances in north London were a “false flag attack”. Just over three weeks out from the campaign, Sarah Wakefield was selected. She placed fifth, with 308 votes.
Party insiders suggest that the performance in Makerfield was down to a pared-back campaign. One told me: “We’ve basically spent this entire period prepping for the mayoral race.” They explained that even if “you suspect Burnham might disappoint people, you’re blocking everyone’s idealised version of Burnham that never has the chance to disappoint anyone”.
The Greens have not been operating in secret either. In a post on Bluesky from 15 days ago, the Green Councillor announced to her followers that she would be running for selection as the party’s candidate in the Manchester mayoral race. She was selected earlier this week, beating two other Manchester-based candidates.
The party is now briefing that the race for the Manchester mayoralty is a straight fight between them and Reform. At the May local elections, Reform won 31 per cent of the vote compared to 23 per cent for Labour and 19 per cent for the Greens. Reform is likely to throw the kitchen sink at winning the mayoral race too. As I reported previously, the party plans to send its chief organiser in London, Elfrede Brambley-Crashaw up to run the campaign. The party has already bought campaign ads which it will release in Greater Manchester today (19 June).
Last Saturday, Polanski described the race as “27 Gorton and Dentons”. But winning the whole of Manchester is a very different beast to winning Gorton and Denton; it will include seats like Makerfield. Labour, freshly galvanised by the return of Andy Burnham, will be ready to map their new blueprint for beating Reform onto the whole of Greater Manchester. And with Burnham back in the fold, will disaffected Labour voters who have lent Polanski their vote return to their old party?
[Further reading: Who would win a Manchester Mayoral by-election?]
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