At 7pm on 22nd April, London’s challenger party candidates gathered at US&Co in EC3 to present their competing visions for London. Representatives from the Renew Party, Animal Welfare Party, Rejoin EU and Burning Pink attended the event, which was live streamed on Facebook.

The Renew Party had hosted the event to give Londoners a chance to hear directly from the challenger candidates, and to ask questions of them.

The candidates addressed questions on political cronyism, air pollution, inequality, housing, racism, policing, reviving small businesses, London’s football ESL aspirants and the settled status of London’s EU citizens.

Renew’s candidate for Mayor, Kam Balayev, noted that, “Europeans that live in London, they are Londoners – London is very international – I wasn’t born here but guess what, a lot of Londoners weren’t born here, and they are very, very important.”

The drama of the night was provided by Extinction Rebellion’s co-founder Roger Hallam, who walked out halfway through the event, protesting that, “…soundbites lead to mass death.” Hallam had been standing in for Burning Pink’s Valerie Brown, who had been arrested earlier in the day for an incident at Canary Wharf.

Renew Party Leader James Clarke said: “The proliferation of candidates shows that, in theory at least, democracy is alive and well in London. Whilst the parties and the candidates have very distinct political platforms, one thing we all agree on is the need to open up politics to ordinary people, to increase participation and to break the two-party duopoly, here in London and throughout the UK.”