The Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) is standing 279 candidates across 55 authorities in May’s elections in England, including a candidate in the directly-elected mayoral contest in Salford and four constituency seats for the London assembly.

Nominations closed on April 5th, and the full list of candidates that made it onto the ballot paper is available at https://www.tusc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Final-list-of-candidates.pdf, with the council candidates presented in a regional breakdown.

Two hundred and sixty-eight of the TUSC council candidates are standing in tier one or two local authorities with scheduled elections this year – 49 out of the 107 councils in that category.  There is also one TUSC community councillor listed, seeking re-election in May. The remaining five council candidates are contesting by-elections that have been called to coincide with the May polls.

Overall, 13.8% of the council wards with local elections this year (263 out of 1,904, nearly one-in-seven) will have at least one TUSC candidate on the ballot paper, contesting 10% of the seats available – three times as many as in the 2023 local elections. 

This is a significant achievement for a coalition without any mainstream national media coverage, particularly when compared to the millionaire-funded Reform Party, which has only been able to find 323 council candidates to represent it.

Every TUSC candidate is committed to stand up to the establishment parties, including Reform, who have all shown themselves to be virtually indistinguishable when it comes to representing the interests of working class people – in domestic policy and foreign policy too.  The TUSC core policy platform for our May 2024 council candidates can be found at https://www.tusc.org.uk/20023/13-01-2024/tuscs-core-policy-platform-for-the-may-2024-local-elections-2/. 

The summary, however, is simple – every one of them will be a stop the cuts, stop the war candidate in the May 2nd polls! ■

There are other candidates who will be taking a similar stance on May 2nd who, while not on this occasion appearing on the ballot paper under the TUSC banner, will be supported by our coalition.  These include the 33 council and one Police and Crime Commissioner candidates standing for the Workers Party of Britain, which has observer status on the TUSC all-Britain steering committee.  Also, amongst the 500 or so ‘Independents’ standing this year, there are a number who could be properly described as anti-cuts and anti-war candidates; headed by Jamie Driscoll – regularly referred to in the establishment media as ‘the last Corbynista in office’ – who is standing to become the Mayor of the new North East Combined Authority.  We are currently collating information on these and will publish as comprehensive a list of alternative candidates as possible in the coming days.