Their Heart isn’t really in it.

Labour now knows what opposition it faces in the two byelections, (full details below).

Boleyn clearly looks to be the more interesting race. Alongside Labour, the Conservatives, Lib-Dems and Greens are putting up candidates.

Reform is in there, seeking to hoover up any residual UKIP votes and as we have already noted, Mehmood Mirza is standing as an Independent.

With the exception of Mirza, the other parties don’t seem to have any energy or desire to win the seat.

In Wall End, the traditional parties are all standing; Lab, Cons, Lib-Dem and Green. Reform is again, putting its hat in the ring.

Labour has devoted words and pictures on their website to the upcoming battles, (indeed they had got their material up two weeks before the election was called!!). The Greens have put up a couple of pictures, but said nothing about their candidates nor what they stand for. It is possible that they are still determining which pronouns to use. The Tories in East Ham have posted about their candidates.

The Lib-Dems and Reform have nothing on their websites yet. It’s almost as if they don’t really care. The Christian People’s Alliance (CPA) seems to have totally disappeared. They might be back for the next local elections in 2026, but they have no presence in the byelection.

With the range of candidates to choose from, these byelections seem to be a shoe-in for Labour. They must be hoping for 50% plus of the vote. Our only caveat is that Mehmood Mirza may yet surprise us. Mixing a Corbynite-Labour identity with a strong record of community campaigning, together with what we suspect will be more than a hint of communitarian politics might just pay dividends for him, especially if there is a low turnout.