Croydon referendum: Residents vote for directly elected mayor

Croydon residents will elect a mayor in May 2022

Croydon will have a directly elected mayor, following a referendum on how the south London borough will be run.

Voters were asked to decide whether the council should continue in its current format or switch to a model similar to ones used in Hackney and Tower Hamlets.

Of a 21% turnout, four out of five voters opted for the mayoral model rather than the current leader and cabinet system.

Croydon residents will elect a mayor in May 2022.

The council's current leader and cabinet system of governance will remain in place until then.

Croydon Council has been run using the leader model since 2001

Croydon Council has been run using the leader model since 2001, in which the leader is elected by the council itself for a term of four years, and they hold the executive powers of the council.

Those powers can be delegated to their deputy leader or a cabinet consisting of up to nine councillors.

The mayoral model is largely the same, but the mayor is voted on by the electorate and is not a councillor.

An important difference is the council would be unable to remove the mayor during their term, as they can in the leader model. This is only possible through the mayor's own resignation.

Since 1965, there have been 32 borough councils in London, and the City of London.

In 2000, the Greater London Authority added another political tier, comprising the Mayor of London and the Assembly.