The ballot paper for the next London mayoral elections is to be redesigned in a bid to prevent confusion among voters.
A record number of 114,201 first-preference votes were rejected in the 2021 mayoral elections, as well as 265,000 second-preference votes.
While this did not affect the outcome – Sadiq Khan was re-elected to serve a second term with a record majority – the Greater London returning officer, Mary Harpley, says the situation “must not be repeated” in 2028.
It comes as Sir Sadiq has again hinted that he will seek a fourth term as mayor, telling The Standard that he still has a “lot of fuel in the tank”.
Declining to follow the example of his football hero Mo Salah, who will bring his career at Liverpool to at the end of the current season, Sir Sadiq said: “I’m loving being the mayor.”
There have been reports that Sir Sadiq will be elevated to the House of Lords by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer. Asked about this, the mayor said: “Don’t believe all you read in the papers.”
Sadiq Khan: “Unlike Mo Salah, I haven't lost a yard of pace. I'm still as fast as I ever was and I still have a lot of fuel in my tank.
— Ross Lydall (@RossLydall) April 8, 2026
"I'm like Stevie G [Steven Gerrard] - occupy the middle, go front and back, left and right, and be a team player." ⚽️🤣 pic.twitter.com/mbS3AZ2Auo
An investigation by the London Assembly into the 2021 mayoral elections said the design of the ballot paper “was confusing to many voters”.
A record 20 candidates stood in the 2021 elections, which were originally meant to be held in 2020 but were delayed by a year by the pandemic.
The number of entrants required the ballot paper to be redesigned at short notice, as the original ballot paper only had space for 15 candidates.
But this caused problems because votes were to be counted electronically, meaning the size of the ballot paper was constrained by what could be scanned by the counting machine.
As such, the ballot papers used two adjacent columns in which voters were meant to indicate their first choice for mayor and second choice for mayor. Voters cannot vote for the same candidate as their first and second preference.
This was not an issue in the 2024 mayoral elections, as the traditional “first past the post” single vote system was used. In addition, there were only 13 candidates in 2024, when Sir Sadiq secured a third term of office.
But the two-vote system, known as the supplementary vote, is due to be brought back into use for the 2028 elections, and electronic counting - rather than counting votes manually - is “being considered”.
The switch back to the supplementary vote system is part of the Labour Government’s English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, which is nearing its progress through the House of Lords and is due to receive Royal assent later this year.
Ms Harpley has authorised £50,000 of City Hall cash to “undertake user-testing and market research of potential ballot paper designs” and instructions to be used in the 2028 elections for the Mayor of London and the London Assembly.
In a decision form authorising the research into new ballot paper designs, Ms Harpley said: “Different designs of ballot papers and instructions, covering scenarios with both a standard number of candidates and a high number of candidates will therefore be tested.
“The ballot papers and instructions will be subject to qualitative market research to ensure they are clear to voters.”
The testing will be carried out by the GLA’s and TfL’s contracted research agency, 2CV Limited.
“The sessions will replicate the experience of voting as closely as possible, asking participants to complete the papers as they would in a real election,” she added.
“We will work with four London boroughs and use actual polling places and voters who would normally attend those venues while meeting the appropriate representation.
“[My] intention is to avoid a repeat of the high number of rejected ballots experienced in the 2021 elections.”
The 2021 elections cost £38m, in part because of £7m spent on the 2020 election date that was subsequently postponed by the then Prime Minister, Boris Johnson.
The assembly investigation into the number of rejected ballots said: “There was a notable increase in the proportion of ballot papers that were rejected because people had voted for too many candidates for mayor as first preference.
“It appears that a revised design for the mayoral ballot paper caused confusion for voters about how to express their two preferences.
“The level of rejected ballots could not have altered the result in the vote for mayor but may have obscured the precise margin of victory and relative levels of support for each candidate.
“The large number of candidates meant that existing ballot paper designs were not able to be used and no alternative had been prepared by the London Elects team, leading to a late redesign to a two-column format in order to deliver ballot papers that the electronic vote counting machines could read.”
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