Labour critics accuse Hackney’s Green mayor of ‘vibe’ politics and blast Garbett’s ‘waffle’ on targets

Hackney’s new Green mayor Zoë Garbett has been accused of “vibe” politics by Labour critics, after pledging to de-prioritise key performance indicators (KPIs) in favour of measuring “what people feel and experience”.

The criticism — including from a sitting Hackney Labour councillor — has been sharpened by the awkward fact that, just two days before Garbett made her remarks, her own administration signed off a £2.2m contract to tackle a backlog of electrical safety inspections that will rely heavily on the very KPIs she dismissed.

Hackney Labour councillor Ben Lucas (Hoxton West) led the criticism, writing on X: “Focusing on real-life impact is right, but you can’t govern based on vibes alone. That’s why targets exist. They might not be sexy — but they have a clear purpose. Worrying that Green Mayor @ZoeGarbett is downplaying this already!”

Former Labour cabinet member Jon Burke went further, accusing the new administration of “waffle”.

“Hackney was transformed for the better by people willing to be judged on what they did, not what they said,” he wrote. “The Greens will no more improve the borough with waffle than the Tories solved child poverty by not counting hungry kids. If you don’t measure it, you can’t solve it.”

Former London Assembly Member Darren Johnson, who left the Greens for Labour in March, added: “The vibe-ometer is high with Hackney Greens. No wonder they don’t want to properly measure anything.

“Sadly, I believe a not insignificant slice of their voter base will be perfectly happy with vibes, rather than them actually delivering anything.”

A KPI (key performance indicator) is a measurable value used to track how well something is performing against a defined goal or target. KPIs translate a broad ambition into something trackable.

The row was sparked by Garbett’s maiden speech as executive leader on 28 May, at the first full meeting of the council since the Greens’ historic landslide election victory. The new mayor pledged to do things “differently” and “get the basics right”.

“We don’t want an administration clinically delivered based on KPIs. The metric of success is what people feel and experience in their day-to-day lives,” Garbett told the chamber. “To make that possible, we need to be right there beside you as partners, mutually learning and learning together.”

But just two days earlier, the council had approved a £2.2m contract to tackle a backlog of electrical inspections, with KPIs to be monitored throughout the contract covering customer satisfaction, safety inspections and social value delivery.

The contract was prompted by serious failings identified by the Regulator of Social Housing in 2024, after 15,000 council properties were found not to be certified as having safe electrics — and 7,000 property systems had never been inspected at all.

Currently, the council’s direct labour organisation carries out 1,300 electrical tests a year. Under the new plan, that figure is set to rise to 7,000 in a bid to make homes safer across the borough.

Responding to the criticism in a statement to the Citizen, Garbett rejected the suggestion that her approach amounted to governing on vibes.

“Across the public sector, I’ve seen first-hand that there is too often a focus on numbers on spreadsheets rather than lives and experiences. For this administration, it’s Hackney residents who are going to set our benchmarks of success,” she said.

“We were elected with a huge mandate, on a manifesto containing a vast number of ways we will materially improve Hackney residents’ lives. Already we have a cabinet in place, making decisions that are making a difference.

“We don’t want to tweak the details and tick boxes: we want to change Hackney in a way that people across the borough can feel and see.”

The Greens took control of Hackney Council last month after winning 42 seats of the 57 total, ending Labour’s long-held grip on the borough. 

The new administration faces its first electoral test on 25 June, when voters in Hackney Central and Dalston go to the polls in two by-elections — contests in which the Greens will be playing close attention to the numbers.