LONDONERS won’t know if they have a new mayor or not until tomorrow night as the count doesn’t start straight after voting stops at 10pm tonight, instead beginning in the morning.


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Held at three big venues – Alexandra Palace, Olympia and the ExCeL – in north, west and east London (but not in the south), the count takes longer than in most elections partly due to the voting system, which gives voters the chance to vote for a first and second preference.

For instance, someone who liked the Green Party’s Jenny Jones best, would put an ‘X’ in the first column on the form for the London Mayor election and if Ken Livingstone was that voter’s next favourite, they’d put an ‘X’ after the Labour Party man’s name in the second column.

To add to the confusion, you also get two votes for the London Assembly, but these are split into Constituency and London-Wide forms; for the first you vote for a candidate, with the second for a party.

It’s all fully explained on the official election site, which also has a pdf file of the candidate’s manifestos, for all those who haven’t yet made up their minds.