From mansion to grassroots as Maxwell heir pitches clean-slate campaign in London

The nephew of convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell is standing for election as a London borough councillor in May.

Ted Maxwell, 39, is running as an independent candidate for the Bethnal Green West ward in Tower Hamlets in the May local elections.

The grandson of disgraced newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell is campaigning on a pledge to make streets safer, and against what he calls the “poisonous” party politics in the borough.

The council was controlled by Labour for nearly 30 years before being taken over by Mayor Lutfur Rahman and the Aspire Party in 2022.

The current council has been investigated for channelling funding to Bangladeshi community groups, and have previously been linked to allegations of family voting, the illegal practice of influencing a family member in casting their vote.

Maxwell’s candidacy has drawn attention because of his name, despite there being little evidence of a close relationship with his aunt, Ghislaine.

Ghislaine Maxwell is currently serving a 20-year sentence in the US for sex trafficking related to the case of Jeffrey Epstein, her former partner, while Ted’s grandfather, Robert Maxwell, stole £400m from the pension funds of companies in his media empire.

ed is the son of Kevin Maxwell, Robert’s youngest son, and his ex-wife Pandora.

He grew up in an 11-bedroom mansion on the banks of the Thames, but has lived in the Bethnal Green area for 15 years, and he currently works as a project manager for the development of London’s Royal Docks. 

Ted Maxwell told the Telegraph: “My aunt’s actions 20 years ago have nothing to do with me and, of course, I do not condone them. But not a single person has mentioned it or asked about it out of the few thousand people I have spoken to.

“People are worried about black mould on their walls, bad maintenance in their building or anti-social behaviour on the streets and they are trying to evaluate whether I can help with that or not.”

Maxwell says that he offers voters a clean slate, saying: “I’m properly independent with no party structure around me. I don’t have a legacy of local decisions that people may not like. People are thinking of voting for me because it’s a way of trying something that is definitely different from other options.”

He has led a successful campaign to overturn Tower Hamlets’ decision to remove three low-traffic neighbourhood (LTN) schemes, his Save our Safer Streets campaign defeating the council in the Court of Appeal in January having raised £100,000.

He has said he would campaign to introduce more infrastructure that would allow people to walk and cycle more, and supports plans that restrict vehicle access near schools during peak hours.

On his campaign website, Maxwell said: “Bethnal Green is home for my family. We have four children at local schools and becoming a parent has made me care more than ever about safety in our community.

“As an independent councillor, I will do what’s right, not what a party boss tells me to do.”