London mayor sadiq khan: ‘what would i do if i saw someone stealing nappies? take my wallet out and pay’

EXCLUSIVE

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan says if he saw someone shoplifting baby food or nappies, he’d take out his wallet and pay for the goods.

In a new interview with The Big Issue on his re-election campaign trail, the Labour mayor answered questions from Big Issue readers and vendors, including the question: Hypothetically, if you saw someone shoplifting essentials in a supermarket, what would you do?

Visibly moved by the hypothetical scenario, Khan replied. “What upsets me is the tags you have now, on nappies and baby foods because of the issue this is related to.

“I’ve not seen somebody, by the way, who’s shoplifted from a supermarket. But in the hypothetical case, I suspect I’d take my wallet out, and I would pay for it.”

He was speaking to The Big Issue after a speech at St John’s Church Waterloo on 15 April, during which he vowed to end rough sleeping in the capital by 2030. He described the mayoral election as an opportunity to “condemn the scandal of rough sleeping to history, not just for a short time but for all time”.

City Hall’s rough sleeping budget rose from £8.45 million in 2016 to £36.3m in 2023, and in this