'It's going to be tough for anyone to overtake Ken and Boris,' admits London Green Party leader and mayoral hopeful Jenny Jones.

'But for Greens, it's incredibly important that we're on the platform. Because if we're not there, then the amount of willy-waving that's going to happen will just become ridiculous.'

As recent polls show Boris Johnson has clawed his way back ahead of Ken Livingstone in the closest mayoral race yet, Jones maintains she needs to stand for Mayor to promote the Green's manifesto for the London Assembly elections, which will take place in May.

The former archaeologist has been on the Assembly since 2000 with fellow party member AM Darren Johnson. This year, they hope to bring two more Greens onto the 25-member panel.

And, as London uses the Alternative Vote system, voters can make a first and second preference. This means the Greens may throw their weight behind either the incumbent mayor Johnson or Labour's Livingstone as polling day approaches.

With almost three months to go before the May 3 elections, Jones is reluctant to make any recommendation at the moment. But she is already leaning towards supporting Livingstone, given that she served as his green transport adviser when he was mayor in the previous administration.

'Ken has given me real responsibility and allowed me to go away and do stuff and spend money. So that's a huge privilege,' she says.

Specifically, Jones launched a report looking at how London could boost the number of cyclists. It touted three schemes as the most likely to be effective: greater investment in training and infrastructure, a cycle hire scheme, and a network of cycle super highways. Two of the three proposals have since come to fruition in the form of mayor Johnson's much-trumpeted 'Boris Bikes' and the ambitious plans for a network of cycling highways, providing evidence of how Green Party policies can find their way into the mainstream.

'For me personally and for London generally, it would be better to see Ken back,' argues Jones. 'But if he doesn't have green stuff in his manifesto, then we're certainly not going to recommend a second preference.'

Conversely, she feels the Green Party has been side-lined under the current administration, explaining that Johnson offered her the role of cycling ambassador, which she rejected as she felt it was a token position without a budget or role within Transport for London (TfL).

Johnson's 'excellent success' at drawing in corporate sponsorship – specifically, Barclays' backing of the cycle hire scheme – seems to be the only area where she will offer praise.

But she is also campaigning against the mayor's close relationship with the banking sector and is critical of the current administration for incurring £27m in bank charges to Barclays in three years, arguing it outweighs the bank's £25m cycle scheme sponsorship.

'That's something that Greens would just never allow,' she says. 'It's because money hasn't been in the right place at the right time and that sort of thing. That is financial ineptitude, I'd say.

'We think that Boris did well getting the £25m. But he didn't actually. It's almost as if we paid Barclays £2m to allow us to have the cycle hire scheme.'

Like many green campaigners, Jones is also frustrated by Johnson's seemingly slow approach to tackling London's 'appalling' air pollution. The capital is currently failing to meet strict air quality targets set by the European Commission for PM10 and nitrogen dioxide, and could be fined hundreds of millions of pounds for failing to meet them by an extended deadline of 2015.

She even accuses Johnson of 'cheating' Londoners, by cleaning walls and introducing planters and dust suppressant technology that glues pollution to the roads – but only doing so around air pollution monitors.

Johnson, however, maintains that his actions tackle the few hotspots, such as Marylebone Road, that have excessively high levels of pollution, claiming the rest of London meets legal limits.

While some critics say dust suppressants are 'silly technology', Jones argues they should be rolled out beyond the monitoring stations – a proposal that the Mayor sidestepped at a recent Question Time session.

'Why not do it around schools if it's so effective?' she asks. 'Pollution rockets up on the roads, and then it falls quite fast, but schools are within that dirty stretch. They should be having the glue... I care more about kids than I do about the monitoring station.'

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