Month: Jul 2007

The Mayor was in Paris this weekend on his latest holiday at our expense. He is pictured above presenting the prize to the winner of the thoroughly drug soaked Tour de France. No mention of it in any press release from the Mayor. Not picked up in British papers who were not tipped off by the Mayor’s numerous press staff. Could it be he is embarrassed? Probably.

The Mayor has got a lot of stick for busily visiting foreign countries over the last couple of years but not visiting many London Boroughs. He has also got lots of stick for flying all over the place whilst exhorting us to be green, see previous posting.

Only three weeks ago the Mayor was making a big splash about the Grand Depart (see here). How different it all looked then before the Tour de France turned into a drug-soaked farce? No wonder the Mayor is keeping a low profile in his summer suit.

As usual the Mayor cynically refuses to discuss the cost of his latest bread and circuses extravaganza for London. The Sunday Times reported that:

London has paid £1.5m to stage the opening stage of the Tour de France and spent another £4m on planning, transport and security.

This does not include another of the Mayor’s large advertising campaigns. I wrote to TfL, who were driving this for the Mayor, on 21st June to ask how much the total comms campaign was costing but they have sullenly refused to answer in spite of making the following pledge:

We will do our best to send you a full written response within 15 working days. If we cannot give you a full answer in this time, we will send you an acknowledgement and then a full written response will follow.

Unless you are asking awkward questions that is.

Yesterday the Evening Standard picked up the story I covered on Tuesday about the explosion in highly paid people at TfL, see previous posting. A shortened version of their story is available on-line here.

The Evening Standard’s Ross Lydall has done a good job. He has got to the bottom of the restatement of these figures. In the TfL Annual Report (page 74) it said the figures were restated but did not explain why. Lydall found out the following:

TfL reported in last year’s accounts that 76 employees earned £100,000 or more. But the figures have been “restated” this year to show there were 90 six-figure earners in 2005/06 when employees’ pension contributions are included.

So let’s get this right. Last year’s figures were deceitful because they excluded employees’ pension contributions, NOT employer’s pension contributions. Most people understand their salary as being what they receive before deductions. This was yet another attempt by TfL to tell lies. I don’t know whether this culture of lying comes from the Mayor or TfL but it seems to be a widespread problem.

As predicted back on June 18th (see previous posting) when the Mayor announced a partial bus fare cut he is using the summer to electioneer. The August issue of The Londoner – the Mayor’s £3 million a year “freesheet” – has a totally outrageous front page headline and article followed up by a page 5 opinion piece from the Mayor.

As ever the Mayor is lying outrageously. He says:

I am pleased that the strength of London’s economy, and efficiencies achieved by Transport for London, mean that fares can now be reduced with no cut in this investment programme or financial risk to the transport budget.

This economic strength and operating efficiency creates benefits that should be returned to London.

The stuff about London’s economy is meaningless waffle and irrelevant to bus pricing.

The talk about efficiency is a lie. Back in February, after a two month wait, the Mayor wrote to me and admitted that bus subsidies would increase by £65 million in the current financial year. Click to enlarge his letter below:

How is it possible to reconcile a £65 million increase in subsidy with the notion of “efficiency”? Bus costs are out of control and cannot be used as an explanation of why it is possible to cut fares. The Mayor is a liar.

Another thing that stood out from the TfL numbers I found yesterday was how badly the finances of the Congestion Charge are going. I say stood out. I mean I spotted them because I was looking for them. They were actually buried on page 99. See below, click to enlarge.

TfL have restated them without saying so. In last year’s numbers they included £1.1 million of Capital financing charges and had done for the previous 3 years. This year they have mysteriously disappeared. They have also laid them out differently to make the surplus look bigger. The Mayor talks about a £120 million surplus but he can only make this ludicrous claim by ignoring indirect costs such as advertising (although how indirect can an £8.7 million campaign on the Western extension be?). The Audit Commission makes him bring indirect costs into the picture which bring his headline surplus down from £122 million to £89 million.

Bizzarely the income is down £1.7 million. You may remember that in 2005/6 30% of income came from fines. I can only think that due to the ability to pay next day and people’s changing behaviour this fines income has dropped away. Obviously it is a good thing if fewer people are picking up penalties.

As you might expect from out of control TfL costs are up. Up £16.6 million or 8.5%. The net effect of less income and more cost is that the surplus from this scheme is down a massive £18.3 million.

Few people paying their £8 a day realise that practically none of this cash is serving any good purpose. I have just updated the cummulative cash flow that I did for ConservativeHome to mark the fourth anniversary of the Congestion Charge. Previously I had used estimates for 2006/7. Now I can use TfL’s actual numbers. Income: £930 million. Cumulative surplus after over 4 years of operation: £14 million. See below, click to enlarge.

Last year I wrote that 831 people employed by TfL earned over £50K. I have just seen this year’s Annual Report. TfL have restated last year’s numbers. Last year’s number was 1,029 not 831. This year’s number is 1,411. I know that we have a large and complex public transport infrastructure but having a cadre of 1,411 highly paid managers seems a bit over the top. The rate of increase in their salaries is horrifying.

Last year I toted up the number of £100K plus salaries. It came out at 76. With the restatement it is now 90 for last year. This year the number of TfL managers earning over £100K is 112. Do we really have 112 people worth £100K in TfL? I don’t think so.