Today the Bow Group, a Tory think tank, publishes its report “London Under Livingstone, An evaluation of Labour’s Mayor”. It is an excellent analysis of the reality of living in Livingstone’s London. Although the Mayor’s £100 million a year hype machine might have persuaded you that Livingstone is on your side this paper systematically demolishes that idea. Please have a read. I will be looking at it in detail myself this weekend.
You might have seen this graphic on various posters around London recently and in full page ads in local papers. In early August the Mayor announced he was consulting on his variable CO2 based charging scheme for the Congestion Charge. This is of course an attempt by the Mayor to rebrand the failed Congestion Charge as a carbon tax and is effectively electioneering paid for by you and me.
As soon as I saw his announcement I thought “How much?”.
TfL provided the answer today, see their letter reproduced below (click to enlarge). To their credit TfL have managed to answer in slightly less than the 20 working days that the Mayor’s office treats as a minimum rather than a maximum. The consultation will cost £1.137 million. Most of the money is being spent on high profile billboards and newspaper ads whose real role is to present the Mayor as a green warrior rather than to find out what people really think.
In June 2006 a telephone poll costing £1,660 found that 64 per cent of Londoners think the most polluting cars should pay a higher congestion charge. The consultation asks only noddy questions. See full consultation questionnaire here. You might want to tell TfL what you think.
I have largely stopped writing letters to papers – I would much rather do a posting on my blog where I know I will get published!
Yesterday though I thought that the Telegraph had let Mayor Livingstone off lightly in its leader column on this week’s Tube strike, see here. They seemed content to blame RMT and maybe to a lesser extent Gordon Brown and his PPP.
They failed to nail Livingstone himself who has been chairman of the TfL board since its creation. Here is my letter:
Sir – You let London Mayor Ken Livingstone off the hook (leading article, September 5). London Underground has been subsumed within the Mayor’s Transport for London since July 2003.
Mr Livingstone has been chairman of the TfL board since its creation. He invited Bob Crow, the general secretary of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers, to serve on the TfL board from June 1, 2002 to July 31, 2004.
As chairman of TfL, the Mayor has been responsible for its strategic direction and the setting of its priorities since its creation in 2000.
The public transport system we enjoy in London today is the Mayor’s creature. The Mayor has worked with RMT and the other unions to give Tube staff excellent, some would say cushy, terms and conditions, but still Mr Crow is prepared to humiliate the Mayor to prove his power.
Instead of just waving the white flag, a London Mayor needs to work to take the strike weapon out of public transport in London without making concessions that would make the majority of London workers look askance.
It is no good blaming Bob Crow and the Metronet collapse for this strike. It is the Mayor’s job to fix things. Fixing Mr Crow is a priority.
Cllr Phil Taylor, London Borough of Ealing, London W13
I have just got home after an afternoon/evening at work and checked on TfL’s Tube performance. Almost a day after the end of the strike and six out of 12 services are still affected by a so-called one-day stoppage. One line is totally out, two are severely compromised and three are merely delayed. Note the Waterloo & City line is not running at this time of night so they can have the benefit of the doubt there.
Is this any kind of way to run a public transport system? 2,300 workers led by a hard left idiot ruining 5 journeys for about 4 million commuters. That is about 20 million journeys. If each one caused an hour of wasted time that is the equivalent of 30 people living for 75 years – or the same waste of life as killing 60 randomly selected people.
Strikes on the Tube need to be outlawed soon and all the candidates for Mayor should be proposing this.
It is 8.30am and still only the three Tubelines services are running properly.
Most people need to have started their journey to work by now to work by now but all of the Metronet lines are still having problems and 6 out of 9 are still suspended.
Phil Taylor 