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News and Comment August 2023

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5 August - Storm Antoni backs ULEZ

ULEZ problemsI don’t have many car owning friends living in Bexley but between them they own(ed) eight cars and five are victims of the London Mayor.

One of the non-compliant cars has been sold for next to nothing, two are unlikely to be used again and two owners are still wondering what to do.

And for what reason are so many lives to be damaged?

The fact that Bexley may not have done the best possible job of air quality monitoring in the past really doesn’t matter, the only thing of any relevance is that ‘it’s never my fault’ Khan (†) has admitted that the ULEZ charge is not going to make any measurable difference to Outer London’s air quality. He nearly bankrupted TfL and ULEZ is his way of making you pay for his incompetence.

Rather late in the day he has taken a few millions extracted from taxpayers via his annual inflation busting tax rises and intends to distribute it to used car salesmen. £2,000 as a scrappage bonus for the those who can scramble to the front of his beggars’ queue on 21st August to spend on a compliant car which has gone up in price by more than that amount solely because of his money-grabbing scheme.

None of that expenditure would be necessary if it was not for Khan’s megalomania. Examine scrappage logically. He is willing to shell out an extra £50 million in order to reduce his ULEZ income. What further proof can there be that the real intention is road charging for all?

Khan lies that if my five (now four) older car owning friends take their vehicles out on the road they will accelerate the death of 4,000 fellow Londoners but if they pay him £12·50 he will give them a Licence to Kill.

Earlier in the week I decided that I would go to observe today’s anti-ULEZ rally in Trafalgar Square. Then the weather forecast put me off the idea as it probably did many others but the combination of the Elizabeth and Northern lines got me to Trafalgar Square via the Bakerloo line exit while avoiding the worst of Storm Antoni.

I arrived at 11:55 and left 20 minutes later when there were only hundreds of people getting wet rather than thousands, all waving the usual placards and shouting “Khan out”. I was struck by the fact that most of the TfL bus drivers were sounding their horns in support.

Summer in the Square ULEZ demo ULEZ demo ULEZ demo

ULEZ demo ULEZ demo ULEZ demo ULEZ demo

ULEZ demo
Obviously nationwide ULEZ as advocated by some Labour front benchers is a very good reason for all freedom loving people not to vote for that party at any election as the people of Uxbridge concluded on 20th July but for me it is also a very good reason not to vote Conservative at the next General Election. The weak and two faced policy flipper Sunak could have used his power to stop Khan in his undemocratic tracks but has chosen not to.

The country is doomed. None of the Lib/Lab/Con opposition party leaders appear to be entirely sane either.


Note: Following publication of the foregoing an anonymous contributor informed me that it wasn’t the self-appointed Chair of TfL, Sadiq Khan’s fault that TfL nearly ran out of money. The anonymous contributor believes that George Osborne caused TFL’s demise by reducing its grant but that was announced in 2015, a year before Khan was elected. Khan ignored the warning signs and froze fares. But bankruptcy is not his fault.

 

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