23 July (Part 2) - Lies and Khanned lies
The Labour party has finally admitted that Londoners cannot afford ULEZ but expects to see it spread to every town (Angela Rayner on Sky TV
“You have got to remember that ULEZ is coming to every town and city across the UK.”)
and continue to say it was all Boris Johnson’s idea. Like most things political that is not actually true. London’s first Low Emission Zone was
introduced on 4th February 2008 (Wikipedia) which is well into the Ken Livingstone era. A year later Johnson as Mayor announced his intention
to defer Livingstone’s plan to extend the restriction to vans pending a public consultation.
On 4th April 2011 at a press gathering in Erith and accompanied by his then partner in crime, the Leader of Bexley Council,
Johnson announced the inclusion of vans.
It was not the first ULEZ, it adopted a lower standard and was still called, LEZ.
A few years later - when did Boris first come under the influence of Carrie
Antoinette? - he proposed extending restrictions to within the South and North
Circular roads by 2020 but in 2016 along came the clown Khan who had other ideas.
By October 2017 there was a £10 toxicity surcharge (T-Charge) for driving within the Central London
Congestion Zone and Johnson’s ULEZ ideas for 2020 were brought forward to 8th April 2019. The price increased to £12·50.
But some people continue to spout that it is the Conservatives and Johnson in
particular who pushed Khan into a London-wide ULEZ. But that is to ignore the
fact that in 2011 Johnson was only advocating Euro IV for commercial vehicles. At no
time has he advocated Euro V for all vehicles across all of London.
That is solely Khan’s idea which he justifies with false statistics. 4,000
people a year are not dying in London from air pollution each year; that is to abuse the
computer modelling. One could equally say that ten million people are dying on a Tuesday
afternoon instead of Wednesday morning.
Neither did the Conservative government insist on the ULEZ extension after Khan
bankrupted TfL. They specifically told the spendthrift that “HMG funding must
not be used to cover the costs of your policy decision to charge road users. If
you choose to implement it you must fund it yourself”.
It is being said that the Labour Mayor is trying to make the poor even poorer; but hasn’t that always
been the party’s principal purpose? Traditionally their support has come more from the
poorer members of society than the better off. The more they can impoverish people the more votes they get.