Nick Fletcher (Don Valley) (Con) I beg to move, That this House has
considered e-petitions 599985 and 633550, relating to local road
user charging schemes. It is a pleasure to serve under your
chairmanship today, Mr Stringer. We are here today to discuss two
petitions. The first seeks the revocation of local government
powers to charge for clean air zones, low emission zones and ultra
low emission zones, and the second seeks amendments to the Greater
London Authority...Request free trial
(Don Valley) (Con)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered e-petitions 599985 and 633550,
relating to local road user charging schemes.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Mr
Stringer. We are here today to discuss two petitions. The first
seeks the revocation of local government powers to charge for
clean air zones, low emission zones and ultra low emission zones,
and the second seeks amendments to the Greater London Authority
Act 1999 to remove the Mayor of London’s power to impose
road-user charges.
I often lead these petition debates, and I always look at the
argument from both sides. For every petition, there is an
opposing view; it is important to consider all aspects and that
everyone’s voice is heard. Cancel culture has no part to play in
a healthy democracy. I have therefore taken the time to speak to
not just the petitioners but, among others, Asthma + Lung UK and
the Ella Roberta Foundation.
Let me start with the facts: who put the legislation forward, and
who was in charge of putting the schemes in place? The then
Labour Government gave local authorities the ability to charge
road users in part 3 of the Transport Act 2000, and the Mayor of
London was given powers by the GLA Act 1999 under the same Labour
Government.
The Transport Act gave those powers to local authorities to
reduce congestion and to help with air quality. Schemes have now
been put in place in London, which has both a ULEZ and a
congestion zone, and clean air zones are currently in place in
Bath, Birmingham, Bradford, Bristol, Portsmouth, Sheffield and
Tyneside—all Labour or Opposition-controlled authorities. I am
pleased to announce that I have had reassurances from the Labour
Mayor of Doncaster that my city will not be subject to one of
these schemes. Pedestrianisation is already doing untold damage
to the local economy, and one of these schemes in my city would
surely be the final straw.
I will speak first on behalf of those who oppose the
petitions—those who think that these schemes are not just
necessary but vital for our country. I met Tim Dexter and Andrea
Carey. Tim works at Asthma + Lung UK and understands that these
schemes can cause controversy, but believes that they are not a
big issue with the wider electorate. He believes that pollution
is too high and says that young people are growing up with
decreased lung capacity. Tim also stated that having clean air in
the city and avoiding losses to businesses does not need to be an
either/or situation, as he believes that pedestrianisation,
alongside ULEZ and clean air zones, can be shown to increase
footfall. For the record, I have not seen any evidence that
supports that to date.
Andrea is the chair of the Ella Roberta Foundation, which
supports the Clean Air (Human Rights) Bill, also known as Ella’s
law. Ella is a young girl who died when she was nine. She lived
close to the south circular and had been diagnosed with asthma.
Her long walk to school meant that she was exposed to car fumes,
and air pollution was stated on her death certificate to be a
secondary cause. Andrea says that, each year, 38,000 deaths are
attributable to illnesses related to air quality. She says that a
lot of money is spent on treating people with lung conditions,
and businesses would benefit from cleaner air as that would mean
that employees took less time off due to ill health. Those are
fair points.
I will now speak on behalf of the petitioners. I met Edward
Green, who had much to say on this subject. Edward, who lives in
London, said that these schemes are bad for business and
families, and that they increase isolation. He described them as
a tax on the poor, a cost to freedom, undemocratic and an abuse
of power. He also stated that the scrappage schemes are
ineffective.
In addition to my evidence-gathering sessions, I recently visited
Sheffield and Doncaster and asked businesses there what they
thought of the schemes. They all agreed with Edward. One
contractor in Sheffield said that he had 20 vans on a
construction site, so the scheme introduced in the city earlier
this year is going to cost him close to £50,000 this year in
extra fees. Every construction site in every city with such a
scheme will now face similar costs, and as we all know, those
costs will eventually be passed on to the public—to us, to me and
you, Mr Stringer. Carers, tradespeople, health workers and others
will be prevented from working by the punitive charges.
That will be catastrophic for the economy in London’s suburbs, as
workers from Essex, Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Buckinghamshire and
Berkshire will simply not be able to work in the suburbs. Every
county surrounding London will be significantly affected, and for
the worse. I have spoken to shop workers who have said that if
the charges are introduced where they work, they may have no
choice but to find alternative employment. Not only will
businesses suffer because of decreased footfall, but they will
suffer when trying to find staff to help run their
businesses.
These issues have been debated in the House before. My hon.
Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallington () stated:
“If we price people out of their vehicles, without potential
alternatives available, we will not just be hitting people’s
pockets by charging them more to use private vehicles; we could
be costing them their livelihoods.”[—[Official Report, 9 March
2022; Vol. 710, c.
137-138WH.]](/search/column?VolumeNumber=710&ColumnNumber=137&House=1)
He is correct. In the main Chamber, I have mentioned the concept
of 15-minute cities. When I see all the cameras being installed,
I ask whether that is the end goal for Labour-run authorities.
The question needs to be asked.
As Members can see, there is much opposition to road user
charging schemes. Nobody disputes that we all want cleaner air;
the question is whether clean air zones and ultra low emission
zones are the way to achieve that. Personally, I think not. In
tourist hotspots, where visitors come from all over the world to
spend money, an American or Chinese tourist will not be put off
central London because of the ULEZ, but even then, it still hurts
everyone who works in the city who needs a vehicle. I know some
people will still argue that the ULEZ is needed in the very
centre of London, but what about Sheffield, Doncaster and
thousands of other towns and villages? Is such a scheme needed
there, where the economy is built on servicing the needs of local
people? I think not.
(Chingford and Woodford
Green) (Con)
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. He has talked about
road charging, and the problem right now in the outer boroughs of
London, where the ULEZ charge is apparently to be applied, is
that it is coming in under the idea that it will clean up the
air, yet Transport for London made it very clear in a report that
it would have a negligible effect. Does he agree that we should
be honest and say that this is actually about raising revenue,
and let the electorate decide on that?
My right hon. Friend makes an important point, and a lot of
Members in the room obviously agree.
Sadly, in South Yorkshire, we have lost an airport due to the
lack of political support against an overzealous green agenda. We
are losing our city’s businesses due to pedestrianisation, we are
losing footfall from terminating buses in one place, instead of
allowing people to use stops across the city, and we are losing
our market for the same reason—yet we have wonderful new council
offices. The staff could bring much business to the town but,
sadly, most of them seem to be working from home. Why? Because
the elected leaders do so. That is the reason why: they set a
poor example. That too is killing footfall.
At one point, Doncaster was a tourist attraction; hundreds of
thousands of people used to come to our market. The market is
still there, but under a new management company, and with a lack
of footfall, tenants are struggling. My home city of Doncaster
has so many assets that are not being used to create the business
and footfall that they should. There are only three Mansion
Houses in the country: in London, York and Doncaster. Why is our
Mansion House in Doncaster not open all year round? Why has the
Grand Theatre been left to rot? Why do we not have free parking
to encourage people to come to town? Why do we not put weekly
events on and advertise them to get people into our towns, or
open business hubs and careers fairs, to give people a reason to
come to our towns? That would get the markets thriving again and
in turn get the shops reopening.
We could do all these things, and while we rejuvenate our towns
and cities the capitalists—the wealth creators out there—will
continue to develop the green technologies that will eventually
increase the efficiency of our petrol cars and reduce the cost of
electric vehicles. That is the way to do this. The way forward to
clean air can be—indeed, should be—win-win and not lose-lose. I
emphasise win-win, but no, the Labour party will always go for
the tax lever. Price everyone out of their towns and cities, and
sit by and watch the demise from home, while they are on Zoom
calls in their echo chambers and blame the internet and central
Government for their business closures.
I have no doubt that these schemes will have respiratory health
benefits for individuals, but not because the air is cleaner in
the cities. No, it will simply be because people will be staying
out of the cities and staying at home, often in isolation, while
their mental health suffers and the economy struggles to
survive.
There are many other ways to tackle this problem, but as usual
the Labour party will go for the tax lever rather than the
innovation lever, and as always, the working person will suffer.
I want cleaner air; I agree with net zero.
(Sheffield, Brightside and
Hillsborough) (Lab)
Thirteen years.
It is 55 years in Doncaster—55 years of a Labour council in
Doncaster. Fifty-five long, long years.
I agree with net zero; I just think that it can be done in a
better way than this. People want more power locally, but too
often it is given to the wrong people. The cities that I
mentioned are testimony to this statement. These schemes show how
out of touch and disconnected politicians at local level are from
the people and from businesses. The people and businesses do not
want these schemes, but the politicians wilfully ignore their
wishes, on purpose and with no care about the terrible impact the
schemes have. This situation cannot be acceptable in a
democracy.
I will close by simply asking the Minister to consider seriously
the petitioners’ requests. They make an awful lot of sense.
(in the Chair)
I ask hon. Members who wish to be called in the debate to stand.
This is a three-hour debate, so I do not think there is any
necessity for a time limit.
4.42pm
(Chipping Barnet)
(Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr
Stringer.
I start by thanking my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley
() for his very able
introduction of this very important subject. I also thank
everyone who has taken the trouble to sign the petitions that we
are reflecting on today.
I will focus on the proposed extension of the ultra low emission
zone to cover all London boroughs, including the whole of my
Chipping Barnet constituency. I do not believe that this
extension is either justified or acceptable. Although I can see
that there is potentially a place for charging regimes in
appropriate circumstances, ULEZ expansion is the wrong scheme at
the wrong time.
Of course everyone in Westminster Hall today will agree that we
need to reduce air pollution, and a range of Government policies
are delivering progress towards that important goal. The Mayor of
London published an independent impact assessment of his ULEZ
expansion proposal that concluded that it would have only a
negligible impact on air quality. I emphasise that—only a
negligible impact. Yet I am sure that many of us have had
constituents attending our surgeries to explain the financial
hardship that they will experience as a result of this charge
being introduced at a time of major increases in the cost of
living.
(Rayleigh and Wickford)
(Con)
As an Essex MP, I wish to place firmly on the record my
opposition to Mayor Khan’s ULEZ scheme, but another thing that
affects air quality is when people have to queue for ages to get
through roadworks. One thing that I support is what is known as
lane rental, which is the concept whereby utility companies have
to pay per day for the privilege of digging up the road and
creating inconvenience for everyone else. The Minister and I have
discussed this issue before. Essex County Council now supports
this idea, by the way. Does my right hon. Friend agree that a
sensible measure to improve air quality would be not to bring in
ULEZ but to crack down on roadworks?
I think that cracking down on roadworks is a good idea, although
I have to say that we have heard many times that lane rental is
to be introduced, and somehow we all still seem to get caught in
those traffic jams. My right hon. Friend makes some valid
points.
(Bexleyheath and Crayford)
(Con)
I am listening with great interest to my right hon. Friend, who
is making a powerful case. Of course, the reason for this ULEZ is
tax raising, not air pollution control, for which it has been
proved conclusively not to work. In places such as Bexley, where
we have good air quality, it is just to get money into the Mayor
of London’s coffers.
Many of my constituents agree with my right hon. Friend. It feels
as if the suburbs are up in arms. They absolutely distrust the
motivation behind the scheme. Other people who are concerned
about ULEZ might be those with older vehicles, which they might
have maintained carefully over many years, perhaps when was telling us that we all
ought to go to diesel to reduce emissions.
Does the right hon. Member recognise this quote?
“Poor air quality is the greatest environmental threat to public
health. Every year, thousands of people have their health damaged
or their lives shortened by air pollution. This problem is
especially serious in London, with many of the country’s worst
pollution hotspots here in our capital city…and we need a
concerted national effort to tackle this problem from Government,
from councils, from mayors, from business, from
individuals.”[—[Official Report, 3 February 2021; Vol. 688, c.
971.]](/search/column?VolumeNumber=688&ColumnNumber=971&House=1)
Those were her words in 2021.
And if I thought that this ULEZ project would improve air
quality, I might be saying a different thing this afternoon, but
the Mayor’s own impact assessment said that it will have a
“negligible impact” on air pollution.
Think also about the sole traders or people running small
businesses who are dependent on a van they cannot easily afford
to replace, even if they fall into the limited category of those
who qualify for the scrappage scheme. Those people all face a
charge of £12.50, or having to scale back radically their
mobility and their freedom to see their friends and family or, in
extreme cases, shutting down a business altogether.
The Mayor made no mention of ULEZ expansion in his manifesto; a
majority who responded to the consultation opposed his plan; and
he is giving people only a few months to get ready for its
imposition. Other charging schemes were announced years in
advance, giving reasonable time for everyone to adjust.
(Twickenham) (LD)
The right hon. Lady talks about the timing of the roll-out. My
Liberal Democrat colleagues and I absolutely agree that, in the
midst of a cost of living crisis, to roll out the expansion of
ULEZ recklessly, at breakneck speed, is absolutely the wrong
timing. Will she and other colleagues in this Chamber sign my
early-day motion 1364? It was tabled today and calls for a delay
to the roll-out, a doubling of the scrappage schemes—something
that Conservatives in the London Assembly supported the Liberal
Democrats on—and the Government to fund a scrappage scheme for
those areas outside London where many of our key workers, who
will be hit so hard, come in from.
Everyone loves a convert, but I wish we had not seen Liberal
Democrats in local government all across London welcoming the
Mayor’s scheme, which is what they appeared to do.
Will the right hon. Lady give way?
No, the hon. Lady will get her turn in a moment.
(Orpington) (Con)
Will my right hon. Friend give way?
I am going to make some progress.
Constituents stop me in the street to tell me how much they
oppose Mayor Khan’s proposal. A protest I organised, which I was
expecting to attract about 10 people and be rather low key,
attracted a crowd of about 60. Outer London high streets in
places such as Barnet are already suffering from the big switch
to online retail, accelerated by the pandemic; losing their
customers from outside London could be a killer blow.
Our public services in outer London depend heavily on workers who
do not live in the capital. Schools, the NHS and the police
already struggle to recruit the people they need. Setting up a
ULEZ pay wall around London will make that task even harder and
place even greater pressure on NHS waiting times.
Many people living in areas around London will find that they
cannot avoid driving into the capital to work, to care for
relatives or for hospital appointments. They will have to pay,
despite never having a vote in an election for the Mayor of
London. That is a shocking example of taxation without
representation, as my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford () pointed out in this Chamber
only a few weeks ago.
The issue is made worse by Transport for London’s unhelpful and
negative approach to cross-border bus services, such as the 84
service in my constituency. The operator discontinued the route
between Potters Bar and Barnet last year after concluding that it
was not commercially viable. However, despite many appeals from
me and others, TfL and the Mayor have not lifted a finger to get
it reinstated. The Mayor promises that the ULEZ expansion will
fund transport improvements, but there is no sign of them so far.
The one orbital bus route that has been announced will be a
wholly inadequate substitute for the millions of journeys that
will be hit by the new charging scheme.
The ULEZ proposal comes on top of a host of anti-car measures.
Too often, schemes such as low traffic neighbourhoods and
segregated cycle lanes have worsened congestion, transferring
traffic from leafier, more prosperous areas to main roads that
are home to more disadvantaged communities, which may be hotspots
for air pollution. When it comes to the radical schemes seen in
London over recent years aimed at promoting cycling, we need to
balance the interests of the small minority who cycle with those
of the majority who do not, including the elderly and people with
mobility impairments for whom getting on a bike is just not a
viable option.
It is not acceptable that taxies are being caught up in Mayor
Khan’s war on the motorist. Nearly half the licensed taxi fleet
is now zero-emission capable, and within a decade, all licensed
taxis are expected to be electric. Licensed taxis are a crucial
part of our public transport system, and the only form of fully
accessible door-to-door transport in our city. There is no
justification for excluding them from Bank, Bishopsgate or
Tottenham Court Road, as is currently the case. That goes against
years of cross-party consensus that meant that taxis could go
wherever buses could.
I am grateful to my right hon. Friend; she is, as ever, making a
powerful contribution. I want to push her on that point. The
number of taxi drivers has now halved. Road blockages, lengthy
queues and difficulties in getting around London have made their
lives a living hell, and more and more of them are leaving the
profession. One of the great shining examples of London transport
is being killed off by the present Mayor.
Many of my constituents who drive taxis will share my right hon.
Friend’s concerns. It would be a real tragedy if London lost its
licensed taxi fleet, but it feels that Mayor Khan is turning the
city into a hostile environment for car drivers, taxi drivers and
people who depend on vans and lorries.
In conclusion, the expansion of the ultra low emission zone to
outer London has no mandate. It will do virtually nothing for air
quality, it will be economically damaging and it will hit the
poorest harder than anyone else. The Mayor should dismantle
Labour’s hated ULEZ expansion. If he does not, I sincerely hope
that Londoners will take the opportunity to vote him out next May
and replace him with a Conservative Mayor of London.
4.53pm
(Bury North) (Con)
As a fellow Greater Manchester MP, Mr Stringer, it will be as
much of a shock to you as it is to me that none of your Labour
party colleagues are present to discuss this huge issue, which
affects every single person in Greater Manchester.
I take a very straightforward view on this issue. It is
inconceivable that any Government could allow the interests of
the green lobby to trump those of hard-working people in my
constituency. It comes down to a basic fact: my constituents
should not be taxed in any way, shape or form to support an
agenda that is utterly damaging to both them and the wider
country. The net zero agenda is worthy of Marx—it is the opium of
the middle-class liberal masses. They are determined to impose on
the rest of us something that none of us wants, including a
speciality of the Labour party: imposing taxation on people who
cannot afford it.
I worked in the private sector for the whole of my professional
career, and I am self-employed when I am not being a Member of
Parliament. What about the guys who go out into the community to
work hard—the plumbers, taxi drivers and electricians? When Andy
first put forward the Greater
Manchester clean air zone, it was astonishing in its scale—493
square miles: the world’s largest clean air zone. No one has ever
been able to give a reason why it was being imposed in the first
place. There are no health benefits from it.
The situation is like many other things we see in politics—the
generalisation and other people wanting my constituents to
believe something without proving that any of it makes any
difference. Every single person in this Chamber knows that we can
look into the cameras, try to be liberal and nice, and say, “In
these circumstances a clean air zone might work.” But the zones
never work because they do not achieve anything and they penalise
the people who elect us.
How on earth can we come up with a policy that puts taxi drivers
out of business? spent £50 million on a scheme
that he planned to introduce on 30 May 2022. Then, miraculously,
with his mayoral election coming up, the scheme was stopped
following a backlash against the scale of the proposals. It was
political opportunism mixed with ideology, and we should fight it
with every sinew of our bodies.
Bearing in mind that Greater Manchester MPs have always dealt
with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs when
it comes to the clean air charging zone, it is a surprise to see
my great friend the Transport Minister here, especially given
that we have had no interaction on this issue. He is a red wall
Minister who believes in low taxation and supporting the
self-employed. He believes in everything that makes most of the
people in this room Conservatives. He certainly—he will challenge
me if I am mischaracterising him—does not believe that there
should be excess taxation on working people to please the liberal
masses. That is fundamentally wrong. The Labour party are not
here because they cannot show their faces. This policy has been
put in place just to please Guardian readers. We have to get away
from it, both as a Government and individuals.
Let me quote this. It has been reported to me—this has never been
challenged by anybody—that the Greater Manchester clean air zone
would cost those of my constituents who have the temerity to
leave for work from their driveways anywhere between £3,285 and
£36,500 a year, depending on the nature of their business and the
individuals involved. Imagine inventing something that charges
someone for leaving their driveway! That is what did.
Thankfully, admitted that the Government
did not force him to come forward with the proposal. I ask the
Minister, through his good offices, to take back to whoever is
going to make the final decision on the Greater Manchester clean
air zone that the Conservative party does not believe in excess
taxation. We believe in evidence-based policy—there has to be a
reason to do something. My constituents are not dropping down
dead as a result of alleged dirty air. That just does not happen.
I have been searching high and low for the evidence to show the
excessive health consequences of dirty air in my area. There is
none.
There is no evidence. The policy puts people out of business and
allows and other politicians to waste
huge amounts of money; we have also given him £120 million to
retrofit vehicles. A few months ago, in this building, I was
talking to somebody from Transport for Greater Manchester—the
active travel commissioner, they were called. “Active travel”
seems to be the thing: encouraging people to jump on a bicycle,
no matter their age—let us spend millions of pounds on
encouraging 85-year-olds to jump on a bicycle and go to the local
town centre.
Angouleme Way in my constituency, a ring road, has been reduced
from two lanes to one. Given that the impact has been to cause
monumental congestion, a not unreasonable question was put to the
person from TfGM; I will not name them here. It was said that the
plan—I am not making this up—was to deliberately create so much
congestion for six to seven years that everyone would jump out of
their cars, get on their bikes or walk about 15 miles from
Ramsbottom in my constituency to the centre of Bury. That policy
making is based on fantasy and hits the wealth creators and
lifeblood of this country. Whether we are talking about the
Greater Manchester clean air zone or ULEZ, it should be stopped
by our Government. The policy does not work for anybody else, and
we need to get away from just following the noise of the liberal
media, which these policies are all about. The Labour party does
not believe in supporting my constituents: it believes in
policies that punish them. That is why none of its Members are
here today.
5.00pm
(Orpington) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer. I
would like to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley
() for leading the debate.
At the outset, I have to say that I fully support the sentiment
of both the petitions we are discussing today, but I will
primarily speak to the petition that refers to a desire to amend
the GLA Act 1999 to remove the Mayor of London’s power to impose
road user charges. The issue has been brought into very sharp
focus by the Mayor of London’s decision late last year to move
forward with the expansion of the ultra low emission zone to the
Greater London boundary, a policy that I have spoken about in the
House a number of times.
My Orpington constituents are part of the London Borough of
Bromley, which will be impacted by the decision. My constituents
are overwhelmingly opposed to the expansion of ULEZ, which they
see quite rightly as a tax-grabbing scheme to fill the holes in
Transport for London’s finances. Moreover, it is a tax-grabbing
scheme misleadingly dressed up as an environmental measure.
Despite a growing clamour and loud discontent, the Mayor is
continuing with its implementation. Indeed, he has effectively
made a mockery of the public consultation on his plans by
ignoring the fact that it showed that over 60% of those consulted
were against the scheme, including 70% of those living in outer
London.
Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act have
revealed that TfL began ordering hundreds of the number plate
recognition systems required for the expanded ULEZ in April 2022,
a full month before the public consultation even started.
Documents obtained by the London Assembly Conservative group show
that the Mayor’s office, having been briefed that the vast
majority of consultation responses coming in were opposed to the
expansion, then attempted to influence the outcome by targeting
an advertising campaign at particular groups of people who were
more likely to respond favourably. There also appears to be a
strong indication that City Hall attempted to suppress responses
from certain individuals in order to make the outcome appear
closer than it was.
It is completely clear that the Mayor was never interested in any
opinion that did not concur with his own, including that of my
constituents. Time and again, he has shown himself to be entirely
unrepentant in his determination to impose prohibitively high
extra costs on Londoners. Orpington simply does not have the
public transport alternatives that exist in central London. We do
not have the tube. We do not have trams. We have a bus network
that is far from comprehensive and is unreliable. We have country
lanes, farms and hedgerows. It is a vast place, and people need
their cars to get around.
My inbox and postbag have been full of messages from people who
are desperately worried because they own a non-compliant vehicle
and can afford neither the daily charge nor the cost of a
replacement vehicle. For some, the expansion will simply mean
that they are not able to drive any more. Indeed a
TfL-commissioned report by the consultancy firm Jacobs, which was
mentioned by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet
(), was published in May
2022 and warned of a disproportionate impact on low-income
households due to their lesser capacity to switch to a compliant
vehicle and/or to change mode.
The Labour party likes to hector everybody about the cost of
living, but this scheme is by one of their own Mayors and it will
hit people on low incomes the most, because they are more likely
to have an older vehicle. Elderly constituents have written to me
distraught about how they may no longer be able to go out and do
their weekly shop or see family and friends because they cannot
afford to drive their cars. They are terrified of isolation. They
have survived the pandemic, but they may not survive this.
Single traders have told me that they will no longer be able to
operate. Social care workers have told me that they will have to
leave the profession. My local higher education college has told
me that the impact on large numbers of their staff will be
devastating. I must agree with small business owners, who are
rightfully complaining that after the pandemic the ULEZ charge is
a crippling additional cost they do not need at this time.
Restaurants and venues within the ULEZ will see a reduction in
footfall. The Mayor clearly fails to grasp that a painter and
decorator or a builder or tree surgeon cannot take their tools up
and down escalators and compete for space on public
transport.
To add insult to injury, the scheme may close businesses in
Orpington. One of my constituents recently told me that he will
have to give up his business, because if he is forced to buy a
new vehicle or pay £12.50 every day, it will no longer be viable.
That is the reality of the situation—businesses closed, family
visits severely restricted and workers worse off. All of that is
about to be imposed by the Mayor of London at a time when the
cost of living is increasing. That arrogance and total disregard
for the great difficulties that will be imposed on less affluent
people are driving my constituents to despair, and the scheme is
entirely unnecessary.
My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does he share my
surprise that, when challenged in the London Assembly on the
issue, a Labour member responded to those worried about the cost
of living by saying, “Go and buy a new car; it will only cost
£3,000.”?
I would like to say that I am surprised by that answer, but I am
afraid that I am not. It comprehensively shows the lack of grip
from some of the people making the decisions that we are talking
about. I remind Members present that every single member of the
Labour group on the London Assembly voted in favour of this when
they had the opportunity to stop it, as did every member of the
Liberal Democrats group and every member of the Green group.
The Mayor’s own independently produced “London-wide ULEZ
Integrated Impact Assessment” states:
“The Proposed Scheme is estimated to have a minor (NO2) to
negligible (PM2.5)…impact on exposure to air pollution”.
Asthma UK ranks Bromley and Havering as the second and first
boroughs, respectively, in terms of the cleanest air quality in
the capital, so why should my constituents have the ULEZ imposed
on them in this way? Improving air quality sounds great on paper
and might earn the Mayor of London brownie points from rich
Labour donors who finance anti-democratic pressure groups such as
Just Stop Oil, but the reality is that the scheme will change
little in terms of air quality.
Devolution, as personified in the form of elected metro Mayors,
has created a form of electoral dictatorship in certain regions
of the country. Most metro Mayors have almost no elected scrutiny
of their actions and no local checks on their power. The London
Assembly has done valuable work in scrutinising the Mayor, but in
practice it is a toothless tiger in terms of its ability to check
his power. The expanded ULEZ will do little to improve air
quality, but it is likely to go ahead because the Mayor and local
authorities have the power to create clean air zones even if they
are flawed. That power needs urgent review.
Section 143 of the GLA Act 1999 appears to offer hope to my
constituents, because on the face of it the section gives the
Secretary of State for Transport the power to direct the Mayor of
London with regard to his transport strategy under certain
conditions. However, I am aware that Department for Transport
lawyers apparently see that as a grey area. So let us put the
issue beyond doubt and do the right thing: let us agree with the
petitioners and seek to remove the power of Mayors and local
authorities to unilaterally impose these charges.
5.08pm
(Dartford) (Con)
I want to make a short speech about this issue, which has a
profound impact on my Dartford constituency. In many ways, places
outside London are in a very different situation compared with
constituencies inside London. We do not vote the London Mayor in
or out, so this is taxation without any accountability or
representation, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping
Barnet () rightly said. Decisions
are being imposed on people in Dartford without any say from the
people of Dartford. That is not democracy, yet that is what is
happening.
That is the case right across the doughnut area around London,
where the Mayor’s scrappage scheme does not apply. Nor should it
apply, because where would we draw the line? Right up to
Manchester or Rochester? We cannot have a situation in which the
general taxpayer has to pick up the bill for the Mayor of
London’s financial incompetence. It is therefore right that we do
not have the scrappage scheme outside London. Even in London, the
scrappage scheme payments are up to £2,000. Show me a
ULEZ-compliant car that can be bought for up to £2,000—there are
hardly any out there.
Right now in Labour-controlled boroughs, such as my borough of
Waltham Forest, they are trying to build tower blocks. They will
not allow any car parking except for those with disability
certificates. That means that even if someone does get the right
car, they will not be allowed to park in London. It is an attack
on the whole idea of the motor car, whether it is electric or
using carbon fuel sources.
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. There is a lack of
joined-up thinking about how we approach motor vehicles, and we
all know that the Mayor of London has an anti-car mentality. The
impact is going to be on people not just outside of London, in
places such as Dartford, but in areas of outer London that fall
within the zone. There will be an impact on businesses: people in
my constituency are not going to travel to them, as it will cost
them £12.50. One in seven of my constituents who own vehicles
will be hit by the charge.
The charge will also affect public services in London. Something
like 50% of all Metropolitan police officers live outside of
London, and I am sure it is a similar figure for paramedics and
firefighters. That group of people is going to have to pay £12.50
to come into London in order to work and keep running the
services that Londoners rely on. It is not just £12.50; if they
are doing a night shift, they will be hit twice. It will be 25
quid to do a night shift. We are talking about the people who
Londoners rely on the most.
(Rochester and Strood)
(Con)
I thank my hon. Friend for the campaigning he has done against
the expansion of ULEZ. Like him, I am Kent MP; he will know that
KentOnline did a freedom of information request, and found that
the last expansion of ULEZ saw 78,000 people in Kent fined within
a year. Over 16,000 people in Medway were fined.
I am now being contacted by residents who are having to travel
into Bexley, which years ago was in Kent, not Greater London. It
is frustrating for my local residents to understand how the
Labour London Mayor has an impact on an area that we used to
believe to be Kent and not London. Does my hon. Friend agree with
me that we should do all we can in Kent to ensure we are
supporting our London colleagues to stop this crazy
money-grabbing scheme by the Mayor?
My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why it has been
so good that Kentish MPs have been working with our distant
cousins from across the border in the smoky town. These are hon.
Friends who, over this issue, would quite like to be in Kent—but
we will not let them.
It is important that we make the point about the penalty notices.
Income from penalty notices has been factored in by the Mayor of
London in the overall budgeting for this. The Mayor relies on
people forgetting to pay, or not knowing that they have to pay.
That is part of the impact that the Mayor is placing on us.
As has been said a few times in this debate, the charging scheme
is not about air quality. That is the façade that has been used.
In Dartford we have poor air quality. We suffer from the impacts
of westerly winds and the Dartford crossing, and as a consequence
we have poor air quality. Therefore, if it was about air quality,
I would be one of the first people to be sympathetic, but it is
not about that. If it was about air quality, would be banning vehicles from
London. He does not want to ban them; he just wants to make money
out of them—and he needs to make a certain amount.
We know that the London underground is far more polluted than the
air on the streets, yet the policy will force more people to use
the underground and so suffer a bigger impact because of the
quality of the air they will be breathing. The scheme has
absolutely nothing to do with air quality. At the moment, the
Mayor of London is doing away with our daily travel cards, which
again pushes more people on to the London underground, where the
air quality is far worse.
At recent public meetings, the Mayor of London equated the
expansion of the ultra low emission zone to the banning of
smoking in pubs. Would my hon. Friend agree that the banning of
smoking in pubs was not subject to a £12.50 charge—as if someone
paying £12.50 would not be polluting the air in the pub while
smoking? The comparison between the two is completely and utterly
bonkers.
Absolutely. It is also fair to say that in any consultations that
took place at the time, the majority of people were in favour of
banning smoking in pubs. Even if we accept wholeheartedly what
the Mayor of London has said about the consultation process, we
know that a majority of people do not support the ULEZ expansion.
It was a sham consultation. What is the point in having a
consultation and totally ignoring its outcome? There are lots of
rumours that the cameras were bought before it took place, and
that therefore there was never any chance of rolling back on the policy. He
was hellbent on expanding the ULEZ no matter what anybody said,
and no matter what the outcome.
What we have not heard is saying that he will not move the
goalposts. I firmly believe that he has in mind the fact that he
has to earn a certain amount of money to pay for the
infrastructure that he will put in—£250 million, for a start—and
to fill the black hole in his finances. If too many people switch
to compliant vehicles, he will move the goalposts, so the next
category of vehicles will no longer be ULEZ compliant, until all
petrol and diesel cars are not compliant and are therefore
charged. The Mayor of London has not ruled that out, and I firmly
believe that it will happen. This is not the end, but the
beginning.
Mr Francois
My hon. Friend said earlier that it is one thing when Kent MPs
co-operate with London MPs; it is another when Essex MPs join in
too. Does he agree that TfL has effectively been bankrupt for
years and is kept going only with central Government subsidy?
While the Mayor pays lip service to air quality, this is a tax
grab, pure and simple. It is not about air quality; it is about
money.
My hon. Friend from across the river is absolutely right. I am
delighted that Essex MPs and Kent MPs have been working together
on this. All MPs who have an inch of fairness about them have
been doing so. It speaks volumes that not a single Labour Back
Bencher has turned up. They are intimidated. When I speak to
Labour MPs privately about the policy, they despair. That is why
they are not present. They have no comeback and no answer, and
they do not want to be here, embarrassed by this policy, which is
supported by the leadership of the Labour party.
I will make one final point. For a party that claims that it
wants to look after the poorest in society, this policy will do
exactly the opposite: it will hit the poorest the most. It will
not hit the rich, powerful and wealthy; it will hit people who
have vehicles that are quite old and that they cannot afford to
upgrade, and small businesses that have two or three
non-compliant vehicles and are therefore unable to upgrade them.
The charge will hit people who cannot afford to pay it, and who
will therefore despair and contact their Members of Parliament.
Scores of them have done so on a weekly basis, desperately trying
to work out what on earth they can do about a policy that they
have no control over—no vote over, in the case of people
Dartford—and simply cannot afford.
This is a cruel form of taxation on people in the south-east. It
is something that the Labour party should be thoroughly ashamed
of. They should be thoroughly ashamed of their London Mayor.
5.18pm
(Carshalton and Wallington)
(Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Stringer.
I, too, thank my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley () for the way he presented
the petitions. I totally agree with everything that has been said
by my Conservative colleagues, and I do not want to be too
repetitive. I will emphasise some really important points, not
least of which are that this ULEZ expansion was not in the
manifesto of the Mayor of London, that the consultation showed
overwhelming opposition to it, and that, according to his own
integrated impact assessment, it will do nothing to tackle air
quality.
In 2020, the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster
(), a deputy chairman of the
Conservative party, said:
“I fully support the Mayor’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) and
its planned extension. The majority of car journeys in the Two
Cities are not made by local people. They are travelling through,
ruining our air quality.”
Why does the hon. Gentleman think she said that? How can he say
that the Conservative party does not support ULEZ?
I am very happy to help the hon. Lady figure out what London
looks like. Its geography comes from the two cities. The
Conservative party did support the inner London low emission
zone, but it does not support the greater London low emission
zone, which applies to my constituency.
She is the deputy chair of your party!
(in the Chair)
Order.
I have long been opposed to ULEZ.
Does my hon. Friend acknowledge that the inner London ultra low
emission zone is contained in the congestion charging zone, which
has a massive surplus of public transport alternatives and
demonstrably worse and less clean air than outer London? That is
why my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and
Westminster () was in favour of it while
she was leader of Westminster City Council and why it was
supported when it was initially consulted on under the mayoralty
of by the GLA Conservative
group.
Outer London is completely different. It does not suffer from the
same bad air or have the public transport alternatives. That may
help the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough
() to understand why there is a
very big difference between the inner London ultra low emission
zone and the outer London ultra low emission zone proposed by the
Mayor.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend. Characteristically, and as a
former member of the London Assembly, he is absolutely right.
Indeed, I imagine that our hon. Friend the Member for Cities of
London and Westminster () may have been less
supportive at the time if she had known that, only a few years
later, the Mayor would be looking to cut the historic No. 11 bus
route out of central London and her constituency.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport ( )
I am sorry to intervene on my hon. Friend. I just thought it
would be worth reflecting on the quote given by the Opposition
Front-Bench spokesperson. Back in 2020, there was no proposal
from the Mayor of London to expand ULEZ to the Greater London
boundary, so whatever my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of
London and Westminster (), who is not present, was
saying in 2020—I am sure the hon. Member for Sheffield,
Brightside and Hillsborough () let her know that she was
going to mention her in Westminster Hall—was not in support of
whatever Mayor Khan has put forward. It was not anything about
what is being debated today because that was not the ULEZ
proposal of Mayor Khan at the time. That is largely the point of
some of the petitioners who have been in touch about today’s
debate.
(in the Chair)
Order. We are not under any real time pressure, but can I remind
right hon. and hon. Members that interventions should be short
and to the point? They are gradually getting longer and
longer.
Thank you, Mr Stringer. I will quickly move on then, and just say
that the Minister is absolutely right.
Like other colleagues, I have seen at first hand in my postbag
the local, organic opposition to ULEZ continue to grow—not just
from my own petition, which is continuing to grow by hundreds of
signatures every week, but from the very real stories that we are
receiving from constituents about how expansion of ultra low
emission zone will impact them. In Carshalton and Wallington
alone, it is estimated that 30% of all vehicles will be deemed
non-compliant; that means that roughly 30,000 cars will not be
deemed compliant if the expansion goes ahead. How many people
will be impacted by that? How many families? How many small
businesses? How many pensioners? How many charities? These are
real concerns voiced by real people, yet how are they portrayed?
How are they dealt with? The Mayor of London, seemingly deaf to
these concerns, labels them wackos, nutjobs and conspiracy
theorists—and that is when he is not too busy trying to sell his
book or going around the world advertising marijuana farms.
Where do my constituents go for help? The Mayor is not helping
them—the Conservatives are the only party opposing the
expansion—so what about their local council? Behind all the smoke
and mirrors is the inescapable fact that the Liberal Democrats
have been consistently pro-ULEZ. That dates back all the way to
2020 when it was actually a Lib Dem Assembly member who berated
the Mayor for not introducing a whole-London ultra low emission
zone. Then, closer to home, a Lib Dem Assembly member has
welcomed the expansion of ultra low emission zone as “right and
necessary” and Sutton’s Lib Dem councillors have been voicing
their support for the expansion of ULEZ to our roads for years.
One went so far as to state boldly on social media that
“Yes we are in favour of ULEZ”
and voted down a motion moved by the Conservative group on Sutton
Council to call on the Mayor to drop it. Even now, even when they
are trying to claw back some kind of credibility, they can still
only go as far as to say that they want a delay. Well, a delay is
not good enough. The only acceptable thing to do with ULEZ is to
scrap it. I am looking towards the Opposition Benches: it does
not surprise me that it is not only the Labour party who are not
here, but the Lib Dems, too.
It is incredibly heartening to see Conservative colleagues
working together across London and outside of it, and I
congratulate the five Conservative-run councils that have brought
forward this proposal. However, having heard your warning about
this matter being sub judice, Mr Stringer, I will not go any
further than that.
We are not only dealing with constituents who are frustrated and
worried—worried to their wits’ end. There are also other groups
and sectors who I fear have been left out of this conversation.
One is charities—for many charities, buying a new ULEZ-compliant
vehicle would be tantamount to financial ruin. I believe that
speaks volumes about the weaknesses identified in the
heavy-handed approach to ULEZ that has been adopted. Tens of
thousands of Londoners, including many people in Carshalton and
Wallington, will receive no help from the Mayor of London’s
scrappage scheme and, as we have already heard, the scheme is not
nearly enough even for those who do qualify. Many Government
Members have long argued for a broader and more holistic
approach, rather than the current scheme.
That goes back to the crux of the issue. The Mayor of London
seeks to punish people for being unable to afford to upgrade
their vehicle instead of encouraging people to have a greener
lifestyle. Instead of spending millions of pounds on ULEZ
enforcement cameras, he could have invested that money
elsewhere—for example, on expanding London’s green bus fleet;
improving the connectivity of outer London boroughs; beefing up
the scrappage scheme; fixing the massive failures in his solar
panel roll-out; or bringing back the boiler scrappage scheme that
the last Mayor had in place.
Take Carshalton and Wallington as an example. Like the borough of
my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington (), we have a terrible public
transport accessibility rating for a London borough: it is just
2. We do not have the tram, the London overground or the tube; we
have bus networks and a limited number of national rail networks.
As my hon. Friend said, those are often unreliable.
The expansion of the tram to Sutton was scrapped by this Mayor
and yet he has the audacity to say that he will somehow improve
the public transport network, which, in our case, is a super-loop
bus that already exists and has a limited number of stops. How
can my constituents get to work, visit friends and family, and go
about their daily lives if they cannot afford the £12.50 daily
charge and there is not a sufficient public transport network in
place? The short answer is that they will not.
Rather than encouraging people to take action through proactive
means, the Mayor has decided to go with the heavy-handed approach
of slapping hardworking Londoners—the least well-off in our
communities—with an arbitrary fee just to leave their driveways.
That is not the way to do things, so I urge the Government to
consider again the petitioners’ asks. We cannot allow this ULEZ
expansion to go ahead.
5.28pm
(Bexleyheath and Crayford)
(Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Mr
Stringer. I will just make a brief speech on behalf of my
constituents in Bexleyheath and Crayford.
I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley () on securing this debate and
on his comprehensive leadership of it. I also congratulate my
right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet () on her comprehensive,
passionate and interesting speech against the ULEZ scheme and
what is happening with it. I do not want to waste everyone’s time
by repeating her comments, but I totally endorse them. My hon.
Friend the Member for Orpington () also made a passionate
speech. He and I have been friends for a long time, we are in
neighbouring boroughs and we have similar situations.
However, the most important thing that I would like to say is
that people in Bexley in particular need their cars. We do not
have an underground system. We have a very limited, east-west
Network Rail and Southeastern train service, which means that if
people want to visit others, they need a car. I believe this
Mayor is anti-car; he wants to stop cars everywhere.
I have a tremendous regard for the Minister. He knows how
passionate I am about cars. Motorists are already taxed an awful
lot—some would say far too much—and the ULEZ is an additional
burden on people who can least afford to change their cars. In my
part of south-east London, the borough of Bexley,
businesses—particularly small businesses, as my hon. Friend the
Member for Carshalton and Wallington () highlighted—need their
vehicles to carry out their work as plumbers and electricians. We
have brilliant care homes in the London borough of Bexley, and
care workers do a fantastic job. They are going to be clobbered.
They are low paid, so the ULEZ is a charge that will be
detrimental to them and their families.
It is a shame that the Mayor of London wants to take this
approach, which was not in his manifesto. We do not expect outer
London to be treated the same as inner London. My hon. Friend the
Member for Dartford () made a powerful speech
about pollution on the underground. Bexley is one of the greenest
boroughs, with more open spaces than nearly any other borough in
Greater London, and our air quality is good. Of course we want to
improve air quality everywhere, for health reasons, but to attack
the outer London boroughs in the way that the Mayor wishes is a
disaster, unfair and undemocratic.
We had an opportunity to have a consultation, but it was a sham
consultation. It was not effective, it was not publicised and the
results are highly suspect. My view is that the respondents in my
borough and constituency are overwhelmingly against the ULEZ.
Whatever people’s political views are in Bexleyheath and
Crayford, they are against the policy for practical and financial
reasons, yet the Mayor is going to proceed with it. It is
undemocratic, and I have huge disregard for his approach of not
listening to facts and comments. In a democracy, we all have to
listen—that is what it is all about—so I am really disappointed
that he will not delay the implementation of the scheme so that
we can have another look at it, because we in my part of London
believe that it is the wrong policy at the wrong time,
particularly given the cost of living situation and because we do
not have the transport network that we need in outer London.
People on low incomes who are doing fantastic caring jobs will be
taxed disproportionately, because they need their car for the
unsocial hours that they have to work—whether it is a night
shift, late shift, early shift or whatever—and there is no public
transport to get them back and forth between home and their
workplace.
This has been a good debate, because it has been comprehensive on
the Conservative side. Different views have been put together,
with one conclusion: the ULEZ must be stopped, and it must be
scrapped. The empty Labour Benches say it all, because a lot of
Labour people in my constituency are fundamentally against the
policy. Labour Members have not spoken up and joined us, which is
a great pity. Of course we want to do all we possibly can to stop
pollution, but this is the wrong policy at the wrong time, and it
is attacking all the wrong people.
5.33pm
Mr (Old Bexley and Sidcup)
(Con)
I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley () for securing this important
debate. I also thank not only all those constituents of mine who
have signed the petitions, but the 6,000 constituents who have
signed my petition against the Mayor of London’s ULEZ expansion
to Bexley and all of Greater London.
The subject of this debate is of huge concern to my constituents.
The planned ULEZ expansion—a tax raid on drivers in outer London
and the neighbouring countries, as we have heard already—will
hammer families, small businesses and emergency service workers
with bills of £12.50 per day, or around £4,500 a year. As the
petitions highlight, and as we have already heard from
Conservative Members, the ULEZ expansion is overwhelmingly
opposed by the public. The debate has also raised a number of
serious issues and questions, including about the process and
powers being used by the Mayor to push it through. I hope that
the Minister will look closely at that again, given these
petitions.
First, there are questions about whether the Mayor has the
mandate to do this. As we have heard already, it was not in his
manifesto, and the impact of the expansion will be felt far
outside the Greater London boundaries. That is alongside the fact
that local authorities also have a statutory duty over air
quality, and, as we know, several boroughs are opposed to the
policy.
Secondly, as highlighted already, the proposals were
overwhelmingly rejected in the consultation by around 70% to 80%
of people in outer London. Unsurprisingly, the number of black
taxi drivers who reject them is even higher. Even Unite the
union, one of the biggest funders of the Labour party, is against
Labour’s policy and has described ULEZ as “anti-worker”. Despite
that, in a rare moment of consistency, the Labour leadership is
supporting the policy and doubling down on its support for the
Mayor of London.
It is clear why people are so furious about the decision, given
the current cost of living challenges. In Bexley alone—the area
that I am proud to serve—around 31,000 vehicles will be directly
impacted. It is hammering us—businesses, families and key
workers—with those bills. According to the RAC’s own independent
estimates—they are far different from those provided by TfL,
which I think we have all started to question—851,000 vehicles
will be impacted in outer London. That is just inside those
Greater London boundaries.
By introducing the charge in August, with less than a year’s
notice, the Mayor has given people hardly any time to switch
vehicles, which was one of the main points raised by objectors in
these petitions and elsewhere. That may suit the Mayor, as he and
Labour desperately hope that people will forget about ULEZ before
May’s election. However, I have some news for the Mayor:
Londoners will not forget, and barely a day goes by without a
constituent stopping me in the street and highlighting how ULEZ
will impact them. That also goes for the upcoming by-election in
Uxbridge and South Ruislip, where voters have the opportunity to
send Labour a message when it comes to ULEZ.
Those constituents include pensioners who rarely drive but need
their car to go shopping or to hospital appointments; families
who need to drop off their kids, perhaps to different schools
each morning; and, as we have heard, tradesmen who need their
vans for their tools and to get to jobs. As my Friend the Member
for Dartford () has highlighted, shops on
the boundary of Bexley, in places such as Bexley village, face a
particular issue. Many customers come from neighbouring Dartford
or Rochester to use their services, and people are so scared that
there will be a significant drop in customer footfall.
Alongside the clearly negative impact of the ULEZ expansion on
businesses and hard-working families, it is also important to
again highlight that over 50% of blue-light workers in London
live outside the capital, and 90% of care workers nationally use
their own cars for work. Those are not my figures but official
figures. The expansion will create many knock-on issues for the
emergency services in the likes of Bexley, including, as we have
heard, the doubling of charges for those working nights. It will
also negatively impact patients, with my local hospital in
Sidcup, Queen Mary’s Hospital, sharing a number of services and
nurses with the likes of Dartford.
Those are all issues that I do not believe have been properly
thought through as the Mayor of London desperately seeks to fill
the black hole in Transport for London’s finances, which he is
responsible for. Bexley does not have the underground, and, like
many other London boroughs, it does not have the same transport
options and connectivity as central London, so it is extremely
unfair that the Mayor of London is proposing plans for ULEZ
expansion.
In recent years, as I have said, our bus and other services have
been cut by the Mayor of London, and there is nothing in his
so-called reinvestment plans that will help areas such as Bexley
and the south-east. For example, when we last debated this
subject in this very room—I believe it was back in December and
that my hon. Friend the Member for Dartford secured it—the
Mayor’s office sent out a glossy press release just before the
debate. It went to all Members of this House, highlighting that
we should support ULEZ because he would expand the bus network in
outer London. But what actually happened in reality? The very
next morning, the B13 service in Bexley, which serves my elderly
constituents and others, had its frequency cut.
Since then, we have heard what we call the super-flop
announcement. Bus routes are getting rebranded in outer London
but they are not helping anyone at all. We are expected to tell
our constituents, “We’re really sorry, but you should drop your
opposition to ULEZ because the Mayor of London is rebranding an
existing bus route in our area.” It is complete nonsense.
Unfortunately, it is also a prime example of the problems that we
have had with this disastrous Mayor of London. All we hear is
press release after press release, but when it comes to substance
and helping hard-working Londoners, he fails time and time
again.
The scrappage scheme announced by the Mayor does not even come
close to matching demand or addressing the costs and practical
issues associated with buying a new vehicle. The fact that he is
forecast to spend double the amount of taxpayers’ money to
install cameras to fine people highlights how this policy is
aimed not at improving air quality, but at raising money. When
Labour members of the Greater London Authority had the chance to
vote to expand the scrappage scheme to help more people, they did
not do so, despite the fact that ULEZ is forecast to raise over
£1 billion in the first two years of expansion, as revealed by
freedom of information requests in the last week or two. The
Government have also provided Transport for London with over £6
billion in taxpayer bail-outs in recent years—another figure that
the Mayor frequently forgets to mention.
As we have heard, the Mayor’s own independent impact report on
the policy highlighted that it will have a negligible impact on
improving air quality in outer London. Our areas are very
different from central London. As my right hon. Friend the Member
for Bexleyheath and Crayford ( ) said, we are already seeing
improvements in air quality, but we need policies that actually
improve it and encourage people to act more sustainably, not ones
that are clearly greenwashed to raise money. If the Mayor of
London actually wants to help tackle air pollution rather than
raise money, further investment should be made to support people
and encourage them to switch to electric vehicles where they can,
including by installing electric vehicle charging points and
leading by example with TfL’s own bus fleet. We have also heard
about underground air pollution.
With traffic having been highlighted as one of the main causes of
air pollution, there needs to be an urgent review of the impact
of the Mayor’s road closures on increasing traffic and emissions
across London. By pure coincidence, I am sure, those closures
have also raised millions in fines for Labour councils in central
London. Like ULEZ, they are clearly designed to penalise drivers
rather than encourage improvements in emissions. I will highlight
another unwanted statistic for the Mayor: London is now the
slowest city in the world to drive in, despite the congestion
charge and ULEZ. These schemes are not working. Traffic in the
capital is getting worse.
While the Mayor of London is out trying to sell his new book, he
is issuing more and more licences for private hire vehicles. The
inconsistencies are stark wherever we look. The Mayor does not
like to talk about it, but we have already heard about the last
Labour Government’s proposals for the purchase of diesel
vehicles. When was the Transport Secretary at
the end of their time in government, he was also in favour of
Heathrow expansion. He does not like to talk about that either.
One of his most fundamental policies and investments during his
mayoralty is the Silvertown tunnel, which will encourage many
more people to drive through east and south-east London and
increase the number of vehicles on the road—something that the
campaigners against Silvertown tunnel like to point out.
We will not take any lectures from on air quality. His days are
numbered; we have figured him out. Next May, Londoners across the
capital have the opportunity to kick out this failing son of a
bus driver, and ensure that they have people in charge who can
get our great city moving again and make it safe for us all to
live.
5.44pm
(Rayleigh and Wickford)
(Con)
I confess that I had not originally planned to speak in this
debate, but as not a single Labour or Lib Dem Back Bencher has
put in to speak, I will make a few points in lieu of them.
The ULEZ zone affects outer London, stretching out towards the
county of Essex, in some cases well past the M25. Many of my
constituents and people who live in Essex will be affected by the
imposition of the charge, and, because they do not live in
Greater London, they cannot vote Mayor Khan out of office or vote
anyone else into office. For them it really is a case of taxation
without representation, which is one reason I feel strongly about
it, and even more so after having heard excellent speeches on the
topic by my Conservative colleagues this afternoon.
The Mayor says the issue is about air quality, but it is not. As
my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet () made perfectly clear, the
studies and detailed scientific analysis show that the effect of
the ULEZ on air quality will be marginal at best. Everybody knows
the truth. It is not about air quality. That is the fig leaf that
Mayor Khan is using to justify it. It is about money, because TfL
is effectively bankrupt and has been for some years. He is
therefore trying to use the charge to fill a black hole. It is
perfectly obvious what he is up to, and I think every Londoner in
their heart of hearts knows that.
The charge will add to the other problems that the Mayor has
introduced such as the road closures and road narrowing measures
in London, which serve to create more pollution on an
increasingly congested number of remaining roads, because the
traffic has to go somewhere. Such measures make London one of the
worst cities in which to drive.
As has already been made plain, not everyone can take public
transport. If people need tools or equipment for work, they have
no choice other than to drive. People in the public sector will
be affected, including Met police officers and NHS workers who
have to drive into London to work in hospitals. I declare an
interest: my wife will be one of those affected. It will also
affect people in the private sector such as tradespeople going
about their work trying to get to and from their place of
business. All of those people will have their lives made more
difficult by Mayor Khan. Let us be honest: he does not like cars
and he does not seem to like car drivers, either.
A black cabbie said to me a few weeks ago, “I’ve been doing this
job for over 30 years and I have never known the traffic in
London to be as bad as it is now. Between all the road closures
and the roadworks it is virtually impossible to get anywhere and
it is about time someone raised it in Parliament.” Well, Bill—I
think that was his name—now they have. Bill the cabbie was
absolutely right. It is becoming incredibly difficult to drive
across our capital city because there are so few arteries that we
can take. If there is an accident or heavy roadworks on one of
the arteries, that whole part of London an rapidly grind to a
halt.
Will my right hon. Friend give way?
Mr Francois
In return for earlier, I am glad to.
Does my right hon. Friend agree that in an age when we are trying
to become a more productive economy, it is madness to make it
more difficult to get around our capital city, which generates so
much of our GDP? That is crazy.
Mr Francois
Yes. Perhaps it is a function of my age, but I can remember a
time when the fastest way to get across London was to hop in a
cab. It is certainly not that way now. We have about half the
number of black cab drivers that we had prior to the pandemic,
which is a fantastic drop-off, bearing in mind that it takes an
average of three or four years to do the knowledge and get a
green badge. Many of them have given up. From talking to them or
to friends of people who have given up, we find that many have
done so partly because of their age—that was an effect of the
pandemic—but that many others have given up because it is so
difficult to get across London. It is just too stressful a way to
earn a living. That is why sometimes people can wait quite a long
while to get a black cab in London. There are far fewer around
than there were. If anybody knows about the challenges of driving
across London, I would suggest that black cab drivers are
well-placed to comment.
One of the other great problems is roadworks, which have a great
effect on air quality. One of the most frustrating things about
modern life, is it not, is spending ages in a car crawling ever
so slowly forward toward the lights to get through that
contraflow, only to finally make it through the lights and drive
past a perfectly coned-off big hole in the ground with absolutely
no one in sight doing any work on it at all? How many people get
wound up by that?
We have had a proliferation of roadworks in my county of Essex.
We are the roadworks capital of the UK. In a recently recorded
12-month period, we had 77,000 roadworks of one kind or another.
I cannot blame that on Mayor Khan. I could talk about the utility
companies or Essex County Council’s highways, but there is just
too much to say. I have launched a “Can the Cones” campaign,
which the Minister kindly agreed to meet me about in March. One
thing he was looking at was lane rental—not ULEZ—which involves
making contractors pay by the day to dig up roads. In the parts
of the country where that has been brought in, contractors,
funnily enough, tend to get the job done much quicker. Perhaps in
the Minister’s reply he could spare a moment to say where he has
got to on that.
Essex County Council, I am pleased to say, has come around to the
idea and is working on a joint scheme with Suffolk to introduce
it. The reason why it is so important is that as communities have
grown historically, we have tended to find that most of the
utilities have been laid on a very limited number of roads, and
those are the ones that get dug up again and again. They would be
ideal candidates for which to bring in some form of lane
rental.
I thank the House for its forbearance, and I would summarise the
issue as follows: ULEZ is going to be, if it is introduced—I hope
the Mayor might yet relent—a tax on ordinary, hard-working men
and people of this country, who will be penalised £12.50 a day
for having the temerity to want to go to work to earn money and
put food on their family’s plates. That is what Mayor Khan is
doing. The whole bit about air quality is complete camouflage. It
is not about that; it is about the money. For that reason, the
petitioners are right: rather than the cars, it is ULEZ that
should be scrapped.
5.53pm
(Sheffield, Brightside and
Hillsborough) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairpersonship, Mr
Stringer. I thank the hon. Member for Don Valley () for opening the debate on
behalf of the Petitions Committee, and I thank the other hon.
Members who have contributed. It is unusual to see the Tory party
all in solidarity with one another. Everyone agreed with one
another, which is not something we often see in the House.
Mr Francois
We can’t talk to the Labour party; they’re not here.
Air pollution is a serious yet solvable problem. The Government’s
figures estimate that between 28,000 and 36,000 deaths are
attributed to air pollution each year, or between 80 and 100
deaths each and every day. Three years ago, nine-year-old Ella
Adoo-Kissi-Debrah became the first person to have air pollution
listed as a cause of death by the coroner. That heartbreaking
case demonstrates the urgency with which we must tackle air
pollution.
Currently, the UK air quality limit stands at 20 micrograms of
particulate matter per cubic metre of air, which is four times
higher than the World Health Organisation’s target of 5
micrograms. The Government are only committed to reducing the
limit to 10 micrograms as late as 2040. Sadly, the World Health
Organisation guidelines for air pollution continue to be missed
across London.
Transport is a leading cause of air pollution, estimated to
contribute 35% of nitrogen oxide pollution and 13% of PM2.5
pollution in 2021. Those stark figures must not be ignored, and
we need action from the Government to address the problem. The
fact is that many local authorities have had little choice but to
implement clean air zones because of the years of inaction on air
pollution at a national level. The Government require local
authorities to take steps to improve air quality, but this
Government’s inaction on the main sources of air pollution means
that local authorities are left with few options to clean up
their air. Given the funding and powers available to local
authorities, clean air zones are, in practice, one of the only
viable mechanisms available to them to meet their legal
requirements.
Just to confirm, is it Labour party policy to support the
imposition of a Greater Manchester clean air zone on my
constituents in Bury North?
The position of the Labour party is that we acknowledge that we
have to get this problem sorted out, and I will come to that
later in my speech.
So that is a yes.
I did not say that; I said that I will come to that later in my
speech.
The Minister may not want to admit it, but a clear policy
direction has been set by the Government, and local authorities
are merely meeting their obligations at the behest of Government.
Although Government Members like to kick up a fuss about clean
air zones, their Government have approved those clean air zones
where air pollution reductions have been legally required. Having
essentially required councils to implement clean air zones,
Ministers have failed to follow through with the support to help
councils to meet their air quality targets.
To take just one example, let us look at the Government’s record
on the transition to electric vehicles. Electric vehicles do not
produce any nitrogen oxide pollution and they produce
significantly less PM2.5 pollution. Encouraging people to switch
from petrol and diesel cars to EVs is therefore a vital step in
improving air quality, but under the Conservatives, we are at
risk of stalling the switch.
[Mrs in the Chair]
Ministers have slashed help to purchase electric vehicles, and we
are set to miss the target for 300,000 EV charging points by
almost two decades. That is why our world-class car manufacturers
are losing confidence in investing in Britain.
Air pollution causes huge harm to human health, which is why
Labour has made ambitious pledges to reduce it, and we plan to
get there by helping the switch to cleaner transport. That is why
we have a transition plan to enable people to switch affordably
to low-emission vehicles. Labour’s plan would make Britain a
world leader in electric vehicles; our national wealth fund would
invest in eight battery plants nationwide and win the global race
for the future of the industry. With action to expand charging
infrastructure, Labour’s plan for green growth will drive jobs,
tackle the cost of living crisis and help to clean up toxic
air.
Can the hon. Lady confirm whether the Labour candidate in the
Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election supports ULEZ
expansion?
I thank the right hon. Lady for that question. She would perhaps
would want to ask the candidate that; I am not here to put words
in his mouth.
Mr French
May I ask the hon. Lady a question?
No, I will not give way.
We will accelerate the roll-out of charging points and give
motorists the confidence to make the switch to non-polluting,
CAZ-compliant vehicles. New targets will hold Government to
account and provide long-term assurance for investors. We will
rapidly scale up UK battery-making capacity by part-financing
eight additional gigafactories, which will create 80,000 jobs and
add £30 billion to the UK’s economy, all while powering 2 million
electric vehicles and improving air quality, alongside clean air
zones. The next Labour Government will build the infrastructure
fit for the century ahead by delivering Northern Powerhouse Rail
and High Speed 2 in full, unlocking the growth and investment
that businesses are crying out for, and helping people to switch
to clean public transport.
We are also committed to passing a clean air Act, building on the
pioneering work of the Labour Government in Wales. The Act would
establish a legal right to breathe clean air and would place
tough new duties on Ministers to ensure that air quality
guidelines are met. We will enshrine World Health Organisation
standards for air quality in UK law and act quickly to bring down
harmful emissions and air pollution through our own ambitious
green prosperity plan.
That plan will allow us to invest in the green industries of the
future, making the UK a leader in green industries such as clean
and renewable energy. Rolling out more electric vehicles,
greening our power sector and insulating 19 million homes within
a decade will make a huge difference to the amount of air
pollution emitted from UK transport, energy and homes.
Labour’s plans will ensure that people across the country are no
longer forced to breathe air that is harmful to their health.
While the Government are too busy tearing themselves apart to
tackle these serious issues, Labour stands ready to decarbonise
our transport, clean up our air and make Britain a world leader
in the technologies of the future.
I have just one question for the Minister: why have the
Government not done more about air quality for the past 13 years
while they have been in office, and why have I got quote after
quote from Conservative London MPs saying that they supported
ULEZ, but now they are all backing off? I wonder why.
6.01pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport ( )
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Murray,
and that of Mr Stringer earlier. I thank my hon. Friend the
Member for Don Valley () for fulfilling his role on
behalf of the Petitions Committee so eloquently and for opening
the debate on road-charging schemes.
I wanted to pick up on a comment made by my hon. Friend the
Member for Bury South—
North.
Mr Holden
My hon. Friend the Member for Bury North ()—he is adopting part of Bury
South in the boundary changes, which is what confused me
slightly.
This area crosses multiple Departments: the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs leads on environmental
legislation overall; the Department for Transport owns the
enabling powers in multiple different spaces; and the Department
for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities owns the powers related
to the devolution settlements. Road charging cuts across many
areas.
Before I get into my speech, I will pick up on a couple of points
made by the hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and
Hillsborough (), who spoke for the
Opposition. She said that she did not put words into other
people’s mouths, but I can categorically state that I have been
in touch with my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and
Westminster () and that she has never
supported the expansion of ULEZ to the borders of Greater London.
Given how the Labour party has criticised potential
misrepresentations by Members on the Government Benches in recent
months, it might be a nice idea for the hon. Lady, at some point
in the very near future, to apologise for misrepresenting the
views of my hon. Friend. The hon. Lady did not do her the
courtesy of telling her that she would mention her in the House
today.
I also want to pick up on a couple of points made by my hon.
Friends from across the Conservative Benches. Kent, Essex,
London, Greater Manchester and South Yorkshire are all
represented in the Chamber, and all spoke with a united voice,
reflecting on what is being done across the country. It was
particularly interesting to see that no Labour Members are
present. People going to by-election polls across the country
will be interested to see that if they vote Labour, they will get
absolutely no voice in this place, whereas with the voice of
, the Conservative candidate
in Uxbridge and South Ruislip, who has opposed ULEZ consistently,
people will know exactly what they get if they vote for him in
the upcoming by-election.
Aside from party politics, it is important to talk about the
petition. Devolving powers to local authorities is an important
tenet of a democratic Government, giving power to those who are
closest to and most knowledgeable about the local issues that
they face. Devolution helps to drive local and national economic
growth, better and more integrated public services, and enhanced
public engagement and accountability—at least, that is the
theory. Our existing Mayors already play an important role across
the country, and the Government are committed to deepening those
devolution settlements over time and building on the existing
framework.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley said, the GLA Act
1999 was brought in after a referendum on the proposal for a
Greater London Authority made up of an elected Mayor and
Assembly, with 72% voting in support. In 2015, the first of the
Government’s devolution deals was agreed and the Greater
Manchester Combined Authority came into being. In 2022, we
announced six further devolution deals, bringing devolution to
people right across the country, with elected Mayors at their
head. The deals mark a new chapter in English devolution. It is
important to reflect on what that devolution means. It does not
just mean devolving power and money; it also means accountability
at a local level. That is what hon. Members have been talking
about: people need to be accountable for the decisions that they
make in local government.
One of the petitions proposes changing the GLA Act to remove a
power from a directly elected Mayor. It is interesting that the
petitioners know where the power lies but do not trust the person
who is currently in the position to stand up for them. It is
quite something when, rather than campaigning to change the
person at the top, the petitioners are so concerned—as my hon.
Friends the Members for Orpington (), for Bury North, and for
Carshalton and Wallington () said—about the impact that
the policy will have on their lives, and those of their families
and communities, that they want to remove a power, because they
do not trust the people in those positions to represent them.
(in the Chair)
Order. I remind the Minister that he should be speaking through
the Chair.
Mr Holden
Thank you for reminding me, Mrs Murray. I apologise for being
discourteous to you.
Hon. Members across the House mentioned tackling air
pollution—one of the biggest environmental threats that we face.
My hon. Friend the Member for Don Valley highlighted Ella’s case.
There is evidence of a link between very high, problematic air
pollution and high mortality, but those living in our country can
see what the Government are trying to do. We have already
introduced the phasing in of electric cars and the phasing out of
the internal combustion engine. We are doing the same for heavy
goods vehicles and for our coach sector. Before the end of this
Parliament, it will be very clear what we will do on the phasing
out of the internal combustion engine in our bus network. We have
invested in more than 3,400 zero-emission buses across the United
Kingdom—very close to our target of 4,000 before the end of the
Parliament.
That is what we are doing across the piece to deliver on our
environmental objectives. We recently introduced two new targets
beyond that for fine particulate matter in the Environment Act
2021. We have invested another £883 million to tackle air
pollution in 64 local authorities where nitrogen dioxide levels
were too high. Since 2010, we have awarded a further £53 million
to English local authorities to support more than 500 local
projects. As recently as 9 February, we announced the latest
round of funding under the air quality grant scheme. London gets
its own package, as my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and
Sidcup (Mr French) said, through the £6 billion that we have
delivered to the Mayor of London for him to deliver on air
quality locally. So we are not just talking about action; we are
actually delivering it.
The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough talked
about the Labour Government in Wales as a pioneer. They are
pioneering in so many different ways. They have the highest
waiting lists in the entire United Kingdom. They have the lowest
employment across the United Kingdom as well. If they are the
pioneers of the Labour revolution, we can all see what they
actually stand for. They are not delivering in the same way as we
are in England on multiple environmental policies. We are
monitoring rivers up and down the country—something that Labour
is not even looking at in Wales at the moment.
The Minister spoke a minute or two ago about investing in bus and
rail services. I wonder why we have so much discontent throughout
communities all over the country about the lack of bus services
and the trains being unreliable. [Hon. Members: “Strikes and
unions!”] Strikes, yes. In the end, what is the Government’s
money doing? Does the Minister recognise that the cuts to local
authorities have had a massive impact already? Whatever money the
Government are putting in is nowhere near as much as the money
they have taken out of local authorities.
Mr Holden
Before the pandemic, the Government were paying, through
concessionary travel schemes and support through the bus service
operators grant, around 40% of all the cash going into bus
services in this country. At the moment, because we are
supporting bus services as they recover from the pandemic, it is
around 60%; £3.5 billion has gone into the bus network across the
country.
It is not working.
Mr Holden
There have been no recent proposals from the Opposition Front
Bench when it comes to actual cash. We have just approved a new
plan of £500 million supporting bus services across the country,
and a £2 fare cap. That is money that we have put in to support
fare schemes in the combined authority areas, which I know Labour
mayors up and down the country like to take credit for. That is
money that the Government have been investing right across the
country, whether in Greater Manchester or Greater London.
Does the Minister share my confusion that Labour’s argument for
ULEZ, advanced in this place and in our local areas, is that
local authorities have been forced to do this, and that they do
not want to? That is not what the Mayor of London is saying. The
Mayor of London has written a whole book about how proud he is of
the ultra low emission zone. Does my hon. Friend think that is
really the best that Labour can come up with?
Mr Holden
I tend to agree with my hon. Friend. The Mayor put the idea of an
expanded ULEZ in his manifesto, but it was not the expanded zone
that we see today, which was only delivered by the votes of the
Labour party, the Lib Dems and the Greens in the London Assembly.
They voted to extend it right to the outer borders of Greater
London, rather than what the Mayor of London had proposed in his
manifesto.
The hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough
shouted at me from a sedentary position that whatever we are
providing for the bus sector is still not enough. I would love
her to tell me how much more we should put in. When I speak to
Labour politicians at the moment, none of them can tell me. They
have no plan. They are just an opportunistic Opposition. This
Government have put more than ever before into the bus network.
We have capped prices for working people, which is something the
Labour party never did when it was in office. Right up and down
the country we have put in the new bus service operators grant of
22p per kilometre, which now includes electric buses—something
that was not the case just a few years ago. We remain committed
to an end date for non-zero emission buses, and that consultation
will be reported on soon.
Mr Francois
We have concentrated mainly on roads in this debate, but as the
hon. Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough () introduced the topic, does
the Minister agree with the simple proposition that our rail
network would run much more efficiently if the rail unions
stopped going on strike?
Mr Holden
I have to agree with my right hon. Friend. I was attacking on so
many different fronts that I forgot to mention the elephant in
the room, which is the continuing rail strikes by people who have
been incredibly financially supportive of the Labour party over
the years.
Although there is a huge amount more to be done, we can be proud
that air pollution has reduced significantly since 2010.
Emissions of fine particulate matter have fallen by 10%;
transport emissions of nitrous oxide have fallen by 32%, overall
nitrogen oxide by 45% and sulphur dioxide by 73%. The hon. Member
for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough might criticise a
reduction of three quarters in the amount of sulphur dioxide and
wish that we could go further. I want to go further too, which is
why we are phasing out internal combustion engine vehicles. If
she wants to go further, would she outline exactly how far and
fast she would like to go?
The only statutory air quality limit that the UK is currently not
hitting as fast as we would like is for nitrogen dioxide around
our road network, but we are making massive progress there.
Around 72% of the road transport emissions of nitrogen oxides
comes from diesel cars and vans, which we are phasing out. If we
are going to introduce a ULEZ across Greater London requiring
£250 million of capital cost, which is going to be phased out
anyway because of the fact that we will be moving, in pretty
short order, towards electric vehicles, particularly in smaller
areas, it seems to be particularly targeted—I think the
Conservative speakers really picked this up—on those who use
second-hand cars and who, because they cannot afford to buy new
vehicles, will be running those cars for a long time. It is
particularly pernicious to put those people at the front of the
list.
Does my hon. Friend agree that this scheme is targeted, like
every single Labour policy, at the self-employed? This scheme
unduly impacts self-employed people, who require transport to go
out to work, so it is grossly unfair.
Mr Holden
There is absolutely no doubt that my hon. Friend is absolutely
right. The owner of a small business who literally carries the
tools of their trade in the back of their van does not have other
options. Even if people are not the owners of small businesses
but are just commuting to work in a car or van, the Mayor has now
hit them on the other side with a day travel card, as my hon.
Friend the Member for Dartford () said. In addition to those
extra £50 million of costs, they are being told to use public
transport and then told to pay an absolutely huge amount more for
it, particularly if they are coming from outside the Greater
London area. Again, that is a change that hon. Members have been
reflecting on today. It means that the people affected by the
change pay more but still do not have any say over the person
responsible. That is part of the democratic deficit argument that
Members have talked about.
I need to move on to local government powers around air quality.
Powers enabling local authorities to introduce road schemes that
charge users are of long standing. They can be used by local
authorities to deliver what they want in their areas. There are
no plans to revoke these powers, which are in the Transport Act
2000. They provide local authorities with an important tool. It
is for local authorities to make decisions and to be accountable
for those decisions.
We require local authorities to consult on these schemes. The
Prime Minister has spoken at the Dispatch Box—I think it was in
response to a question from one of the hon. Members here today;
it might have been my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington
()—on the consultation around
the ULEZ scheme. The Prime Minister thought it would be a
sensible idea for the Mayor of London to think again and I tend
to agree with him. This scheme needs to be thought about again,
more broadly.
These powers have been used by some local authorities in various
areas, but what I would say to all local authorities across the
country is that if they want to take people with them, they
should not try to drive people out of using cars; they should
provide better quality alternatives. It is particularly sad to
see the Mayor of London reducing some bus routes, particularly
historical bus routes, and not allowing that alternative when
people really need it. I have pledged before to my right hon.
Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet () that I will speak to the
transport commissioner in London about the No. 84 bus. I will see
the commissioner in the next few weeks, and I will do so
again.
The Government recognise the need to support a range of solutions
across the board for individuals and businesses affected by
measures to tackle air pollution. That is why we have already
awarded £402 million through the clean air fund to some of the
local authorities that face some of the most pernicious negative
impacts of air quality that are also difficult to mitigate.
Under the Greater London Authority Act 1999, transport in London
is devolved to the Mayor and Transport for London. It is the
Mayor’s responsibility to manage and oversee the transport
network. This includes the power to create, or vary, road schemes
that charge users, which is why the petitioners drafted their
petition in the way that they did. It is up to the Mayor to
determine and justify what he is doing.
The mayoralty in London has previously used those powers to
introduce the congestion zone, the low emission zone and the
current smaller ULEZ in central London. When the Mayor brought
forward his transport strategy, which was voted on, it could have
been rejected by the members of the GLA, but instead it was
supported by every party in the GLA apart from the Conservatives.
That is where the Mayor gets his ability to do this from.
The GLA Act gives the London Assembly the power to accept or veto
mayoral strategies, including the transport strategy, but only on
the proviso that two thirds of elected members of the GLA agree
on an alternative, which means that of the 25-member GLA, 17
would have to agree on the alternative. The electoral system for
the London Assembly guarantees that no one party will be able to
achieve that; Labour votes would have been required to achieve
that. That is why the Mayor’s budget has never been amended and
why no strategies have ever been amended. Does the Minister agree
that that is precisely why the petitioners have put forward this
petition today? The London Assembly does not have the effective
power to veto the Mayor’s transport strategy, which is why the
petitioners are calling on the Government to step in and do
that.
Mr Holden
I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. What is
particularly interesting today about Labour Members is how few of
them are here. In fact, no Labour Back Bencher is here. I would
be really interested to know why that is the case. It is clear to
me that a few of them, secretly and in the background, would go
against their party leader, the Leader of the Opposition, who is
fully behind Mayor Khan’s plan for the massive expansion of the
ULEZ. I think a few of them would like to speak up in that
way.
I understand the point that my hon. Friend makes and I will
address it directly at the end of my remarks, if I may, but I
think it is very important that we also say to people, “If you
want change, then rather than trying to change the rules or the
legislation in this place, you can change the person in charge of
implementing them.” That is the most important message that we
can send today, and a really important way of sending that
message in the very near future is to deliver it in Uxbridge in
the next few weeks—sorry, Mrs Murray, I digressed slightly
there.
The mayoralty in London has previously used the GLA Act to
introduce various measures, and there has been a significant
reduction in nitrous oxide as well as particulates and other
pollutants over the last few years, but that is due to
improvements in engines as well as to other factors. The Mayor of
London needs no agreement from the Government or the London
boroughs to pursue his proposed expansion of the ULEZ under the
current law, and although the current Mayor notified the
Department for Transport of his intention to expand the ULEZ, he
is not obliged by the legislation to consult the Department. At
the last mayoral election, in 2021, the Mayor stood on a
manifesto that included a pledge to expand the ULEZ to the
boundary of the North and South Circular Roads; his manifesto did
not say that the ULEZ would be expanded to the boundary of
Greater London. To implement his preferred option of expanding
the ULEZ, the Mayor had to revise his transport strategy, and
this was subject to a consultation and a vote in the London
Assembly.
The car is an important, and often the only, way for people to
get around in their daily lives; the same is true of small vans.
These vehicles are particularly needed for people who have
limited mobility—another element to this issue that we all need
to consider at the moment. People depend on their vehicles for
food, for their health, for their livelihoods and to visit
friends and family. They should be given a choice of how they
travel. Imposing obstacles and doing so during a cost of living
crisis is quite a blow to those who need their cars, who have no
real alternative and whose choice is being removed. The Mayor
could have proposed other, less intrusive measures to improve air
quality in the capital, but he did not; instead, he and has
chosen to expand the ULEZ. That is his decision, and he has the
power to do it under the current law.
Before I conclude my remarks, I want to touch on the rest of the
country, because my hon. Friend the Member for Bury North also
raised important points. One area where we do recognise an
emerging inconsistency is in the powers of local authorities to
look at charging systems where the approach taken in London
differs from those outside the capital. The judicial review of
the Mayor’s proposal is being heard in July. At the moment, I
cannot speak in much greater detail about that, aside from saying
that the case will be heard on four grounds—it was two
previously, before the recent appeal—including how the Mayor
conducted his consultation, and his scrappage scheme. Clearly, it
would not be proper to comment on that, but we have seen the
difficulty that the inconsistency in local authority powers can
create, with four London borough councils, alongside Surrey
County Council, challenging the decision. It is important to
recognise that. As many hon. Members have said, constituents
being impacted without their having the ability to change the
Mayor is a real issue.
Outside London, combined authorities have their own locally
agreed decision-making processes. For road schemes that charge
users, powers are typically held by combined and local
authorities, and some degree of local authority agreement is
required to introduce schemes. That is separate and different
from the situation in Greater London. Two decades on from the
re-establishment of the mayoralty of London, it is right that the
Government take stock of how London’s devolution settlement is
operating in practice, which is why the Government are committed
to reviewing the London devolution settlement as part of the
English devolution accountability framework more broadly.
I am not in a position today to announce any change to the
Government’s position on this issue—it is more proper for
Ministers in other Departments to fully reflect on it—but I
recognise the strength of feeling not only of hon. Members
present but of the petitioners. I commit to raising the concerns
expressed during the debate with ministerial colleagues.
6.25pm
This extremely good debate has brought north and south together,
which is always good to see. Unfortunately, the Opposition did
not want to join us today, and we have heard in the speeches the
reasons why. Wherever there is a socialist authority, there are
always additional taxes. We have heard that Scotland is speaking
about tourist taxes, which are already in place in Manchester.
Socialist authorities seem to want only to tax businesses and the
people of this country, who pay enough as it is. We do not need
any more of those policies.
Has the hon. Gentleman thought about the impact of the actions in
September and October of the former Prime Minister, the right
hon. Member for South West Norfolk (), which have led to the
highest taxation for almost everyone?
(in the Chair)
Order. The shadow Minister’s comments are a little out of scope
for this debate.
Thank you for stepping in, Mrs Murray. I remind this place that
we were left with a note saying that there was no money left and
that the last Labour Chancellor sold off all the gold as well,
but there we go—shirking responsibility as always.
I thank the Minister for his comments. I also thank the
petitioners and the Petitions Committee. I thank Edward Green,
who started one of the petitions and has come here today. It is
super important that the voices of the petitioners are heard in
this way. Although no decisions are taken in these debates, the
Minister will ponder the speeches that have been made today. I
hope that the Mayor of London will too, and stop the ULEZ
expansion. It will obviously cause untold misery for everybody up
and down the country, as low emission zones in Sheffield and
Manchester are. I thank the petitioners once more. It has been a
pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mrs Murray.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered e-petitions 599985 and 633550,
relating to local road user charging schemes.
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