For millions of Londoners, the Transport for London network is the lifeblood of our daily commute. So I was shocked to read a sorry tale in the Evening Standard of misplaced priorities and virtue signalling gone awry last week.
Sadiq Khan, off the back of announcing that he would knock a dizzying 10p off the price of a Tube journey, did a victory lap, earmarking £6.3 million so that he could rename our Overground lines.
Sadiq Khan’s attention seems to be fixated on superficial changes rather than addressing the pressing issues at hand
Many Londoners, including me, were left scratching their heads and wondering if City Hall had lost sight of what matters. What use is 10p off a journey that’s late or cancelled? And how are women like me supposed to feel knowing we can’t get better CCTV, which would cut down on the tidal wave of sexual violence on the TfL network because some of the cash to fund it has been siphoned off to rebrand Overground lines? Good old-school journalism by this paper last week enabled whistleblowers from TfL to reveal that the Central line, one of London’s busiest, operates with around half the trains it needs to function. Worse still, many trains in service are described as “accidents waiting to happen”.
That’s a damning indictment of the state of our transport infrastructure, yet Khan’s attention seems to be fixated on superficial changes rather than addressing the pressing issues at hand. Instead of patting himself on the back for freezing fares and renaming lines, he should be addressing the glaring deficiencies in our transport system.
It’s what I would do. Pop the hood and fix the motor. Londoners deserve safe, reliable, and efficient trains — not just feel-good names on a map.
I want to crack open the TfL budget and see where the pounds and the pennies are going. It’s time to get to grips with the “accident waiting to happen” trains on the Central line. And it’s time to put some serious cash into getting the CCTV network up to scratch and proper lighting at outer London stations especially, so women know they are safer. That’s what responsible leadership looks like. Our city deserves nothing less.
