Sadiq Khan’s office is spinning so hard we could wire him up to a generator and power half the city. And all because he’s been caught out on his plans to impose pay-per-mile on every driver in this city.
His plans are a proven, verifiable fact. Sadly, what does he do when he’s been caught out? He takes to the press to smear his opposition, with made up claims and falsehoods.
In January 2022, Sadiq revealed his schemes for pay-per-mile to this newspaper’s excellent Leader podcast; he left no doubt about his intentions.
These are his words. No spin.
If he believes this is the right thing for London, then he should just come clean – and say it. It’s down to the Mayor to make a case for what he believes in.
Sadiq Khan has spent a fortune on plans to bring in pay-per-mile, a scheme that I believe would be a disaster for London. It would hit families and small businesses even harder than the loathed ULEZ expansion. It would be indiscriminate – which would mean every driver would face a charge. Right now, when many families are struggling financially, this would be wrong.
At his instruction, TfL are working tirelessly to make a system that could be used to introduce pay-per-mile, spending up to £150 million on the underlying technology. He has claimed he won’t introduce pay-per-mile.
Based on his past actions, I don’t believe him, and I would urge Londoners to question what he says too. In 2021, he told Londoners he had no plans to expand ULEZ to the whole of London. It took him mere months to go against his word. I expect him to do the same, no doubt with some old excuse, if he wins a historic third term in office.
Whether you were born and raised in London or moved here to pursue a dream, I will be a Mayor for you
But what frustrates me, and many of the Londoners I listen to, is that Sadiq Khan doesn’t just ignore people and mislead people, he expects us not to notice.
That is why over the last week, his spin doctors have been desperately whipping up a ‘disinformation’ storm.
‘It is all fake news’, they cried, copying tactics directly from President Trump’s playbook. His staff told journalists and fact checkers to report that any claim that Sadiq Khan has plans to bring in pay-per-mile is a “lie.”
The audio recordings of him announcing it, the TfL board papers that detail their work developing it, the countless public statements he has made in favour of it – all of this we must pretend do not exist.
Apparently when Sadiq Khan pinky promises he’ll never bring in pay-per-mile, we are all supposed to take him at his word.
But the gaslighting is disappointing. Sadiq Khan has shown he is willing to take this election campaign into the gutter if it suits him. Londoners deserve better than that.
Especially when, ironically, it is Sadiq Khan’s campaign that has peddled misinformation in this campaign – accusing me of opposing a free school meals programme that I pledged to extend even before Sadiq did.
Now he is trying to divide our city, by writing letters to parts of our community with baseless smears that I am against them, in a desperate bid to cling on to power. I will not rise to it. London must always reject division. We must never let it win.
Whether you were born and raised in London or moved here to pursue a dream, I will be a Mayor for you. I am determined to bring our city back together.
Because, unlike Sadiq Khan, I don’t live in a Westminster bubble, believing my own spin.
I have been listening. My priorities for London are what you have told me you want to see changed. I will help struggling families and businesses in outer London by scrapping the ULEZ expansion. I will not bring in pay-per-mile.
I will bring back borough-based policing, so our police are in and working for our communities again. And I will build more family homes, which Londoners can afford.
On May 2nd, we can and should vote for change. Eight years of Sadiq Khan is enough. We can’t let this go on for another four years.
