Londoners should not be “clobbered” with new Ultra Low Emission Zone charges during a cost of living crisis, a Labour shadow minister said on Tuesday.
Jonathan Ashworth warned that road charging schemes designed to clean up toxic air “are hurting families”.
Sadiq Khan has vowed to press ahead with expanding the Ulez to the London boundary on August 29. It will see drivers of the most polluting cars pay a £12.50 daily charge to use their vehicle.
The shadow work and pensions secretary urged the Mayor of London to take other steps to improve air quality, including installing more electric vehicle charging points and more electric buses.
Mr Ashworth told Times Radio: “The general problem of these different iterations of road charging schemes is that they are hurting families, they are hurting motorists at a time when there is a desperate cost of living crisis.
“At a time when people’s mortgages are going through the roof because of decisions taken by the Conservatives last autumn.
“People are really struggling at the moment.”
He added: “There are particular issues in London, around the way in which the government financing of Transport for London works, but generally speaking, you can improve air quality by pursuing measures like electric bus fleets and so on, rather than clobbering people in a cost of living crisis.”
The Labour leadership blamed the party’s loss at the Uxbridge by-election last month on the Ulez expansion.
But the Mr Khan vowed to press ahead, even if it costs him votes at the City Hall elections next May.
“The Ulez policy is popular in London,” he said.
“I accept there are some people with concerns. We’re trying to address those concerns… but we can’t kick the can down the road when it comes to addressing a public health emergency or tackling the climate emergency.”
It comes as the Department for Transport confirmed that claims the Government ordered City Hall to expand the Ulez Londonwide are false.
An excerpt from a letter to the mayor, from then Transport Secretary Grant Shapps in May 2020, was widely circulated on social media ahead of last month’s High Court ruling that allowed the Ulez expansion to proceed.
Many people wrongly interpreted the paragraph that required Mr Khan to “urgently bring forward proposals to widen the scope and levels” of road charges in London as a condition of the Government’s first bailout of Transport for London.
In fact, the letter was referring to the reintroduction of the C-charge – which had been switched off by the mayor at the start of the pandemic – and his proposed Ulez expansion from central London to the boundaries of the North and South Circular roads, which went ahead in October 2021.
