Some politicians aren’t interested in keeping the streets safe. Sadiq Khan’s office has been forced to reveal today that the London Crime Reduction Board, founded in 2011, has been scrapped. The LCRB was established as the place “where the Mayor, the Police Commissioner and London’s boroughs come together to agree a coordinated approach to crime reduction, local policing and community safety in London”. A Freedom of Information request has revealed that there has not been a London Crime Reduction Board since July 2023, when it had its last meeting. Meanwhile, violent crime is up 30% since Khan took office in 2016. Khan must be dropping everything to focus on his re-election campaign…

For once, the Advertising Standards Authority has made a sound decision. They ruled last night that Sadiq Khan and his TfL misled Londoners with some claims about the benefits of the ULEZ, flouting the rules three times via radio and newspaper adverts. These claims made by Khan are not the whole truth: “One of London’s most polluted spots is inside your car,” “most air pollution deaths occur in Outer London,” and overstating ULEZ’s impact that it resulted in “almost a halving of levels of nitrogen dioxide”. Guido could have told you that months ago…

Here’s one advert to watch out for – don’t be fooled by Khan’s propaganda:

While ASA ruled these ads were “misleading” and “unsubstantiated”, the ads are not banned from future use, though TfL’s future Ulez ads will have to include the data sources for claims on its effectiveness.

City Hall Conservatives Tony Devenish said:

“Sadiq Khan and TfL have been caught out making misleading and unsubstantiated claims about the benefits of ULEZ to Londoners. This shouldn’t surprise anyone. Sadiq Khan’s own report said the ULEZ expansion would do little to tackle air pollution. Sadiq Khan has a history of making misleading and false claims. Afterall, he told us he wouldn’t expand ULEZ to outer London but then did exactly that. Sadiq Khan can’t be trusted. He doesn’t deserve another four years as mayor. Eight years is more than enough.”

Just more hot air from Khan exaggerating the benefits of his money-grabbing scheme…

Update: 

Susan Hall tells Guido:

“It is shameful that Sadiq Khan has consistently misled Londoners about his ULEZ expansion. It is nothing but a tax grab which only has a negligible effect on air quality. We know his staff leant on scientists to change their findings and he is taking hundreds of millions from the poorest Londoners. I will scrap the ULEZ expansion on day one of my Mayoralty, no ifs no buts.”

Sadiq Khan got heckled at the last “People’s Question Time” event in November. Now he’s decided he doesn’t want to do them in person any more. The mayor’s office is claiming that the “unacceptable and threatening behaviour experienced at the last PQT” – shouting “Get Khan out“, that is – put “the safety of all those involved at risk“. You can’t mute a real-life audience…

Not content with moving public scrutiny to Zoom, Khan also wants to replace Assembly Member chairmen with an “independent” chairman to preside over the event. Assembly members have previously chaired these events since 2000 on a rotating basis. The London Assembly’s Tory group have rightly accused the mayor of “running scared of scrutiny”. Another event turned into meaningless self-congratulation for Khan…

Looks like Khan’s love-in with the EU is going through a rough patch as European governments are furious with TfL for wrongly fining hundreds of thousands of EU citizens for driving the in ULEZ area. One poor Frenchman was wrongly fined £25,000 for driving in ULEZ…

Five EU states accused Khan’s TfL of illegally obtaining names and addresses, resulting in 320,000 penalties since 2021. Sleuthing Belgian MP Michael Freilich said “this is possibly one of the largest privacy and data breaches in EU history, but so far no concrete action has been taken while responsibilities are being shunted on to driver.” No amount of smoke can get Khan out of this one…

Even the LibDems have blasted Khan, calling for an immediate investigation as this may damage the city’s reputation. Susan Hall weighed in, telling Guido:

“These are incredibly serious allegations that must be investigated urgently. There can be absolutely no justification for illegally obtaining people’s private information to enforce Sadiq Khan’s unfair ULEZ expansion.

“It is telling that even Sadiq Khan’s friends in the EU are saying he can’t treat drivers like cash cows. As Mayor, I will scrap his ULEZ expansion on day one and ensure these allegations are looked into.”

Since Brexit, the UK is banned from automatic access to personal details of EU residents, so Khan’s indiscriminate ULEZ tax grab from EU citizens violated the law. Khan can raise the EU flag all he wants, this isn’t going to get him in the good books…

Another week, another revelation of how our Khan spends taxpayer cash. This time it turns out the London mayor has spent £1.23 million in the last year providing advice and support to help migrants stay in the UK and nullify “increasingly hostile policies” of the government. This is duplicating services that are already provided by boroughs and councils. Since 2023, Khan has spent:

• £429,000 on “services that improve resilience of the migration sector” including training, advice and support for migration agents.
• £200,000 on “improving understanding on core issues” including “the development of practices that enable migrant voices to be heard” in policy making.
• £601,000 providing immigration advice and support.

Meanwhile Khan hikes his share of council tax from April by 8.6% – more than twice the rate of inflation…

The London Mayor has been boasting on Twitter about how the “vast majority” of tube lines will have network coverage by the end of this year. If only that were true…

Stream, text and call on the TfL network now that 4G and 5G is being fully rolled out ⚡

Parts of the Central, Jubilee, Northern, and Elizabeth line are already connected, and the vast majority of the Tube and Elizabeth line will have coverage by the end of 2024. pic.twitter.com/bvyaRo74KV

— Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan (@MayorofLondon) January 21, 2024

The post is not true. Just weeks ago Khan said in a press release: “20 per cent of Tube stations with platforms underground now have mobile coverage, with this number expected to double by Spring 2024“. Khan actually pledged to have network on all tubes by 2024 in his 2021 manifesto, and yet the networks involved in distributing 4G/5G across the tubes have said the plan’s been delayed until at least 2026. Khan’s literally having to make up victories now…