• Question by: Valerie Shawcross
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

I agree, Mayor. The thing that needed doing was that the externally employed middle man needed taking out, and that has actually happened.

• Question by: Bob Neill
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

Can I also make the point that it is important to have something similar for members of the public. That is a helpful suggestion ' and I will accept that in the spirit in which it was given obviously - but at the A2 Midhurst footbridge at Bexley, for example, members of the public made the specific point ' and they had no axe to grind ' that they knew how to get hold of Bexley Council; it was much harder and more remote for them to get hold of TfL when the fairly blatant breaches of the deal that...

• Question by: Jennette Arnold OBE
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

I just want to start my question by saying just how important this question is. Chair, I really didn't understand what you were talking about regarding the Mayor's powers. The Mayor is charged in the GLA Act with a watching brief on health issues, particularly the public health issues of this city, and he does that through the work that we are doing on the London Health Commission. That is absolutely not helped by any public sector or any body saying at this time that they should still be investing in tobacco company stock when we know the latest figures...

• Question by: Mike Tuffrey
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

Why has it taken six years for you to wake up to the evidence that Jennette (Arnold, AM), for instance, has given?

• Question by: Mike Tuffrey
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

But given your responsibilities?

• Question by: Mike Tuffrey
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

Given your responsibility for health promotion, is it not extraordinary that, today, the LPFA ' to whom you appoint the board and have done for six years ' is currently investing in two tobacco companies?

• Question by: Mike Tuffrey
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

Good.

• Question by: Mike Tuffrey
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

You do not have the power to direct, but you do have the power to appoint the board and you are actively now seeking to intervene in the nominations the London councils have made to this board, so you are very interested in some aspects of board member's activities and not others. The Vice-Chair is your good mate Mike Ward, and yet the LPFA is not only investing in two tobacco companies as we speak, but it is also investing money in small scale arms companies. Would our staff ' or many of our staff ' not be amazed that...

• Question by: Jennette Arnold OBE
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

Can I just add to the statistics that you have got there, that I was at a conference two days ago, and what we learnt there, from the latest figures, was that tobacco companies need over 700 people a day ' this is young people, under 20 ' to start smoking, and that is why this is such a critical issue.

• Question by: Jennette Arnold OBE
• Meeting date: 13 September 2006

No, I was adding it to the statistics that he has used, so that he can use that in future.