• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

Can you give us an update on the proposal to build a coach park on East Marsh in Hackney, which is probably even closer to Stratford than Poplar?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

Thank you, Chair. It is good to see the Mayor's support for these measures, which will help people who drive their cars and who are passengers in them in East London. It is interesting in the Mayor's response to Jenny (Jones) that he consistently says that working class people do not have cars, when all the evidence suggests that actually very often they are more dependent on their cars than people with higher incomes. Would you consider doing some research on that and changing your viewpoint, Mayor, because it really does not reflect reality?

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

Okay, but if you come back to the Thames Gateway Bridge argument that you put, I get very annoyed..

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

I want to use public transport, and I am just concerned that provision of such a huge car park is basically going to mean that the long-distance commuters from Kent and Essex coming over the six-lane motorway that you are creating will go and park there.

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

Speaking as somebody who is definitely going to be back after the election, I would just like to find out if, when you were actually agreeing to this new road building, any thought was given to negotiating road closures in Coulsdon?

• Question by: Mike Tuffrey
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

Can I pursue the point about how the Coulsdon Inner Relief Road, and indeed the Purley Cross scheme, is actually funded? In your re-marriage of convenience with the Labour Party, you will no doubt be aware of the Parliamentary Labour Party Transport Committee and Labour Finance and Industry Group Paper 'Towards a New Labour Transport Strategy', where it talks about funding of schemes like this and it says: `In rich regions and areas we should expect more of the money for investment in transport infrastructure, such as road and rail schemes, to be raised locally'. So are you now signing...

• Question by: Andrew Pelling
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

Another question: I am pleased that you see the importance of improving the environment in the centre of Coulsdon. One comment you have made in the past was the importance of seeing the development at Purley Cross being in tandem with this development, and inevitably residents in the area, maybe jealously, will say Coulsdon is being improved but the situation with Purley is not progressing. Previously you said you saw them progressing in tandem. Will resourcing be there in next year's budget to continue to progress work on investigating the possibilities for improving Purley Cross, and do you have any...

• Question by: Andrew Pelling
• Meeting date: 14 January 2004

I have asked a lot of questions about the Coulsdon Inner Relief Road over the three years so far, and the one thing I wanted to see in these four years was the relief road and the Coulsdon Town Centre Improvement scheme put in place, so I am delighted by that news. I would also like to compliment the officers of TfL, who have shown both great professionalism and enterprise in ensuring that the scheme actually happened after there were some very significant hitches just before the contract was awarded. Can I ask how you see the combination between TfL...

• Question by: Samantha Heath
• Meeting date: 17 December 2003

I was interested in your response to Jenny. When you talk about permanent outcomes, my understanding is that it is reducing car use or the need to own a car. In your response you talked about the car-sharing scheme. My understanding is that the Smart Moves budget is actually due to be cut, which is the car sharing scheme that TfL supports. Does that mean that you are minded to change your mind on that?

• Question by: Andrew Pelling
• Meeting date: 17 December 2003

A practical example of taking traffic out of shopping areas is the Coulsdon Inner Relief Road. Do you share my concern about the way in which National Health Service (NHS) Estates are slowing the prospect of the work starting on the relief road and the Coulsdon Town Centre Improvement Scheme at the beginning of next month by their unwillingness to release land until certain planning permissions have been given? Do you share my frustration that having given all these promises that it is going to go ahead, we are now going to have to go back on these promises?