• Question by: Bob Neill
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

Can we just get it clear, then? Can you tell us now: are the debt charges for the borrowing going to met from fares or from the council tax?

• Question by: Angie Bray
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

You told Londoners they would.

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

I thought you might have been saying something more like, `Do not worry, everybody. Gordon Brown is going to allow me to incur a huge debt on your behalf and leave you with the mortgage for paying it off over many years.- Nevertheless, is not the reason that you did not say that, and you did not tell Londoners before the election about how you were going to plug a black hole in your finances, because it actually would have clashed with what you were saying then, which was that fare increases would be held at an inflationary level for...

• Question by: Bob Neill
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

You are on record as saying you could not conceive of circumstances in which you would increase the Congestion Charge beyond inflation. What happened?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

We know the record the Liberals have in that respect, Mr Mayor, but why did you not publish your fare proposals before the election?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

Why did you not publish your Business Plan before the election?

• Question by: Peter Hulme Cross
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

Across the board, you are actually squeezing Londoners. You are increasing the Congestion Charge to try to get fewer people to use their cars. You are increasing bus fares on a rolling basis, by a quite considerable amount. You are also increasing Tube fares, so the cost of transportation in London is simply increasing well above, I would submit the cost of inflation.

• Question by: Peter Hulme Cross
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

I see. You are treating buses as a sort of cash cow, in a sense.

• Question by: Peter Hulme Cross
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

As you quoted from the Business Plan, which I have here, and you have quoted exactly correctly that the Plan is predicated on above-inflation increases in fares, while this Plan remains in force, so Londoners can expect above-inflation increases in fares for the foreseeable future.

• Question by: Angie Bray
• Meeting date: 15 December 2004

Sorry, but you did not actually tell Londoners before the election that those were your choices. You were not saying to them then, `Sorry, you have to get real here. You have got to put up with this, or you have to put up with that.' You were not telling Londoners that that was the only choice on the table. You were telling Londoners, `We have it under control', and that Gordon Brown was going to give you all the money that you needed to make their lives wonderful. All this banging on about your bond and how wonderful it...