• Question by: Peter Hulme Cross
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

How do you explain the Traffic and Transport Report (July 2004) into the Thames Gateway Bridge which says, critically, `It is unlikely that discounts to local businesses could meet the EU restrictions concerning state aid.

• Question by: Graham Tope
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

Given all the pressures facing policing in London, including the very good point just made by Valerie Shawcross (AM), do you actually see it as any sort of priority to work for a merger of the MPS and the City of London Police?

• Question by: Darren Johnson
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

I welcome your comments, certainly as regards the City of London Police. Do you think that, as well as being more effective strategically if the City of London Police was merged into the Met, that there would also be proper accountability, because the City of London Police would then be properly accountable to the MPA, like the rest of the Met.

• Question by: Damian Hockney
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

Isn't that sometimes the argument made nationally to have a centralised police force, and to try and centralise everything yet further, and to actually give less responsibility to the police on the ground, surely.

• Question by: Damian Hockney
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

I welcome your response, Mayor. I think that it just brings out the point that, in relation to the City of London Police, they too have, if you like, a terrific support within the City, and a great satisfaction level. I feel that, if we are talking about devolution of responsibility and keeping things local, then surely the City of London Police should be left in the way they are to actually carry on running, rather than being incorporated.

• Question by: Valerie Shawcross
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

One of the concerns that the Labour Group on this side has had for some time is the poor resourcing of the British Transport Police (BTP) that serve the mainline rail system in London - the BTP that is not funded in any way by us. I gather that it is the case that the SRA (Strategic Rail Authority) ceased the capital grant to the British Transport Police last year, and the Department for Transport is not due to pick up the capital responsibility until next year, which leaves British Transport Police with a year - the current year -...

• Question by: Darren Johnson
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

It is still a rotten borough that is not properly elected.

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

You do not feel unable to criticise the Government any longer.

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

Perhaps I may continue after that helpful intervention, and I will be fast upstairs to gaze into my computer screen as soon as we are finished here. But figures revealed by the Department of Transport recently showed that, since 1997, the operating costs on London Underground have gone up from £600 million a year to £1.6 billion - in other words, there has been a £1 billion increase. Tony Travers said today that he feels there is a major public accountability issue here and there are grounds for the National Audit Office or the Audit Commission to investigate whether the...

• Question by: Lynne Featherstone
• Meeting date: 20 October 2004

You and I were shoulder to shoulder against the PPP, and you have been remarkably quiet for yourself over the £42 million profits that Tube Lines made, let alone the £100,000 bonus for the Chief Executive. Has the cat got your tongue? Do you no longer think that Tube Lines' failure, with 27 out of 39 targets not met, that you have to take a hard position and a negotiating position, because we are where we are with the PPP contract and we can still negotiate within it. If you do not open your mouth and you do not attack...