• Question by: Valerie Shawcross
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

I will try to be brief, then. Ken, obviously part of the idea of having a Mayor was that there should be a single unifying approach behind the strategies, and now that the draft strategies are starting to emerge, we can ask questions about consistency. One of the key issues seems to me to be about the vision for the future of London's economy. The draft economic development strategy is concerned, it seems, with diversity - having a broadly based economy, and therefore a more secure one, which is not so vulnerable and narrowly based. The SDS, in the view...

• Question by: Brian Coleman
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

I will be brief. The 48 extra staff that the Assembly has are needed to read all the bumf that your office produces, Mr Mayor. The GLC at its height, I believe, had about 17,000 staff. Have you had any wild dreams about how many extra staff you might need to implement your strategies? More importantly, have you given serious consideration to the serious role that the boroughs will have and should have in implementing these strategies? Has the fact that your relationship with the ALG and many of the boroughs is pretty poor been a factor in deciding the...

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

My colleagues make a good point, but I do wonder how many of these people will actually be working on ensuring that your strategies are consistent. We have noticed that they make statements which are often directly contradictory. For example, your air quality strategy states that the congestion charge will not improve air quality, yet your transport strategy sees that as a major way to do it. How do you reconcile those two statements?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

And how many more staff do you have than the Government anticipated?

• Question by: Samantha Heath
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

In terms of feeding the Assembly information, it was a great sadness to me to learn that the air quality strategy was going to be launched from the Evening Standard rather than by your own staff. Can you make sure that we know in future when a strategy is going to be launched and have adequate notice? In addition, we have been promised sight of the legal advice you received on the waste strategy with regard to its composition. Can you make sure that we actually see that legal advice, as it has been promised?

• Question by: Eric Ollerenshaw
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

Just to help you, Mr Mayor, since that finished, it has got into worse trouble over the last few months. It is an absolute disaster, and Labour Ministers had to step in yesterday, with all six of them announcing things. A Labour majority obviously leads to even worse financial chaos.

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

It sounds like you are about to have another meeting with your friends in the RMT. Given that you appear to have surprised yourself with your staffing plans, and discovered that you have far too many people, do you now regret your earlier support and enthusiasm for the new City Hall project?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

Given the number of strategies you are coming up with, Mr Mayor, I would not be at all surprised if you started appointing Tsars next.

• Question by: Toby Harris
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

The answer is that you do not actually know how many more strategies are being produced. Is it not the case that what all this strategy production is doing is ignoring your statutory responsibilities to take an overview of those key issues with which the Act charges you? This is all about fine words rather than action, and a plethora of paper, concealing a lack of coherent vision. Isn't that what it is really all about?

• Question by: Samantha Heath
• Meeting date: 19 September 2001

I am interested in the implementation element. With the air quality strategy, you have to sign off on the boroughs' strategies. Are you going to be as lenient with them as you have been with yourself in changing the Act's wording from "achieving" to "working towards"? If you are going to be lenient with yourself, are you going to be equally lenient with them? What implications will that have for getting better air quality in London?