• Question by: Samantha Heath
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

• Question by: Toby Harris
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

What arrangements are going to be made for the plain clothes revenue enforcement staff to take note of the behaviour of bus drivers on buses?

• Question by: Toby Harris
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

Will you be requiring that all bus drivers clearly wear a badge identifying themselves, so that such action can be pursued?

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

I have one and a half other tiny questions. First, you published this year a Budget which suggests you are going to spend £64 million on precautionary, preventative and ameliorative measures in the areas just outside the zone and on the edge. Are you committed to that money being spent in the boroughs on those measures, and not taken back in some imaginative accounting process by TfL?

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

Don't you recognise, though, that there is a risk that, to protect their position, boroughs outside the zone will oppose your charging proposal because they are not sufficiently reassured about the steps that will be taken to reduce its effects just outside its boundaries? The people within the boundaries have a pretty clear picture from the proposal, but the people just outside - like my constituents in Tower Hamlets - have a great fear of rat running, commuter parking and all sorts of deviant driver behaviour as a result of the charge, which will cause grief for local residents. As...

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

Another of these dry technical matters is that something called a traffic order is about to be published, which describes the congestion charge scheme and how it works. Transport planners get excited about these things, rather as trainspotters get excited about trains, but they probably do not mean much to Londoners. A concern that has been expressed to me is that boroughs are being consulted on this and will be consulted on it, but they are not being given the details of what work will take place in their areas just outside the zone. So they are being asked to...

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

Thank you. My supplementary is very simple - this is obviously a far gentler issue than the previous one. But it is one in which the evidence is that things might come to grief. I have received an allegation from one of the London boroughs that the modelling is at best wishful or, more cynically, has fiddled the books, inventing figures which suggest a massive increase in bus use where it will not happen. Obviously you are not going to answer that here and now, but do you have a commitment to a transparent and independent audit of the work...

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

I think that is the problem. If we are not careful with this - if you are not careful with this; we will keep some distance until we are sure that you have been careful - Londoners will resent it as a tax for which they see little benefit, unless you can join those bits up and produce real improvements in transport, so that I can leave my car at home, get on a bus, it will quickly reach its destination, and it will be heaven. Unless that happens, people are going to say, "Ken is just making money out...

• Question by: John Biggs
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

Labour Members have no problem with the principle of a congestion charge, but the devil is in the detail. We think that there is a great risk that Londoners will resent and resist this proposal, and it will prove to be unworkable, unless those details are worked through. We are seeking from you a commitment to openness, which you have given, to transparency with the boroughs, which you have given, and to spending the money you have offered the boroughs - and presumably more, if necessary - to deal with those problems. But does that mean that you will be...

• Question by: Jennette Arnold OBE
• Meeting date: 18 July 2001

Did you get a sense that you were talking about not just the infrastructure and the national stadiums, but the importance of the legacy, especially for children and young people in that area? Are you aware of the importance of this proposal for an enormous number of young people in that area?