• Question by: Trevor Phillips
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

I was delighted that you included a paragraph on the alcohol and drugs strategy in your report. I see that you are going to meet Keith Hellawell, and have promised to report back to the Assembly. May I politely suggest that it would be helpful if you were to involve Members of the Assembly who are active in health - particularly myself and Elizabeth Howlett - before drawing up a programme of action, because this is a subject which it is quintessentially important for the Assembly to get hold of as well.

• Question by: Sally Hamwee
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

Do you recall that, at the People's Question time, when you were asked about cannabis, you referred to cannabis and Ecstasy in the same breath? Do you agree that there appear to be considerable dangers attached to Ecstasy, which may not be the case with cannabis, and will you distinguish between them and not promote legalisation of Ecstasy at the same time as relaxation of the cannabis law?

• Question by: Louise Bloom
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

As I am sure you are aware, the residents groups we are talking about - the Aylesbury Estate Tenants Association and the Burgess Park Committee - are very aggrieved because they feel that their views are not being taken into account, and that, in the presentations by officers to which you referred, they were clearly told that routes in which they are interested, which do take account of where people live and work, were not on the table for discussion. Are you now saying that that is not the case, and that the possibility of alternative routes backed by residents...

• Question by: Valerie Shawcross
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

This is in my constituency, and I have quite a lot of contact with interested parties in the area - perhaps much better than my Liberal colleagues who do not represent the area and do not, so far as I know, live there. The public meeting that we held in Lambeth last week with David Wetzel was a considerable success. Another public meeting is booked for Monday night in Southwark town hall, which has been widely advertised by TfL. We would appreciate a chance to talk to the Mayor, in his capacity as Transport for London Chair, about the problems...

• Question by: Louise Bloom
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

Are you aware that one of the favoured current proposals actually slices Burgess Park in three? I am told that there have now been 33 campaigns to save Burgess Park from various different planning applications, bits of development and all the rest. Will you therefore ask the TfL officers to take account of this valuable piece of local green space, so that it is not included in routes that would slice it up?

• Question by: Sally Hamwee
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

It is great when it is about access to information. Do you agree that a willingness to be open is of no use, either to the Assembly or to the public, unless we can readily access information. That means that information has to be offered - not merely that officers respond in a rather bureaucratic fashion. Simply saying, "We will answer questions if you ask us a very precise question," will not be sufficient.

• Question by: Sally Hamwee
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

Thank you: I am glad I asked the question. [Laughter.]

• Question by: Valerie Shawcross
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

Tell me if I am just being depressed and pessimistic today, but one of the things that sometimes, when I am in such a mood, strikes me about the GLA is that as an organisation which is designed to integrate policies and services and strategies, and deal with a very big picture, long term issues, we are sometimes an organisation with too many internal divisions professionally and structurally and where we have too many little big wheezes and press releases rather than substantial movement. If I was being depressed and pessimistic, I would say that this initiative looks like a...

• Question by: Victor Anderson
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

Do you think that the SDS will be able to deliver a better quality design that you have talked about? Because I think that there is a danger that we will have a rhetoric about better quality design but not actually mechanisms for achieving it.

• Question by: Victor Anderson
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

What advice will you give to the Mayor about the two different views in the proposals document about development of London? One of the views in the document is the emphasis on orbital public transport routes creating a city of interchanges. The other view is that there are four development corridors which link the City of London and central London to existing airports or a possible future airport in North Thames. With these two contrasting views in the same document, what view will you take?