• Question by: Tony Arbour
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

Lord Rogers, you have made it quite clear that any scheme will work provided it is of the right design. I want to ask you about who should be the arbiters of design? For example here at the GLA the Mayor has already told his planning committee, even though it was unanimously against him for example on the Bishopsgate Tower, he took the view that his single view was more important than ours. We already know that he thinks his views are more important than those of English Heritage; the chances are he thinks his views are more important than...

• Question by: Samantha Heath
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

If I could just go on a little bit further. I have got here your designs for Greater London, it was on the website. On page 7, I have turned to it, you actually refer to a barrage. You refer to a barrage going across the River Thames, an additional barrage. I would just like to recommend to you, give advice to you formally, not to have a barrage across the Thames because it would create a great cesspit which in London would create a whole number of diseases.

• Question by: Samantha Heath
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

On what planning applications have you given formal or informal advice to the Mayor?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

So in a political headquarters should there be more open plan or more quiet spaces?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

Can you tell us what features you think the new City Hall for the Mayor and London Authority should embody and how you would have designed it if it had been your task?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

Obviously you seem hopeful that your contract will be extended beyond the initial year and into the future to work with us. If that is the case will you be happy to work in the new GLA headquarters with the rest of us and what do you think the advantages are that we can look forward to from working in a building that is as transparent and functional as the table we are sitting at this morning?

• Question by: Brian Coleman
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

I think the problem is the GLA does not think it is worth it but the Mayor thinks it is. It does seem extraordinary. Do you believe in civic duty, Lord Rogers?

• Question by: Brian Coleman
• Meeting date: 11 July 2001

Lord Rogers, you are on a 12-month contract for a fee of, I believe, £130,000. Do you think that is value for money for Londoners?

• Question by: Nicky Gavron
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

I do not think it is good enough to leave air quality to the waste strategy. I think we need an holistic view of air quality, and you cannot get that if you take some pollutant sources and not others. That is what we do: we fragment our approach to pollutants. We do that with incineration. Incinerators are unique in relation to air quality: they produce a very wide spectrum of chemical pollutants. There are no adequate testing mechanisms in place, and those that exist are not good enough. A parliamentary question in the past month revealed 849 instances of...

• Question by: Darren Johnson
• Meeting date: 28 February 2001

Although I fully accept what Nicky has said about the need for an integrated approach to dealing with the air quality problems caused by incinerators, can you assure Nicky and everyone else here that the waste strategy will deal robustly with her concerns on incineration; but also with concerns that incineration will crowd out the potential for recycling? If we just have more and more incinerators, we are not maximising our potential for recycling or for new technologies in London