• Reference: 2012/3872
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

How do you explain the decision to award the University of East London (UEL) a further £51,000 over the next financial year to train and support mentors, when they have failed dramatically to deliver on your original ambition for the establishment of 1,000 mentoring relationships over the initial three year period?

• Reference: 2012/3871
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

One of the recommendations in the Education Inquiry was to target apprenticeships and mentoring opportunities towards children in care and care leavers. How many of the young people who have mentored through your programme to date are children in care or care leavers?

• Reference: 2012/3870
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

One of the recommendations of the Education Inquiry was to target apprenticeships and mentoring opportunities towards children in care and care leavers. How many apprenticeships across the GLA Group have been provided for children in care or care leavers to date?

• Reference: 2012/3869
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

I am concerned by the recommendation in the Education Inquiry that you should support schools to redesign their buildings and to 'do more with less', essentially reconfiguring the layout of schools in order to fit in more pupils and address the shortage of school places. Do you not agree that this is a step towards 'shrinking schools', which might have inadequate space for activities outside the classroom and could threaten the inclusion of disabled children in mainstream schools? On this basis, will you reject this particular recommendation?

• Reference: 2012/3868
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

Further to MQ3360/2012, when do you expect your review of the future use of the National Sports Centre to be completed?

• Reference: 2012/3867
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

Further to MQ3364/2012, please list the indicative number of units that were planned for the Greenwich Peninsula but which are not now proceeding due to changes in the phasing of development.

• Reference: 2012/3866
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

It has been reported that apartments in the Battersea Power Station riverside development will go on sale in Malaysia and Hong Kong before being offered to British buyers in February. Does this risk forcing up the capital's house prices and reducing the availability of homes to buy for local people?

• Reference: 2012/3865
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

Do the tax breaks open to offshore buyers - for example through avoiding capital gains tax, inheritance tax or stamp duty - help to explain why the price of prime residential property in London has increased by 49 per cent since March 2009?

• Reference: 2012/3864
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

Further to a recent assessment of London's private housing market by The Smith Institute, do you accept the need to monitor the effects of overseas investment on the London housing market, including the extent to which properties held by investors domiciled abroad are kept empty?

• Reference: 2012/3863
• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 19 December 2012

Do you accept that the high cost of housing in London is the single biggest threat to London's international competitiveness?