A Congestion Charge should do what it says it will do: tackle congestion. Keeping traffic moving will reduce congestion. In order to do this Brian proposes:

• Keep flat rate of £8.00 per car travelling into central London.  No exemption for Band A & B cars and no £25 charge for Band G cars
• Scrap the Western Extension Zone
• Introduce in its place a 24/7 £10 greater London congestion zone for non-Londoners. Commercial vehicles and London registered vehicles will be exempt. Aimed at encouraging visitors and commuters to use public transport.
• Scrap the Low Emission Zone which is putting small and medium businesses at risk. Introduce in its place a 24/7 £10 greater London congestion zone for non-Londoners. Commercial vehicles and London registered vehicles will be exempt. Those who live just outside of London but travel in to carry out everyday activities – eg shopping, work, visiting relatives etc – will be able to register the registration plate of their vehicle with TfL to be exempted from the £10 charge. As with any congestion charging scheme order, there will have to be a consultation period. This will help the new Mayor to judge the scope of what ‘local’ should mean.
• Use the extra revenue from the expanded congestion charge to fund improvements in public transport specifically in the outer London boroughs. For example, I could finance network enhancements to enable commuter trains to run more frequently.
• Streamlining the way the charge is administered: No more fines for late payment. The charge will be collected by sending a bill to registered address once it reaches £40 and can be paid by direct debit. This scheme, modelled on one in Oslo, would cost 10% of revenue generated to run.
• Re-phase traffic lights and manage road works to keep traffic moving – stationary traffic causes more pollution than moving traffic

Improving Buses

Buses are unreliable, overcrowded and badly managed. Brian proposes:

• Allow pre-pay Oystercards to be used for unlimited bus journeys within an hour so people can change buses with no additional charge. You don’t need to pay twice when you change tubes, why should buses be any different?
• Shorten bus routes in congested areas so buses pick-up fewer delays and provide a more reliable service.
• Implement the Brighton and Hove GPS system to track where buses are, with an indicator on every bus stop accurately stating when the next bus will be arriving. This allows for regulation of service to ensure buses arrive at regular intervals.
• Safer Transport Officers on every bus on the top 10 most dangerous routes in London from 9pm-1am Sunday to Wednesday and 9pm-4am Thursday to Saturday.
• Guarantee the Freedom Pass and allow travel on buses only before 9am

Sorting out the Tube

Tubes charge first class fares for third class travel. Despite record investment, they are still overcrowded, overheated and unreliable. Brian proposes:

• A guard on one dedicated ‘women friendly’ carriage, on every tube from 9pm till closing time 7 days a week.
• Run the Tube on the model of award winning and successful concession model along the lines of the DLR and London buses. One company runs the tracks, trains, staffing and signalling for a fixed fee and TfL take the fare box. TfL act as asset managers overseeing operations but huge tier of middle management will go.

Safer Cycling

• License all cycle couriers.
• Additional £50m to be spent on cycle lanes on all red routes
• Introduce the Velib scheme, similar to the one in Paris
• Cycling representative on the TfL board

Promote Walking

• Walking timetables at bus, tube and train stops.

Black cabs

• See separate black cabs manifesto.

1. Diverting money currently paid to private landlords to house families in temporary accommodation

Many Londoners have nowhere to call home – there are over 63,000 families in London living in temporary accommodation. Still more have no chance of getting on to the housing ladder, requiring an average of £80,000 a year income before they can become first time buyers.

What we need is for councils to pay Housing Associations to house families permanently. For the same cost over a ten year period, the Housing Association can borrow and buy a property.  After ten years the loan is paid off and the property can be rented cheaply creating a parallel market in affordable rented accommodation. This would supply high-spec, affordable, rented accommodation fit for young professionals and low income families alike. Local authorities are paying millions of pounds a year to private landlords to house homeless families.

2. Building on publicly-owned brown field sites by acquiring land at low cost

The major cost of urban development is land, often costing far more than the construction costs.  In London there are at least 7,000 hectares of unused brown field sites owned by public sector organisations such as Network Rail, Transport for London and the NHS.  Acquiring this land cheaply could enable private sector investors, such as pension funds, to invest in low-cost affordable rented accommodation that would still give them a good return on their money.

3. Bringing unoccupied homes into use through compulsory purchase

There are 83,000 empty homes in London. Local authorities have the power to take these dwellings into use. When Lambeth Council was under Liberal Democrat control, it worked with registered social landlords and used Compulsory Purchase Orders to bring empty properties back into occupation.

Islington’s Empty Property Strategy reduced the number of private sector empty properties between 2003 – 2006 by 16%. The new three year strategy builds on this success and concentrates on bringing back into use private sector empty properties since at any one time over 70% of Islington empty properties are in this sector.

4. Providing help and assistance to people whose homes are too big for them

Many people, particularly older people, are living in accommodation that is too big for them. Council tax that takes no account of ability to pay and increasing heating costs are making the situation where one or two people are living in a three or four bedroom homes unaffordable. With the right help and assistance, many would willingly move to smaller homes. The Mayor of London and local authorities should provide the help and assistance to free-up under-occupied properties to ease the shortfall in larger homes.

As Mayor I would acknowledge that licensed black taxis are as much a part of London’s public transport as buses and trains by giving cabbies a seat on the board of Transport for London.

As Mayor I will consult on the possibility of banning pedicabs or severely restricting their numbers.  If a ban is not possible, I will look to license pedicabs with an identification plate clearly visible.  Their riders must be licensed and trained in road safety and the pedicabs subjected to safety checks.

As Mayor I would completely overhaul traffic management in Central London, including the re-phasing of traffic lights, the proper management of road works and a scheme to reduce the number of vans and lorries, to ensure smoother traffic flow, less congestion and faster journeys.

The obligations for licensed black taxis for more stringent driving tests, vehicle examinations and ‘the knowledge’ must result in privileges not afforded to private hire vehicles.  Private hire vehicles will not be given access to bus lanes and enforcement against private hire cars plying for hire will be stepped-up.

Licensed black taxis drivers should be encouraged to make their vehicles more environmentally friendly not penalised for doing so.  I will look at working with taxi manufacturers to develop more environmentally friendly vehicles and providing a subsidy to licensed black taxi drivers who buy new environmentally friendly vehicles.

I will eliminate the risk of accidentally getting a ticket for driving in a bus lane.  All bus lanes under the control of TfL (Red Routes) will be standardised to the same hours of operation and all will allow licensed black cabs to use them.  I will encourage all local authorities to follow suit so that all bus lanes are standardised.

Local authorities need to take a more reasonable approach to licensed black taxis that are waiting for passengers.  For reasons of security, where loading and unloading is permitted, I will encourage all local authorities to treat licensed black taxis stopped to allow passengers to access a cash machine as ‘loading and unloading’.

To save on congestion and pollution taxis should be encouraged to use taxi ranks.  As Mayor I will look to increase the number of taxi ranks, particularly at stations and hotels, and revise the fare structure to allow an additional charge for licensed black taxis picking-up passengers from cab ranks.

Effective action must be taken to ensure all vehicles registered as private hire are genuine.  When I am Mayor, those registering or renewing will have to provide copies of ‘hire and reward’ insurance certificates and the contact number(s) where any member of the public can hire the vehicle.  Random ‘mystery shopper’ calls will be made to those numbers to ensure the service is genuine.

Road planners need to consult with those who know London’s road best.  I would look to consult the taxi trade on all future road schemes on TfL roads (Red Routes) and encourage local authorities to do the same on all other roads.

Former senior police officer Brian Paddick is the best choice for Mayor. He has already spent thirty years fighting crime and working with local communities right across London.

Every Londoner will be safer
Brian Paddick has promised to deliver a 5% cut in crime every year. Where Mayor Livingstone has failed to come anywhere near his aim to cut crime by 50% over the last four years, Brian will be held accountable – if he doesn’t reach his target to cut crime after four years, he won’t stand again for Mayor.

Brian Paddick will personally chair the Police Authority to lead the drive to get knives and guns off the streets in London. We will act to stop the closure of small police stations in the capital – we need a strong police presence in our communities. We will lead a major drive to rebuild community spirit across the capital – bringing Londoners and the police together to make our streets safer.

Every Londoner will have a cleaner environment
Brian Paddick and the Liberal Democrats will make London the greenest capital in Europe. We will protect London’s green and open spaces from greedy developers. We will launch a new scheme with London Councils to plant thousands of new trees in a drive to develop and restore the character of high streets, markets, squares and open spaces across the capital. We will work with councils across London so that every London resident has access to the best recycling services. By cutting congestion on our roads, we will cut carbon emissions and improve air quality for all.

The worst emissions in crowded city centres are caused by stationary or slow-moving traffic. We will review the number of traffic lights in the Central Zone, and use the new powers to act firmly against utilities with better coordination of road works.

We oppose the current Mayor’s plan to allow DVLA Band B vehicles into the congestion charge zone for free as it will increase congestion – and therefore pollution.

We oppose the current Mayor’s LEZ scheme which Transport for London admits will only deliver an 0.3% improvement in air quality across Greater London and has cost £57 million to set up and will cost £10.7 million a year to operate. We will consider adapting the technology already installed to facilitate a perimeter congestion charge to reduce polluting congestion on Red Routes during the morning peak period.

Every Londoner will have better transport
We will improve London’s overcrowded public transport and increase the reliability of Tube and bus services and bring forward a comprehensive plan to get London moving within three months.

A top priority will be to improve bus services across the capital especially in those areas outside the tube network to ease congestion and overcrowding. We will allow unlimited changes of bus within an hour for the price of one journey on an Oyster card.

We will also introduce new measures to make transport safer for all. A new cross-river tram project linking south and north London will transform central London’s transport, and will be supplemented by an ultra-light rail tramway from Oxford Street to Stratford and one from Waterloo to Deptford.

New bike and car hire schemes will be introduced in every locality. Students of all ages will get free travel on public transport.

London Underground Limited is part of the problem with our transport system with its record of fifty years of failure: endless delays, cancellations, signal failures and strikes.

Therefore Liberal Democrats want to run the tube like every other form of public transport run by the Mayor and Transport for London (buses, DLR, North London Line): through the “concession model” where Transport for London sets the fares and service standards and takes the fare box, and a contractor is paid a fee to deliver the service.

For more information on aspects of transport, you can read Brian’s full transport manifesto and black cab manifesto.

Every Londoner will benefit from better housing
The lack of affordable housing near where Londoners work keeps people off the housing ladder and contributes to congestion on the roads and overcrowding on public transport.

We will take urgent action to turn London’s 83,580 empty properties into sustainable homes at affordable rents. We will negotiate the release of surplus public sector land to form new community land trusts, providing long-term low-rent housing without the need to build on London’s precious green spaces.

We will conduct a war on the problem of homelessness – this has no place in a modern London.

We will make sure that communities across London have a real say on housing developments in their area.

Every Londoner will get value for money
Brian Paddick will keep the Mayor’s contribution to our council tax bills down by cutting waste at City Hall to get better value for taxpayers’ money. Ken Livingstone has increased his precept by over 150% since he became Mayor, while spending more on press officers than the Prime Minister.

Every Londoner will see a new London Government
Brian Paddick will be the listening Mayor of London and will hold regular public meetings where people can come and ask Brian questions. As Mayor, Brian Paddick will end the cronyism under the current Mayor by making the Mayor’s cabinet directly elected by London Assembly members. Brian Paddick will work closely with councils, community leaders and ordinary Londoners to deliver the changes our city needs.

Like to find out more?