Today I was in Lewisham, highlighting Boris Johnson’s dishonesty in attempting to cover something that is causing the premature death of over 4,000 Londoners every year.

The biggest contributor to pollution is traffic on our roads. We simply wouldn’t accept it if over 4,000 people were killed in collisions with cars, , so why is it in any way acceptable that people should die prematurely from fumes? The lollipop men and women who joined me today highlighted this dreadful double standard.

The campaign group Clean Air in London last week revealed that the capital has the highest levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), a toxic gas, of any capital city in Europe in 2010. Levels are comparable with those in Beijing where many people routinely wear masks to protect themselves.

Air pollution is now emerging as the number one public health issue for Londoners. But the response of the Conservative mayor has been to try and hide the problem, by ‘gluing’ pollution to the streets around air monitoring stations – rather than taking steps to deal with its causes.

By electing more Green Assembly Members, London can help ensure that this crucial issue is given the attention it needs. Green Assembly Members have been campaigning for realistic action to tackle air pollution for many years. The Campaign for Clean Air in London has said that the party has made “the most strident commitment to air quality” in its 2012 London Manifesto.

We have also made a 6-minute video on the air pollution problem, entitled ‘Air Pollution: A 21st Century Health Scandal’, including interviews with Simon Birkett, Director of the Campaign for Clean Air in London, Dr David Green from the Environmental Research Group and Dr Frank Kelly, Professor of Environmental Heath, at King’s College London and ordinary Londoners affected by air pollution.

Please pass it on to others, and together we can tackle London’s second biggest killer.

The Boris mantra during this election has been that it’s all about trust and honesty. He repeats it at every opportunity. Londoners should vote for the person they trust. So, consider the following.

Safety measures were proposed at Bow Roundabout when the new cycling superhighway was installed and they were rejected. Two cyclists subsequently died. Since then Boris has failed to explain why they were rejected and by whom.

Bow Roundabout was a tragedy and one that appears to have been replicated elsewhere in London because of the mayoral decision to prioritise the speed of car and lorry drivers. The Mayor’s office have denied any direct involvement in the decision to reject the safety improvements contained in the consultant’s (Jacobs) report and when Ken suggested on LBC that Boris’s high profile Mayoral advisor, Kulveer Ranger, had intervened, Boris responded that this was ‘reprehensible’. However, when pressed on Kulveer’s involvement, Boris merely said he “didn’t know.” I commented on how odd this was, given that Boris spent several months (November through to March) having to handle a dozen written questions from me and two verbal exchanges on the subject. Indeed, in response to one of my questions to him in February (Question No: 3701 / 2011) about the involvement of Kulveer, the Mayor said: “As a normal matter of course, my Advisors are not involved in the scheme development process.”

Boris’ answers to my questions concluded in March with a very emphatic statement that Kulveer Ranger did not discuss or see the Jacobs’ report until after the two deaths had occurred and I had given a copy to BBC London to publish. I find this remarkable as it implies that TfL never discussed the Jacobs’ proposals with the Mayor’s office, even after two people had died and the Mayor’s office were asking why it had happened.

Of course it can all be explained by the fact that the Mayor and (it appears) his advisors don’t do detail. That means it was TfL’s job to make the decision about safety at Bow Roundabout (within the context of the Mayor’s new ‘smoothing traffic flow’ policy) and they are to blame. Except that I have information from FoI requests to TfL which say otherwise. But I now know that Kulveer Ranger had monthly meetings with TfL from 2009 onwards to discuss cycling. These were formal meetings with agendas, minutes and decisions. Cycling superhighways were discussed every month and the project officers implementing the schemes were present to discuss the detail. We have only been given a snippet of the minutes from May 2010, but from this we know that Bow Roundabout was a particular concern as it was on the border of Tower Hamlets and Newham. It reads:

“Discussion on CSH routes 2 and 8 (to be delivered in 2011), focusing on Westminster’s and Newham’s positions on CSH/blue paint. Possible impact on route 2 delivery beyond Bow Flyover leading to Olympic Park in Newham was discussed in more detail, including solutions for Vallance Road and Bow roundabout. Group agreed that it is necessary to continue discussions with boroughs sensibly.”

Bow needed Kulveer’s personal and ongoing attention as Newham’s Labour politicians didn’t want the Mayor’s blue paint and were blocking the progress of the cycling superhighway beyond the roundabout. It was a political problem, not an engineering problem and I understand that any safety measure on the east side of the roundabout, as proposed in the Jacobs report in January, would also have needed Newham’s sign off.

I am aware that the Mayor’s office have stalled FoI requests from November about their involvement and I feel that we need a proper judicial enquiry into the role that the design of roads plays in the deaths of cyclists in London. In the meantime, I have today written to the police with this information and asked them to consider a corporate manslaughter charge in the case of the Bow deaths, just as
they were considering them in the case of Kings Cross.

It may well have been human error by the lorry drivers and I wouldn’t wish to detract from that line of investigation, but the role of the Mayor’s office and overall policy must not be ignored. As this exchange from the November Mayor’s questions time illustrates:

Boris Johnson: “I didn’t over rule anybody in respect of Bow Roundabout. There are decisions taken on a wide range of traffic measures throughout the city which are not always referred to me. Certainly Bow Roundabout was not referred to me.”

Jenny Jones: “You were in charge of TfL, you give them a strategic overview of how to deal with these junctions.”

Boris “Yes I do.”

Jenny Jones: “It’s your ‘smoothing traffic flow’ that meant that TfL did not go forward with the improvements to the roundabout which could have saved lives.”

Boris “That is a hard accusation you are making.”

Indeed it is.

This evening I’m speaking at London Citizens’ accountability assembly. Or rather, I’m not really speaking so much as pledging to work with them, as Greens have done for the past twelve years on the London Assembly.

I’m happy to agree to the whole of their agenda for London, all of which is in our manifesto, with one tiny exception. They would like free travel extended to all full time students and apprentices, which is a very worthwhile but expensive promise. Instead we have pledged to bring down fares for everyone, and to help students further by bringing down housing costs, making it safer and easier to cycle, and campaigning against education cuts.

A lot of my work on the Assembly in the past four years, and that of my colleague Darren Johnson, has been to do with the London Citizens agenda from 2008.

I have pushed, lobbied, battled with Boris to make good on his promise to support a network of Community Land Trusts. Working closely with London Citizens and other communities around London, I had meetings with the Mayor’s advisor and staff and raised it at Mayor’s Question Time. I wrote a report showing how he could do it, and repeatedly badgered him into opening the door for them.

Sadly, earlier this year he sold the St Clements’ site to another bidder, leaving the local community that London Citizens organised to crowbar their way back in. He claims it’s a Community Land Trust but it isn’t owned or controlled by the community. I really want to get City Hall to work with local people to build permanently affordable housing, and to stop thinking that “regeneration” can be delivered without them.

Darren has spent years pushing the London Living Wage, ever since we got Ken to set up the London Living Wage Unit as part of our budget deal in 2004. Every year Darren compiles a progress report on local councils, pressuring them to sign up. He has lobbied Boria on his broken promises on catering, government departments and most recently the Olympics hotels. Boris completely failed hotel workers by granting Holiday Inn the prestiguous position of official hotel partner for the London 2012 Games, despite their refusing to sign up the London Living Wage.

We also brought the Strangers into Citizens campaign into the spotlight, getting cross-party support on the London Assembly and persuading the Mayor to support the campaign.

Darren and I are hoping to get re-elected to the Assembly on the 3rd May, and to get more Greens alongside us. Together we can continue to work closely with communities like London Citizens to deliver on our common vision for a fairer, more affordable and healthier London.

I suspect that Boris is considered relatively harmless by most Londoners, but his inaction and backwards steps on air pollution are leading to premature deaths, reduced lung capacity in children and severe respiratory problems for tens of thousands. Whatever Boris may say he is doing about reducing air pollution, the reality is that it hasn’t worked. Last year was one of the most polluted years in London since the big pollution spike of 2003.

I do not let Ken off the hook on this, as it is definitely a two mayor problem. Ken did eventually set up the low emission zone after years of successful pressure by my Assembly colleague Darren Johnson (dating back to 2000), but that ban on the most polluting vehicles was just one policy amongst many which needed to be implemented. Ken agreed to our request for tighter rules to cover light good vehicles, but Boris then delayed the start date by a year and a half. Ken brought in mid year inspections for black cabs, Boris abolished them, but after further pressure from Darren the Mayor is now bringing them back. The greens on the London Assembly have played a vital role in making sure air pollution stays a big issue at City Hall, even if the Mayor and Government would rather it were forgotten.

Boris Johnson’s record on air pollution is truly appalling. London have been suffering the effects of bad air long before it breached the European legal limits in 2005, but instead of focusing on reducing the health impacts on Londoners, this Mayor has put all his efforts into a series of cheats which he hopes will enable us to avoid the threat of £300m fines from the European Commission.

The main cheat is the use of dust suppressors to glue pollution to the roads in front of air quality monitoring units.  Hundreds of roads in central London are polluted but only those with monitoring stations are getting the pollution glued to the roads. These monitoring stations are like the canary down the coal mine. They are there to help us know when the pollution is really bad, so the Government can issue pollution alerts to the tens of thousands of adults and children who suffer sever respiratory problems. Except the Government only issues one alert a year and the impact of the Mayor’s dust suppressant spraying is to reduce the level of pollution measured. It is like putting a gas mask on the canary in the coal mine. This lower level of pollution is then reported to the European Commission, although this spraying does nothing to help the bulk of Londoners living, working and passing through areas which are not being sprayed.

The other big cheat is ignoring those local authority monitoring stations which are recording higher levels of pollution than the main Government run monitoring station at Marylebone Road. For example, the monitoring station at Neasden Lane, run by Brent Council, was over the limit last year and it is already over the legal limit this year (i.e. more than the 35 bad air days for PM10). The Government only get away with it, by not telling European Commission that the monitoring stations exists. They claim it doesn’t meet the standards the Commission sets, but the local authority and the experts who run the London air quality network both agree that it does.

The Mayor was given £5m by the government to reduce air pollution last year. He has wasted much of that money on pot plants along the olympic route network and on gluing pollution to the road. I would stop this waste and redirect the money to setting up a very low emission zone in central London, so that only the cleanest vehicles were allowed to use the roads where the pollution is worst.

I would also stop the Mayor’s massive subsidy for his new bus for London. He is planning to waste £37m a year just on the extra member of staff which his proposed 600 new buses will need. I will use that 37m a year to help ensure that all new buses are low polluting hybrids.

I am shocked by the absence of action on air pollution in the Boris Johnson manifesto. At least in 2008 he had ambitions for a big electric vehicle program. It is shameful that he let this ambition collapse. The London Assembly worked out that it would take hundreds of years for London to reach his aspirational target of a 100,000 EVs on London’s roads. Yet, the Mayor shows no embarrassment for his failures, even the example of his £1m fund for an electric taxi which he press released again and again in 2010 & 2011, but turned out to have never existed. Boris has not apologised for this complete fraud on those journalists who covered the issue.

I believe that traffic reduction, rather than a switch to electric vehicles, is the main solution to London’s chronic air pollution problem. Especially as the current Mayor has not even managed to ensure that the electric charging points he funded are sourcing their energy from renewable sources. However, it does make sense for a green mayor to encourage a big switch to hybrid engines in taxis and electric engines in lorries and buses. It is a combination of measures that will solve our air pollution crisis, but all of them are urgent priority whoever is Mayor.

But the latest report, showing that almost 19,000 women aged between 15 and 88 needed emergency housing in 2008-09 shows the degree to which so many lives are torn apart. These women need help; they need quality services to help them back on their feet.

The Green Party’s (http://london.greenparty.org.uk/manifesto ) London manifesto  promises to work with councils to set up one-stop shops for domestic violence survivors in every borough of London. That’s informed by the experience of the Green-run Brighton council, where a pilot of what is called “intelligent commissioning” of domestic violence services is winning plaudits.

It’s found that dedicated services do a great job in meeting the needs of victims holistically, but even there, only about a quarter of incidents are reported – the aim is to make identifying and preventing domestic violence a core business of all public services, something we’d seek to also apply in London.

Our manifesto particularly identifies the importance of refugees with specialist skills to help ethnic minority women, including those at risk of honour killings.

But ultimately, what we have to do is concentrate, hard, on bringing down the levels of domestic violence in our society. Here’s four things we can do:

1. Educate children, young people and adults about healthy relationships: Research has found that (http://www.amnesty.org.uk/news_details.asp?NewsID=17168) physical abuse of girls by boys is widespread in teenage relationships. And we need to educate society in general about the need and opportunities for them to take action, as with the Met’s (http://content.met.police.uk/Campaign/domesticviolence2011) Help Make It Stop campaign last year.
2. Ensure that the police’s response to domestic violence is consistent and high quality. There have been improvements, but more needs to be done.
3. Deal with inequality. The fact is that (http://www.londonspovertyprofile.org.uk/indicators/topics/low-pay/low-pay-over-time/) more than half of the low-paid workers in London are women, and cuts to housing benefit, family tax credit and other benefits are going to hit them hard. Women are left feeling trapped by economic circumstances in abusive relationships, or even forced back into them when they have tried to leave.
4. Recognise how restrictive asylum and working visa rules can leave women hugely vulnerable. Women who enter Britain on visas with no recourse for public funds, along with asylum-seekers and domestic migrant workers who face (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14778107 ) “slavery” under new visa rules, are all being set up as potential victims.  We will lobby to change these rules.

I pressured the Met police to change their approach on trafficking, so that they finally helped the women (who are the victims) and got them onside to take action against the traffickers. I opposed Boris’ decision to abolish the specialist unit which was doing so much good work on the trafficking of women and I am concerned that this is one of the reasons for a decline in the Met Police’s success in dealing with this problem.

I also worked with the previous Mayor to successfully oppose a pole dancing club opening in Southwark and supported Object’s national campaign to change the planning laws to give communities more say in opposing strip clubs being opened.

There is a lot that City Hall can do to deal with the issue of violence against women. As an Assembly Member and a member of the police authority I constantly badgered senior officers into changing the attitude of the police towards rape. Despite the extra resources and apologies for past failures, the Met are still failing. Assembly Members can get some changes made, but we also need a Mayor who will be unrelenting in their pressure on the Met Police to ensure that rapists are convicted and put behind bars.

Finally, there is an immediate priority for the new Mayor. The (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6055502.stm ) sad fact is that there’s evidence linking big sporting events to increases in domestic violence. We need to take action now to try to ensure that doesn’t happen in London this summer with the 2012 Games coming to town.

Domestic Violence affects us all because it damages society, damages children, damages those who are trying to escape. It’s time it was a priority with elected people who can make a difference.

I recently pledged to help secure funding for the Met Police Service’s Wildlife Crime Unit if elected Mayor.

It is obviously a popular issue as I have received about 700 emails from people concerned about the loss of the unit during the campaign.

Our animal manifesto contains lots of pledges about how as a city we can better look after animals, including a pledge to lobbying for dogs to only be sold from pet shops if they are already micro-chipped, vet-checked and with name and address of breeder.

In addition we have promised to ensure all animals must be sold with information about how to care for them which must include the Defra Code of Practice (for dogs, cats and equids).

The World Society for the Protection of Animals recently recorded an interview with me about this subject. you can watch the video here.

There is another way. There is an alternative. The Green Party Election Broadcast for the Local Elections and London Elections on May 3rd. Help us Make The Difference.

Produced and promoted by Martin Bleach on behalf of Jenny Jones and London Green Party candidates, all at Development House, 56-64 Leonard Street, London EC2A 4LT

Yesterday’s LBC hustings was fiery and many points of tension were fully explored. But Boris’ fury over Ken’s comments on his tax affairs seemed a bit selective, when earlier in the programme Ken had made the much much more serious assertion that the Mayor’s office was culpable in the deaths of two cyclists at Bow Roundabout.

Perhaps I have a misguided sense of political priorities, but I assume that preventable deaths on our roads are a more serious affair than the details of Ken and Boris’s company accounts.

Ken made the accusation that the Mayor’s Deputy in charge of cycling, Kulveer Ranger, was involved in the decision not to go ahead with safety improvements at Bow Roundabout, when the cycling superhighway was being built there. These safety improvements were outlined in the Jacobs report which was submitted to Transport for London as part of the official consultation exercise on the superhighway.

We already knew from a written Mayoral answer that the recommended safety improvement didn’t go ahead because of fears of traffic jams.

This has been a common theme of the Boris era, with safety improvements to Kings Cross and elsewhere being rejected because of the policy of giving priority to cars and lorries. It is possibly one of the main reasons why we can’t say that cycling has got safer in London since Boris was elected.

There is nothing new in saying that the Mayor’s policy of ‘smoothing traffic flow’ has led to Transport for London making some bad decisions about road design. What was interesting was the Boris reaction to the suggestion that Kulveer Ranger might have been directly involved in cancelling the safety projects and effectively overruling TfL.

Boris initially said it was a ‘reprehensible’ idea – no argument there. But then when Ken pressed him on whether Kulveer made the call to cancel the proposed scheme, Boris backed off and said ‘he didn’t know’. Now this is surprising as I spent three months putting a series of written questions to the Mayor on this very point. Only after some very blunt questioning did I get an unequivocal answer in March this year, which was ‘no’, Kulveer was not involved.

So whilst Boris issued a straight denial on tax, the best he could do in defence of his Deputy Mayor in charge of cycling, was to claim he had no idea.

I don’t like the ambiguity of that statement and I think that Boris owes it to the victims’ families to again make clear that his chief cycling adviser had nothing to do with the decision on Bow and to publish all the relevant papers that show whether this was the case.

We were just 8,136 votes short of electing a third Green Assembly member in 2008 across the whole of London. This time we don’t want to leave it to chance. Please tell your friends, family and colleagues that a Green vote on the Orange ballot paper will mean you elect more Green Assembly members.

Here you can find information on which ballot paper to use to guarantee electing more Greens on to the London Assembly, how to Vote and how to register to Vote if you haven’t already done so.

Which ballot paper do I use?

Use the ORANGE ballot paper to elect more Greens to the London Assembly

Seats from this vote are allocated to parties in proportion to their overall vote.

This is where your Green vote is most valuable. If you Vote Green on the Orange ballot paper you WILL elect more Green Assembly Members. As this election is proportional, every vote counts. There are no wasted votes.

To re-elect Jenny Jones and Darren Johnson and elect more Greens to the Assembly, simply put a cross next to the Green Party name and logo on the orange ballot paper.

Use the PINK ballot paper to elect Jenny Jones as Green Mayor of London

You have two votes in the election for Mayor of London.

Vote 1st choice vote for Jenny Jones, the Green Party candidate by putting a cross next to her name in the first column on the pink ballot paper. Your second choice vote will only counted for Jenny if she is one of the top two candidates.

Use the YELLOW ballot paper to elect a Green candidate in your local constituency

Seats from this vote are allocated to parties using a ‘first past the post’ system. To elect a Green to represent your constituency in the Assembly, simply put a cross next to the Green Party name and logo on the yellow ballot paper.

For more information visit: http://www.londonelects.org.uk/im-voter/how-vote

Three ways to vote

1. Voting in person at your local polling station

As long as you are registered to vote in London, on 3rd May you can visit your local polling station between 7am and 10pm and cast your votes there. Please make sure that you arrive in plenty of time to avoid missing out on having your say. If you arrive and there’s a queue you might not be able to enter the polling station in time to vote.

2. Voting by post

If you are not going to be around on Thursday May 3rd or if you find it more convenient to vote by post, then you can register for a postal ballot. You can apply by downloading a form from the Electoral Commission’s website here and sending it off to your local Town Hall.

All the information you need is contained on the Electoral Commission website. The last date to apply for a postal vote, and for the council to receive the application by, is 5pm on Wednesday 18th April.

Download a form today if you don’t want to miss out!

3. Someone votes on your behalf (proxy)

You can also ask someone to be your proxy. This means they can vote on your behalf but for the candidates you wish them to vote for. You can apply for a proxy vote for a number of reasons, including: if you are unable to go to your polling station (for example if you are away on holiday, or will be working), you have a physical condition that prevents you going to your polling station, you are a British citizen living overseas, or if you are a member of the armed forces.

How to register to vote Green

To vote green on 3rd May, you need to make sure that you are registered to vote before 18th April 2012.

Can I vote?

To be able to vote in the London elections you must:

• live in London
• be a British, Republic of Ireland, Commonwealth or EU citizen
• be 18 years old or over on 3rd May 2012. 16 and 17 year olds can register with their  local borough and they will be added to the electoral register as soon as they become 18.

Being registered with the council for services such as paying council tax will not automatically include you on the electoral register. Although both are held by the council, the two lists are separate.

How do I register to vote?

It takes just a few minutes to register to make sure you can have your say. Visit www.aboutmyvote.co.uk to download and print off a simple form. You then just send it back to your local borough’s election office (contact details are provided).

More Assembly Members will help us to ensure our policies are adopted – and help make London a more equal, healthier and affordable place for all. A third or even fourth Green Assembly Member is really within our grasp but we won’t achieve this unless we meet our funding target. – we were only 8,136 votes off winning a third seat in the 2008 election, let’s not leave it to chance this time.

Please donate what you can today. With your help we can Make The Difference.

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