A leaked email revealed that the London Assembly Labor Group had blocked questions that could be “deeply embarrassing” for Sadiq Khan in the run-up to municipal elections.
The email, which was seen by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, revealed that City Hall task force agents had rejected four proposed questions about the controversial Silvertown Tunnel ahead of the hour’s session. Mayor’s Questions (MQT) earlier this year.
The questions revolved around whether Sadiq Khan had stopped to rethink the modeling of the project in light of the Covid-19 pandemic, but they were dismissed on the grounds that “they could be deeply embarrassing for the mayor , especially so close to the election of the mayor. ”.
The £ 2bn Silvertown Tunnel is a road tunnel project that will link the Greenwich Peninsula to the west of Silvertown, but has been criticized by politicians, activists and climate experts for its potential impact on quality local air.
One of the questions rejected by Labor Group officials asked the mayor why pollution with PM2.5, a type of particulate pollution caused by vehicle tires and road wear, had not been taken into account in the assessment of the air pollution of the project.
A spokesperson for the Labor group said that “every now and then we have too many questions for MQT, and we need to prioritize based on what matters most to Londoners”.
The spokesperson said: “This means that over the past few months we have prioritized the issues of tackling crime, recovering the capital’s economy, creating jobs and cleaning up our toxic air. .
“Labor MAs are committed to providing a full and proper exam – including on the Silvertown Tunnel, on which we have submitted written questions for the past two MQT sessions.
“The review takes place at different levels across the GLA and indeed the GLA oversight committee, which was chaired by a member of the Labor Assembly, was examining a number of issues on Silvertown during that same. period and did so by correspondence with TfL. ”
Following the re-election of Sadiq Khan, Labor members of the London Assembly were accused of ‘abdicating their responsibility to hold the mayor to account’ by Conservative mayoral leader Susan Hall after a disagreement over the distribution of chairpersons of review panels.
None of the assembly’s control committees will be chaired by Labor members this legislature after the group rejected a deal proposed by the other three parties in the assembly.
At the time, the leader of the Labor group, Len Duvall, accused the other parties of forming a “coalition” and said that “we do not have to chair any committee to fully participate in control”.
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Source: www.times-series.co.uk
This notice was published: 2021-06-04 16:00:00
