I completely agree.

Even if you didn’t do as you suggested, most black cabs will come back for you for the return trip as it’s in their interests to get the fare in these economic conditions.

We’re back to the MP expenses saga – which is worse, the fact that the rules allow these claims, or the fact that the people claiming clearly have no moral conscience when it comes to spending public money.

I can guarantee if Boris was making a personal visit (and having to pay for it himself) – there is no way on earth he would leave the meter running on the cab.

However because it’s not his money there is an attitude of ’so what – it’s only public money’ – just as the MP’s have had with expenses.

Meanwhile thousands of Londoners scrimp and save to get through the hard times.

Of course this is a cumulative total but nevertheless I am surprised the London Assembly’s Audit Panel hasn’t picked up on this. I imagine Navin Shah (Labour) and Caroline Pidgeon (Lib Dem) would derive great glee from pointing out the Mayor’s profligacy in this regard.

Maybe they already have and I just haven’t seen it reported. The Audit Panel doesn’t usually attract much of an audience!

Your bus route and fare knowledge is exceptional.

There is a valid point behind this which doesn’t relate to the cost of the journey by cab, it’s to do with understanding what it’s like to be an ‘ordinary Londoner’.

If the mayor (or any London MP) actually had to wait for up to an hour for a bus in the pouring rain, or be stuck in a tube in the hot and sweaty summer, or been late for countless meetings due to transport failings – then their priorities for London would be very different to what they are at the moment.

This is why transport is always low down the priority list for most Government (local or National) representatives. If I took taxi’s everywhere or was driven by limo then I wouldn’t be able to see what the big problem is with transport that makes nearly every single Londoner wince when you mention it.

Until they live like us – they can never truly represent us.

The Mayor should be living in a crappy estate in a bad part of London and having to catch a vandalised bus with aggressive youths abusing old ladies to work every day – and then perhaps they might start making policies that actually make a difference to peoples lives.

In addition to this, the constant pampering of our leaders (like the Mayor) and raising his level of importance to ‘god like status’ – simply makes them (more) arrogant and less empathetic to the people they Govern.

I have been living in London for the last 8 years and in that time I have only restorted to using a taxi twice (for fares over £3) – one was when I was stranded in the City at 3:30am in the pouring rain with no coat and the other when there was a tube strike and I had to get to an interview on time. The photo op with Jaqui Smith and Ian Blair is not what I would constitute as ‘desperately important to Londoners’. I’m sure 99% of Londoners wouldn’t have noticed if Boris wasn’t in the picture and the other 1% wouldn’t care!

Interestingly enough, City Hall told me: “A cab was ordered on this occasion to get the Mayor swiftly to a tennis event at Old Lillian Baylis School with his Commissioner for Sport Kate Hoey.” but as I understand it, that’s in Lambeth Walk.

Either way, the reason for the trip isn’t important IMO, £99 for a journey by cab a 343 or 35 bus would have cost £1 on is hardly delivering best value for Londoners – a key claim of Boris’s mayoralty.

http://www.london-se1.co.uk/news/view/3309

The taxis are a different matter though. By all means he should take them if he needs to, but he shouldn’t make us pay £237 for a 9 mile journey. If he wants to waste money, he should waste his own.