Mayor of London Ken Livingstone has claimed overwhelming public support for proposals to charge cars with the highest CO2 emissions £25 a day to drive in the central London congestion charge zone.
The claims follow polling by Ipsos Mori as part of the recent consultation on the emissions based charging proposals. The company spoke to 3,620 Londoners, with “around half of those resident in the existing congestion charging zone”.
According to figures announced by Mr Livingstone’s office 91 per cent of those questioned said that they thought climate change was “important” or “very important”.
The findings also suggest two-thirds (66 per cent) of respondents were in favour of the proposals on which Transport for London has consulted, with 38 per cent strongly supporting it.
However the veracity of the Mayor’s figures was disputed by the One London party on the London Assembly.
Party leader Damian Hockney said, “The Mayor has a history of asking leading questions. The first question in this poll, whether respondents think climate change is ‘important’, reminds me of the notorious ‘do you agree with Nelson Mandela that London should host the Olympics?’ in a previous poll.
“If you were to ask Londoners whether they think that residents should be barred from receiving residents’ discount for having a mondeo, you would not get support. £25 a day to drive your own car in your own street”
Mr Hockney claimed the poll was “based upon a failure to explain the detail, false assumptions and pandering to envy.”
