More sensitive types at Transport for London may want to look away now.
I’m on record as being broadly supportive of the cable car scheme but the fact remains that the Mayor repeatedly promised it would not cost the taxpayer any money to build.
That promise soon evaporated and TfL has instead found millions of pounds, up to £60m according to some reports, going spare in the same year the Mayor is putting up fares by an average of 7%.
It’s therefore legitimate for journalists both to remind readers of the Mayor’s promise and point out that he’s failed to live up to it.
It’s less appropriate for TfL’s press office to call up those journalists and express displeasure at such coverage.
TfL has its own website on which it is free to publish whatever one-sided corporate puffery it sees fit.
It should not seek to influence wholly accurate and factual coverage just because it doesn’t fit its narrative. As Boris might want to remind them, that’s the sort of Pyongyang propaganda he’s repeatedly condemned.
In the course of my discussion with TfL’s press office today they refused to confirm over how many years Emirate’s sponsorship fee would be paid.
But Londoners should be entitled to know whether the money is being paid in a lump sum, over the entire ten year sponsorship period or somewhere between the two.
They’re also entitled to know whether the £36m referred to in TfL’s press release is guaranteed or whether it is dependent on certain outcomes – such as completion of the scheme before the 2012 Games.
It’s wrong for politicians and public bodies to enter deals with commercial concerns and then refuse to publish the full details.
For their part companies working with any tier of Government need to recognise that the public has a legitimate right to know what has been agreed to in their name.
I still believe the cable car could be a great scheme for Londoners but to date all it’s given them is a £24m funding shortfall and yet another tacky logo.
Hardly an inspiring start.
PS: London Reconnections have a great piece setting out why the scheme is one of the most expensive cable cars in the world.
Adam also has a ‘must read’ piece on how money is no object for Boris’s “vanity projects”.
