Sir Keir Starmer calls for London mayor to ‘reflect’ on ULEZ after by-election loss as Sadiq Khan stands by policy
Sir Keir Starmer has called on Labour’s mayor in London to “reflect” on his decision to expand the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) to the capital’s outer boroughs, after the impact of the policy on the Uxbridge and South Ruislip by-election.
Many had predicted Labour would overturn the 7,000 majority in Boris Johnson’s old seat in the west of the city after the former prime minister’s shock exit as an MP last month.
But throughout the campaign, it became clear Sadiq Khan’s plan for ULEZ had angered people on the doorstep.
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The Tories clung on to the seat with a majority just shy of 500 votes – which was still a 6.7% swing towards Labour – and Rishi Sunak told reporters: “When there’s an actual choice on a matter of substance at stake, people vote Conservative.”
Speaking to reporters, Labour leader Sir Keir said the constituency was always “going to be tough” to win as it had never voted for his party.
But he said the ULEZ expansion was also a factor in “why we lost in Uxbridge”, adding: “We all need to reflect on that, including the mayor.”
Mr Khan also said he was “disappointed” the party didn’t win the seat overnight.
But he insisted the decision to widen the ULEZ, due to come in next month, was “the right one”, adding: “It was a difficult decision to take. But just like nobody will accept drinking dirty water, why accept dirty air?”
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Khan: ‘ULEZ expansion difficult but right decision’
The ULEZ was first proposed by Mr Johnson during his stint as London mayor as a way to cut air pollution in the capital.
When he announced it in 2015, he said it was “an essential measure to help improve air quality in our city, protect the health of Londoners, and lengthen our lead as the greatest city on earth”.
The policy in its current form – which sees drivers having to pay a £12.50 daily fee to drive in the zone if their car does not meet emissions standards – currently covers central London and the areas up to, but not including, the North and South Circular Roads.
But Mr Khan plans to expand the zone up to the capital’s borders with Buckinghamshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent and Surrey from the end of August.
London’s Ultra Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) is to be expanded in August
The mayor defended the by-election loss, saying: “I have lived in London my entire life [and] this seat has never been Labour since I’ve been alive, including in 1997 in the Tony Blair landslide and the subsequent by-election a few months later.
“But I am quite clear though, the policy to expand the Ultra Low Emission Zone is the right one.”
Mr Khan outlined the successes of the existing policy, saying there had been a toxicity reduction in central London of 50% since ULEZ began, and 20% for inner London boroughs.
He also said a third fewer children were being admitted to hospitals with asthma attacks.
“Four million Londoners are already benefiting,” the mayor added. “What about the other five million in outer London, where there is the largest number of premature deaths?
“The 10 boroughs with the largest number of premature deaths are in outer London [and] it is the poorest Londoners who are least likely to own a car that suffer the consequences.”
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Rayner blames ULEZ for Uxbridge defeat
Mr Khan said he had been “listening” to people’s concerns about the expansion, increasing the eligibility of people to be exempt – such as families on child benefit or small businesses who employ up to 50 people.
“We are going to carry on listening, making sure we monitor the situation,” he added.
“But the choice is simple. Do we kick the can down the road to clean up the air in London or do we take action?”
Politics
Red Wall MPs should focus on two-child benefit cap rather than winter fuel, Harriet Harman says
Red Wall MPs should push for the two-child benefit cap to be lifted rather than a reversal of the winter fuel payment policy, Baroness Harriet Harman has said.
Baroness Harman, the former Labour Party chair, told Sky’s Electoral Dysfunction podcast that this would hand the group a “progressive win” rather than simply “protesting and annoying Sir Keir Starmer” over winter fuel.
Earlier this week, a number of MPs in the Red Wall – Labour’s traditional heartlands in the north of England – reposted a statement on social media in which they said the leadership’s response to the local elections had “fallen on deaf ears”.
They singled out the cut to the winter fuel allowance as an issue that was raised on the doorstep and urged the government to rethink the policy, arguing doing so “isn’t weak, it takes us to a position of strength”.
Labour’s decision to means test the policy has snatched the benefit away from millions of pensioners.
But Baroness Harman said a better target for the group could be an overhaul of George Osborne’s two-child benefit cap.
The cap, announced in 2015 as part of Lord David Cameron’s austerity measures, means while parents can claim child tax credit or Universal Credit payments for their first and second child, they can’t make claims for any further children they have.
Labour faced pressure to remove the cap in the early months of government, with ministers suggesting in February that they were considering relaxing the limit.
Baroness Harman told Beth Rigby that this could be a sensible pressure point for Red Wall MPs to target.
She said: “It could be that they have a kind of progressive win, and it might not be a bad thing to do in the context of an overall strategy on child poverty.
“Let’s see whether instead of just protesting and annoying Sir Keir Starmer, they can build a bridge to a new progressive set of policies.”
Jo White, the Labour MP for Bassetlaw and a member of the Red Wall group, suggested that her party’s “connection” to a core group of voters “died” with the decision to means test the winter fuel payment for pensioners.
“We need to reset the government,” she told Electoral Dysfunction. “The biggest way to do that is by tackling issues such as winter fuel payments.
“I think we should raise the thresholds so that people perhaps who are paying a higher level of tax are the only people who are exempt from getting it.”
Pic: AP
A group of MPs in the Red Wall, thought to number about 40, met on Tuesday night following the fallout of local election results in England, which saw Labour lose the Runcorn by-election and control of Doncaster Council to Reform UK.
Following the results, Sir Keir said “we must deliver that change even more quickly – we must go even further”.
Some Labour MPs believe it amounted to ignoring voters’ concerns.
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One of the MPs who was present at the meeting told Sky News there was “lots of anger at the government’s response to the results”.
“People acknowledged the winter fuel allowance was the main issue for us on the doorstep,” they said.
“There is a lack of vision from this government.”
Another added: “Everyone was furious.”
Downing Street has ruled out a U-turn on means testing the winter fuel payment, following newspaper reports earlier this week that one might be on the cards.
A man from the US state of Virginia will spend over three decades behind bars after being convicted of sending crypto to the terrorist organization commonly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
Federal Judge David Novak sentenced Mohammed Azharuddin Chhipa to 30 years and four months in prison on May 7 for sending over $185,000 to the Islamic State, the Department of Justice said on May 8.
Prosecutors said that from around October 2019 until October 2022, the 35-year-old Chhipa collected and sent money to female Islamic State members in Syria, which helped them escape prison camps and funded fighting.
The Justice Department said Chhipa would raise funds for the United Nations-designated terror organization through social media — receiving money online, or traveling hundreds of miles to accept donations in person.
He’d convert the money into crypto and send it to Turkey for it to be smuggled to Islamic State members across the border in Syria, prosecutors said.
A federal jury convicted Chhipa in December, finding him guilty on a charge of conspiracy to provide support to a terrorist organization and four charges of providing and attempting to provide support to a terrorist organization.
“This defendant directly financed ISIS in its efforts to commit vile terrorist atrocities against innocent citizens in America and abroad,” Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement. “This severe sentence illustrates that if you fund terrorism, we will prosecute you and put you behind bars for decades.”
Chhipa tried to flee US during FBI probe
Prosecutors said that during the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s investigation into Chhipa, he tried to flee the country to escape prosecution and tried to hide his tracks through a series of actions seemingly aimed at confusing authorities.
According to a motion for detention filed in August, FBI agents searched Chhipa’s house on Aug. 2, 2019, and that night Chhipa drove to a bank, withdrew $1,800 from an ATM, and then went to a Taco Bell, where he paid a stranger for a ride to a relative’s house. The relative then drove him to a grocery store.
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Three days later, prosecutors said Chhipa “purchased a series of bus tickets using variations and/or misspelling of his name and recently created email accounts.”
He then travelled from Virginia to Mexico and onto Guatemala. He then bought tickets to fly from Guatemala to Panama, then onto Germany, and then to Egypt, but an Interpol Blue Notice was issued, and he was returned to the US.
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