The electoral campaigns for the London mayor and assembly are in full swing now with voters going to the polls on May 6th.
Several of the candidates have spoken out on environmental and transport-based issues with the Conservative candidate Shaun Bailey, promising to ditch the ULEZ expansion and reverse previous congestion charge increases.
Now the current mayor and favourite to win the race Sadiq Khan has unveiled his green vision which is built around the creation of around 175,000 green jobs.
Khan has stated work will begin on a number of projects including electrifying London’s bus fleet, increasing the resilience of flood risk areas, and tackling emissions from the city’s buildings. Among the jobs created will be 3,000 to electrify the city’s bus fleet, 4,400 jobs in solar energy and 1,700 in energy.
This follows Khan’s announcement last year of a £50m Green New Deal to drive progress towards ensuring that the city will be carbon neutral by 2030.
“If re-elected, a top priority will be jobs, jobs, jobs. Good, high-quality jobs for Londoners in future-proof sectors such as the green economy which allow us to tackle the climate emergency alongside the looming unemployment crisis,” Khan said at the launch.
Sian Berry of the Green Party will publish her manifesto later today (8th) while Shaun Bailey has promised to replace old buses with zero-emission buses. He will also offer an interest-free loan to every black cab driver so they can switch to electric cabs, which he claims is equivalent of taking one million diesel cars off London’s roads.
