In letter to TfL boss, Khan says plans ‘will not include new pay-per-mile road user charging scheme’
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has pledged not to expand the ultra-low emission zone (Ulez) scheme if he returns to the role after May’s election.
In a letter to London’s transport commissioner, Andy Lord, Khan wrote that he had “categorically” ruled out the introduction of a pay-per-mile scheme as well as any tightening of Ulez emissions standards.
Continue reading...Subsidiary of Lazari Investments fined £67,000 for breaches of HMO licence conditions on Camden flats
A family-owned property empire whose holdings include the former Fenwick department store building on London’s Bond Street has seen one of its subsidiaries named on the city’s rogue landlords register and hit with fines totalling £67,000.
The Lazari family have an estimated fortune of £2.5bn, placing them 72nd on the Sunday Times rich list. It is based on a property portfolio that includes some of the most luxurious addresses in central London as well as rental flats in the north of the city.
Continue reading...Waltham Forest council has not yet found suitable location for statue that was completed in 2020
The first photographs of the dormant sculpture of the Bayern Munich and England striker Harry Kane have been published, five years after it was commissioned. The statue has sat in storage because Waltham Forest council in east London has been unable to find a suitable location for it.
The sculpture of the Walthamstow-born, Chingford-raised record goalscorer for Tottenham and England was completed in 2020 at a cost of £7,200, but has yet to appear in public.
Continue reading...Final year students from Goresbrook school talk about housing, higher education and social media – as well as hopes and fears
Zainab Shehzadi has a long list of worries: robots stealing jobs from humans, the damage wreaked on the climate by previous generations, turmoil in other countries, fighting fierce competition to secure a job that pays enough to live a comfortable life.
It’s a lot for a 17-year-old to take on, but she sees it as a reflection of the uncertain world she has grown up in. “We’re living in an age where everything is changing very rapidly,” she says.
Continue reading...Company founder Felix Barrett says Viola’s Room, written by Daisy Johnson, will be an audio-driven production perfect for date nights
Punchdrunk’s last immersive production, The Burnt City, drew more than 600 masked theatregoers each night to spend three hours venturing around a sprawling saga based on Greek myths. Their next show, announced on Monday, will invite them to take off their shoes and socks for a slumber party.
“This whole thing is a bedtime story,” said the company’s founder, Felix Barrett, of Viola’s Room, which will open in May at their headquarters in Woolwich, south-east London. Audiences will wear headphones rather than masks and follow what Barrett called an audio-driven “linear story” rather than explore the “open world” of Punchdrunk’s trademark shows, which let you roam freely around the space. Theatregoers will, according to publicity material, “feel their way through a maze-like installation as an unseen narrator guides them on a sensory journey”.
Continue reading...Two incidents happened 10 days apart in Shoreditch but are linked, Met said
A search is under way after a woman and a man were injured in suspected crossbow attacks in east London.
The incidents occurred 10 days apart in Shoreditch but were linked, the Metropolitan police said.
Continue reading...Hackney MP tells large crowd ‘this is not about me, this is about the level of racism in Britain’
Diane Abbott greeted large crowds of people who gathered at a rally in support of her on Friday night, telling the crowd they had to “stand firm” against racism.
The rally was organised by local black women in Hackney after remarks emerged about the longstanding MP by Frank Hester, the Tories’ biggest donor, that were widely condemned as racist and misogynistic.
Continue reading...Jennifer Edmunds sued police, which have now settled after dropping charges relating to 2021 gathering on Clapham Common
The Metropolitan police has agreed to pay £10,000 in damages to a woman arrested at the Sarah Everard vigil in Clapham, her solicitors have said.
Jennifer Edmunds was detained overnight and charged with breaching Covid restrictions at the Clapham Common gathering on 13 March 2021, said Bhatt Murphy Solicitors.
Continue reading...Ministers disappointed by decision of one of worst sewage dumpers not to join England-wide initiative
Thames Water has risked a fresh backlash over its commitment to tackling sewage dumping after it declined to commit funds to a £180m industry-wide initiative to fast-track efforts to reduce pollution in England’s waterways.
The government said on Monday that the sum would be spent by six companies over the next 12 months to prevent more than 8,000 sewage spills, as water companies attempt to address their woeful record on tackling spills.
However, Britain’s biggest water company, which has a £14bn debt mountain, has not taken part in the drive and it is understood that government officials are disappointed in its refusal to do so.
Continue reading...Marchers on Saturday came from wide range of backgrounds as rightwing press characterises city as ‘no-go zone for Jews’
As on previous Saturdays in the past six months, there were two marches taking place in London yesterday. The first, a gathering of tens of thousands of full-throated, flag-waving supporters of an immediate ceasefire in Gaza gathered at Hyde Park Corner at noon, and shuffled peaceably and patiently in the sunshine in the direction of the American embassy at Vauxhall, over the river.
The second march was taking place mostly in the imaginations of right-wing commentators and politicians who increasingly choose to see these displays of solidarity with the Palestinian cause only as a provocation and a threat. Following the prime minister’s Downing Street address on 1 March which represented these gatherings as representative of “forces trying to tear apart” our democracy, the latest figure to loud-hailer that version of reality was the government-appointed commissioner for countering extremism, Robin Simcox, who argued on Friday the marches were “a permissive environment for radicalisation”, leading to a hysterical Daily Telegraph front-page headline that read: “London is now a no-go zone for Jews”.
Continue reading...Attenders reiterate call for ceasefire in Gaza and condemn PM’s comments linking protests to ‘extremism’
Tens of thousands of people marched through central London on Saturday reiterating calls for a ceasefire in Gaza in the first national demonstration since Rishi Sunak suggested pro-Palestine demonstrations were a display of “extremism”.
The march began in Hyde Park Corner and ended outside the US embassy in Nine Elms. Near the start of the march, a crowd gathered around drummers, whose instruments were clad with the Palestinian flag and who played to chants calling for an end to Israeli occupation.
Continue reading...Investigation begins into Homerton Fertility Centre after errors discovered in freezing processes
A fertility clinic in London has had its licence to operate suspended because of “significant concerns” about the unit, the regulator has said.
The Homerton Fertility Centre has been ordered by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) to halt any new procedures while investigations continue.
Continue reading...Research looked at three London boroughs to value overall health benefits of active travel over 20 years at up to £4,800 per head
Policies to help people walk and cycle such as low-traffic neighbourhoods can create public health benefits as much as 100 times greater than the cost of the schemes, a long-term study of active travel measures has concluded.
The research, based on six years of surveys among thousands of people living in three outer London boroughs that introduced LTNs or similar schemes, found they tended to prompt people to switch some trips from cars to active travel, although the effects were varied.
Continue reading...People bereaved by Covid want government recognition and protection for South Bank place of remembrance
Volunteers at the Covid memorial wall are urging ministers to make the monument permanent as Britain marks its first national day of reflection after the pandemic.
The wall runs between Westminster Bridge and Lambeth Bridge on South Bank in London and is looked after by a group of volunteers, who rely on public donations to maintain it.
Continue reading...RSPCA take in young rodent after Canning Town staff discover cage in alleyway
A guinea pig has been found abandoned outside an east London tube station, with a note reading: “I need a new owner.”
Staff at Canning Town station discovered the animal, which has been named DiscoPig, alone inside a cage with the piece of paper taped to it.
Continue reading...Force was previously unable to locate sim belonging to Mia Janin, 14, after investigation into her death in 2021
Scotland Yard will return the lost sim card and phone of a bullied schoolgirl who killed herself, after the items were found months after her family requested their return.
Mia Janin, a 14-year-old pupil at Jewish free school (JFS) in Kenton, north-west London, died on 12 March 2021. Police admitted losing evidence it had gathered following her death last year – including the teenager’s main phone, second phone and sim card – but have since recovered them.
In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counsellor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
Continue reading...Legal adviser to pro-Palestinian protesters was taken to hospital by passersby after the incident on Westminster Bridge in London
A 71-year-old legal observer has accused a group of police officers of deliberately knocking her over and leaving her bloodied and unconscious on the ground during a Gaza ceasefire protest in London.
Lesley Wertheimer – who was wearing a hi-vis bib with “legal observer” printed on the back – crashed face down into the road when a phalanx of about 30 police officers ran towards Westminster Bridge during the first pro-Palestine demonstration of 2024.
Continue reading...Person on moped fired weapon in Clapham Common area and suspects remain at large, police say
Three people have been taken to hospital after shots were fired by a moped rider in south London, the Metropolitan police said.
Police were seen chasing the bike through Clapham after the incident on Friday afternoon. The firearm, believed to be a shotgun, was discharged from the vehicle in the Clapham Common area.
Anyone who saw the moped, or captured the incident on dashcam, should phone 101 and quote ref CAD 5008/1 Mar.
Continue reading...Eleven people treated for smoke inhalation after fire breaks out in residential building in London
Eleven people have been taken to hospital after a fire broke out at a converted terraced house in the upmarket London neighbourhood of South Kensington.
Fifteen fire engines and about 100 firefighters were called to the fire at a terraced house converted into apartments on Emperor’s Gate, in the south-west of London, close to the Natural History Museum.
Continue reading...Inquiry chair says there is ‘nothing to stop another Couzens operating in plain sight’ and radical overhaul is needed
Sarah Everard’s “devastating” murder was “entirely preventable”, campaigners have said, as they called for urgent reform of policing to restore women’s trust.
The Angiolini inquiry found that Wayne Couzens should never have been given a job as a police officer and that chances to stop him were repeatedly ignored and missed.
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