Councillor Darren Johnson, AM said:
"Tag technology already works in Melbourne and other cities, so why don’t we get on with it in London. The number of cars registered in London has risen by 15% in the last seven years. With the cost of public transport rising again, there is every chance that people are going to start using their cars more, which means more congestion, more pollution and more greenhouse gas emissions."
"There is no way that London’s roads will be able to cope with the increases in population which the Mayor and the Government expect us to have in the next ten years, unless we have some form of road pricing. The Mayor has recently given the go ahead for car based developments like Stratford in east London, which has 10,000 car parking spaces. You can’t keep packing people into London and cars onto roads, without the whole system reaching gridlock. The problem is that the Government is allowing this crisis to happen without having the courage to bring in road pricing and the other measures which would allow us to manage transport in a sustainable way."
ENDSNotes to Editors:A report commissioned for TfL recommends that they introduce a system which combines the use of the tags with Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras. Local residents would be charged a registration fee and the tags would enable them to travel at a lower toll rate than long distance commuters.