Why Brent and Harrow electors should vote Green in the GLA election on Thursday

This is what Jafar Hassan told the Harrow Times when asked why people should vote for him as the Green candidate for the Brent and Harrow constituency. LINK


Green Party candidate Jafar Hassan said:

"London is in an awful housing crisis and the Green Party are the only ones with a viable plan to support and protect renters, and ensure housing is genuinely affordable. 

"This city is becoming more expensive to live in, making it harder for communities to stick together, but also making it completely unfair for those travelling from the zones in Harrow and Brent. We are campaigning to introduce a flat fares system making it cheaper to travel if you're a part time worker or living in the outer parts of London. 

"Investment in cycling and speeding up the introduction of zero emissions taxis and buses. During the school rush on busy roads around Brent and Harrow it is a disgrace that children are being exposed to so much toxic air on a daily basis. I will be fighting for safer cycling routes and ensuring all of the bus routes in our boroughs are electric powered. 

"I've lived in north west London my whole life, I studied both my journalism degree and masters in politics in London. This city along with my upbringing has shaped who I am. My mum who came to this country from Iraq before even turning 20 raised my sister and I on her own. I learnt from her the importance of persevering through difficult times and never losing hope. I will fight to give London back to Londoners and give them the Green policies they want. 

"We absolutely need more Greens on the London Assembly. Your votes for the Green Party in London elections have ensured investment for Cycle Superhighway and Cycle Hire, helped create the London Living Wage Unit, meaning that 60,000 Londoners are now paid a Living Wage, and pushed new housing developments to have more affordable housing. If you only want to give us one vote make sure it is on the orange ballot paper, where if you vote Green, you get Green."

Greens: Bring rail back into public hands following more fare rises

As rail companies in England announced fare rises for 2014,  commuters and their household budgets received more bad news.

Firms are allowed to put fares up by much as 2% above the agreed price-increase figure which, for 2014, is 3.1%.

Among the fares announced were annual seasons for travel between Reading in Berkshire and London, which is up 3.23% to  £4,088. and travellers from Dover Priory and Deal to London see annual fares rising 3.04% to £5,012.

Green Party leader Natalie Bennett said:

This latest price hike is going to put a dampener on many commuters' Christmas, and be a boost to support for Green MP Caroline Lucas's private members' bill calling for the railways to be brought back into public hands.

Travellers face overcrowded journeys as standard on too many routes, on the most crowded trains in Europe.

They face immensely costly journeys, and they know that more than £1bn of their cash is going into the 'black hole' of privatisation inefficiencies, plus billions more in declared and undeclared
government subsidies.

Casual users face a confusing fare structure that often leaves them paying more than they need or trapped with penalty fares due to confusion.

It's time to say enough is enough: privatisation has failed, we need to bring the railways back into public hands.

Labour launch petition on fares and ticket office closures

The message below comes from a Labour Party source but I thought worth sharing with Wembley Matters readers. HOWEVER A WARNING There is a major reservation that I have concerning the petition. By signing it you leave yourself liable to be contacted by the  Labour Party or its elected rpresentatives and can only opt out by writing to a very small print postal address. I think it would be much more ethical to enable signatories to opt out electronically. There have been some concerns about people's names appearing on Labour Party websites locally, interpretable as endorsement, without their knowledge.

On Monday it was revealed that Boris Johnson plans to close every ticket office at TFL stations in London. It will mean no ticket offices at Wembley Park, Wembley Central, Northwick Park, Kilburn, Queens Park, Queensbury etc.

The effect will be dramatic. Firstly it will mean no human presence to help out when things go wrong – ticket machines out of order, Oyster Card lost or stolen etc. Secondly it will make stations less safe, particularly for older commuters and travellers. Thirdly it will make access to travel for disabled passengers in Brent even harder than it already is. Fourthly it raises serious questions over whether there will be enough staff at stations to cope in an emergency situation and lastly it will result in up to 6,000 job losses. Disastrous all round!

On top of this the Mayor looks set to raise fares above inflation yet again for 2014. Under Boris Johnson fares have become the highest in the world. A single bus journey is 56% more and a zone 1-6 travelcard is £440 a year more expensive. The Mayor is asking Londoners to pay more for less.

Sadiq Khan, Shadow London Minister has launched this petition – www.GreatToryTrainRobbery.co.uk and given the statement below:

Boris Johnson has an abysmal record of hiking fares year on year that has contributed enormously to the cost-of-living crisis in London. London fares are now the most expensive in the world. Since Boris became Mayor the cost of a single bus journey has increased by 56% and the price of a zone 1-6 travel card has increased by £440 a year. He must recognise that Londoners are struggling and that their budgets can’t keep stretching forever and freeze fares at least at the rate of inflation for 2014.The Mayor can afford to do this; all that is missing is the political will.”

On top of this, the Mayor plans to give Londoners a worse service for their money. On Monday his secret plans to close every ticket office in London were revealed. His plans mean you will get no help if your oyster card doesn’t work, or is lost or stolen. There will be no help for tourists who need advice or disabled passengers who need assistance. It raises questions about whether there will be enough staff at stations to deal with emergencies and will result in 2,000 job losses. This is one of the worst examples of breaking a manifesto promise I have ever seen in London politics. No wonder the public are so cynical of politicians.

Fare hike makes no economic sense - London Greens

The London Green Party has said that the rail fare hike is the latest evidence that ministers are out of touch with the lives of people struggling to make ends meet.

London Greens pointed out that commuters will have to fork out at least £132 extra for an annual travel card for Zones 1-6. They said that Londoners will be particularly hard hit by the increases, given the money that many spend on commuting.

The government say that many fares will rise by 6.2% in January - almost double the rate of inflation - and some fares could be higher still.

This would see a one-day travelcard for Zones 1-3 rise from £10.60 to £11.26. A single peak ticket from Zone 6 to Zone 1, on Oyster pay-as-you-go, would rise from £6.90 to £7.32.

Noel Lynch, co-ordinator of the London Federation of Green Parties, said:

Once again, Tory and LibDem ministers have shown they are out of touch with the lives of people who are struggling to make ends meet. With unemployment going up and living costs rising, this fare hike makes no economic sense. Londoners will be hit hard as they travel to work.

The relatively smooth running of most of London's public transport during the Olympics shows that efficient railways are a real possibility. But money is going into profits, not invested in decent trains and track. Let's take our railways back into public ownership and run them for people, not profit.

Greens: Bring railways back into public ownership

This week saw another price hike in rail fares. With the UK already having the highest rail fares in Europe, The Green Party calls for the British railway system to be come back into public ownership.  It has been approximated that “£1.2 billion of public money is lost each year as a direct result of privatisation and fragmentation”

The Green Party has condemned the rail fare rise of an average of 6.2% announced yesterday.

Alan Francis, Green Party Transport Speaker, said:

We need to make rail travel more affordable, not less. Many people have had their wages frozen for several years. These fare rises will hit them hard. This fares increase makes rail travel even more unaffordable each year and pushes people back into cars on our already congested roads. Instead of an RPI+3% formula we should have a RPI-X% formula so that fares are reduced in real terms each year.

Rail privatisation and fragmentation has been bad for the railways and for passengers and has significantly increased costs. These higher costs, as much as £1bn per year, are paid by both passengers and taxpayers. We favour the railways being brought back into the public sector and more integration. This would reduce costs and so allow lower fares. Consequently we believe that as each TOC franchise ends it should be retained in the public sector, initially operated by the government-owned Directly Operated Railways. There would be no cost to the taxpayer.