By Sam Tobin
LONDON (Reuters) -A plan to expand London’s clean air scheme which charges the most polluting vehicles in the city will go ahead at the end of next month, the city’s mayor said on Friday, after London’s High Court ruled it lawful.
The British capital’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) levies a 12.50 pound ($16) daily charge on drivers of non-compliant vehicles in order to tackle pollution and improve air quality.
London’s Labour Mayor Sadiq Khan last year decided to extend the scheme to cover almost all of the Greater London area, encompassing extra five million people in leafier and less-connected outer boroughs, from Aug. 29.
Five affected Conservative-led local authorities argued the decision to expand ULEZ was unlawful, but their legal challenge was rejected on Friday.
“This landmark decision is good news as it means we can proceed with cleaning up the air in outer London,” Khan said in a statement following the ruling.
The five local authorities said they were “hugely disappointed” with the decision.
“Although the Mayor of London and Transport for London may have the legal right to implement the scheme, the question remains whether the public would agree he has the moral right to do so,” they said in a joint statement.
Britain’s green agenda has been in focus over the past week after the governing Conservative Party won an election in former Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s old seat just outside central London, in part by attacking the ULEZ expansion.
The Labour Party’s national leader Keir Starmer, said after that vote that the party, which is well ahead in national polls, should reflect on the scheme’s decisive role in the result.
While Starmer and Khan, who will seek a third four-year term in next year’s mayoral election, are at odds over the policy, it was first introduced by a Conservative – Johnson himself while he was London mayor.
Judge Jonathan Swift rejected all three grounds of challenge to the expansion of ULEZ, including that the public consultation on the proposed expansion was unlawful.
The court also dismissed the councils’ case in relation to Khan’s decision to not extend a 110 million pound vehicle scrappage scheme to those living just outside the expanded ULEZ area.
Khan said he would be expanding the scrappage scheme to nearly a million families who receive child benefits and small businesses with up to 50 employees.
“The decision to expand the ULEZ was very difficult and not something I took lightly and I continue to do everything possible to address any concerns Londoners may have,” he said.
The planned expansion of the scheme has pitched Khan and health campaigners against those who say they cannot tolerate another economic hit at a time of soaring living costs.
While London’s transport authority says only one in 10 cars in its outer areas is non-compliant, that has been heavily contested with some saying the true figure could be higher.
($1 = 0.7809 pounds)
(Reporting by Sam Tobin, Editing by Kylie MacLellan and Tomasz Janowski)
