Richard Barnes, who earns just over £96,000 a year, made his "throwaway" remark last week at a transport committee meeting.

Mr Barnes, who is responsible for Mr Johnson’s social justice policies, has previously spoken about how he and the Mayor are "determined to make a difference in addressing inequalities".

The Conservative made the comments at City Hall on July 14 in a discussion about the High Speed 2 rail project.

Asking about the cost of redeveloping Euston station, Mr Barnes said: "Are they like most Irish builders … saying it’s going to be roughly that [he licked his finger as if checking the wind direction]. Are we working on estimates?"

Labour Assembly member Murad Qureshi, who was at the meeting, said: "I was taken aback by the comment. Given the huge contribution made by the Irish in building London, this is particularly offensive.

"What is even more shocking, is that he made these comments as the Mayor’s lead on equality and diversity policies. He should make an unreserved apology to the Irish in London."

He added: "He’s been pretty exemplary on the subject of equality other than this. He has to accept that someone in his position making a comment like this is not acceptable."

Mr Barnes said: "If anyone was offended I will turn around and apologise but no offence was intended and I’m sure none of my Irish friends would find it offensive. It was a throwaway line. We’ve all had builders."

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The proposals would allow both runways to be used simultaneously for either arrivals or departures as a way to cut delays and cancellations when airport operations are disrupted by poor weather or other problems.

The campaign to persuade Transport for London (TfL) not to amalgamate the 312 and 412 services has been taken up by London Assembly member Murad Qureshi.

Mr Qureshi asked the mayor to review the situation, which he claimed would lead to more overcrowding and a reduced service for people living near Croydon Bus Garage, in Brighton Road.

The TfL proposals involve withdrawing the 412 route, which serves Purley, Sanderstead and Selsdon.

The 312 route, which runs from the bus garage to Norwood Junction via East Croydon station, would no longer serve the garage.

Instead, it would divert on the journey from Norwood Junction at the Swan and Sugar Loaf pub in South Croydon and follow the 412 route to Sanderstead, Selsdon and then on to Purley.

Opponents to the changes have organised a petition to TfL, urging a rethink.

The petition claims the 312 is the only bus during the peak hours on which people living near the bus garage can guarantee to find a place.

In reply to Mr Qureshi’s request, the mayor said TfL was considering feedback from residents and would write to them "once a final decision is made."

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The Stop the Tunnel North Westminster action group protested outside City Hall on the banks of the Thames, waving placards calling for an end to High Speed Two (HS2).

The group told a committee investigating the rail link from central London to Birmingham they had been shut off from the plans and warned that properties would be damaged ­during years of disruption to areas already hit hard by the Crossrail development. 

Chairman of the group Julius Hogben said: “HS2’s aim is to keep the public in the dark as much as possible and rush this monstrous project through Parliament.”

Queen’s Park activist Katie Cowan said: “They did not tell us about their plans until April and we have had problems getting information from them.”

HS2’s proposals include running trains in a tunnel run under north Westminster at a depth of 30-35metres.

The group told the committee that “no data” had been provided on whether noise from the tunnel would be heard in their homes.

Plans to build a huge ventilation shaft in Queen’s Park was described by committee panel member Murad Qureshi as “a big hole in the ground which will surpass anything that we have seen before”.

Mr Qureshi wants the route to terminate in Acton and not smash through central London. 

HS2 were notable by their absence despite being called to give evidence. Assembly Member Caroline Pidgeon, who chairs the cross-party transport committee, told the West End Extra: “I was extremely disappointed and frustrated that we were let down by the department and HS2 when they are the prom­oters of the project. We wanted to have a balanced discussion focusing on the issues affecting London and we have not been able to do that.”

Though HS2 did not present evidence to the committee, they had support at City Hall in the form of Adam Raphael, a journalist and member of the Campaign for High Speed Rail, who said the scheme was “essential to economic development” and would help address economic imbalances across the country. He said: “We’re 60 years behind France, 20 years behind Spain and about the same in Germany. Let’s get on with it.” 

The government’s public consultation on the HS2 ends at the end of this month.

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A Boeing 747-400 passes close to houses shortly before landing at London Heathrow Airport

So at the moment BAA are permitted under limited circumstances, for example, during busy periods or during poor weather conditions to use both runways simultaneously.  These proposals effectively give airlines the green light to implement these special measure procedures much more often.  Mixed mode expansion is what residents have feared the most.  The government pledged there would be no expansion at Heathrow, yet this is exactly what they are now proposing.  In the meantime The Department for Transport are playing the whole thing down using semantics, claiming that the proposals are different to mixed mode because they are not “planned”. And they think this is somehow better? Now residents are not only expected to endure noise throughout the day, but they will also be subjected to it at hoc, at the discretion of the airline companies without effective stringent policing. I think it’s time to bolt the back door!

One of the inherent structural problems of the UK economy is its growing reliance on imported energy.  North Sea oil has provided a great comfort blanket for the country since it has been pumped ashore from the mid-1970s. It helped plug the gap in the balance of payments created by the relative decline of manufacturing, while paying for tax cuts by Tory governments and spending increases by Labour governments.  Unfortunately we did not have the good sense and foresight to put away the North Sea oil revenues into a sovereign fund, as Norway did, which could have been used to re-tool and rebalance the economy in a way many have been advocating for a long while. Instead this money was spent some time ago and more recently since 2005, the UK has imported more energy than it has exported.

This dependency could not have come at a more difficult time, as the era of readily available cheap crude has passed with the recent hiked oil prices holding strong.  The reasons for this continued price rise are a combination of factors including stronger demand from the fast-growing emerging economies, the long anticipated arrival of peak oil (the phrase often used to describe the situation when global oil supplies reach a peak) and no doubt, speculation from hedge funds.  All these factors are set against a backdrop in which it is becoming more difficult to extract oil from even more dangerous deepwater fields for example, along places like the Blackpool coast, (which allegedly caused an earthquake in the seaside resort recently) using increasingly difficult technology such as “fracking” (the procedure of creating fractures in rocks and rock formations by injecting fluid into cracks to force them further open.  In the long run countries will have to find ways of making fossil fuels cleaner, going nuclear, or investing heavily in renewables.  All are expensive and potentially controversial, as Germany is discovering following its decision to abandon nuclear totally.  However, at least they’ve been preparing to face up to issues which the UK has ducked.

So what about the implications for London?  The London Assembly Environment Committee recently investigated the growing energy gap asking the question whether we are losing the energy game.  This is given the Mayor’s own assertion that we risk having a gap of some 576,000 MWh by 2020. It is suggested that with energy demand reduction programmes like energy efficiency programmes for Londoners homes & work places; energy supply programmes including decentralised energy and waste to energy schemes like anaerobic digestion, then we may have the potential to reduce London’s energy gap.  We also have the bonus of the worlds largest coastal wind farm in the Thames Estuary known as London Array kicking in and making a difference.

But will this all go far enough? Well this year alone we had an energy price hike of just under 7% at the start of the year by energy companies, and very recently, Scottish Power announced a an increase of up to 19% for its tariffs with expectations of a similar announcement by the country’s biggest energy supplier, British Gas.  There is also mounting speculation that the cluster of timely announcements made by the big energy suppliers is “cartel” like behaviour, leaving consumers little choice about where to go for their energy and forcing them to pay the higher prices, thus maintaining profits for the energy companies. This is happening at a time when average annual incomes have dropped in real terms by about £700 resulting in creeping but stubborn fuel poverty in London with the strong likelihood of an ever widening energy gap as a result of even further price hikes before 2020.

Are there other lessons to be learnt from other parts of Europe? Copenhagen comes to mind and the journey from Copenhagen to London takes you from one end of the energy use spectrum to the other. Copenhagen is a city that heats itself by burning its own waste whereas London unfortunately makes a business of wastefulness on this front.  For example Copenhagen boasts one of the most advanced waste-to-energy plants in the world, having the capacity to convert hundreds of tons of garbage a year to heat.  The city aims to free itself from fossil fuels with wind, biomass and waste incineration playing a major role by 2025.  Not surprisingly, therefore, the fastest growing Danish exports are in the clean-tech sector with new technologies that improve the energy efficiency of buildings, reduce loss in energy transportation and turn waste into an energy source. The UK, on the other hand has yet to exploit the huge global business opportunity resulting from the clean-tech sector.

In short, if global cities like London are going to shield themselves from further price hikes, a widening energy gap and achieve energy security, then plugging the gap with renewables and demand reduction measures will require immediate attention and investment into low carbon energy sources. The Office of Gas & Electricity Markets in the UK (OFGEM) estimates that up to £200 billion of investment is needed over the next ten years to replace the UK’s ageing infrastructure to meet energy needs and to move to a low carbon energy supply system. That’s more then twice the amount invested in the last ten years. It is still unclear how such large-scale financing will be generated and where it will come from.  What we do know is schemes like London Array are being funded by companies all of which have their headquarters outside of the UK (Dong Energy in Denmark, E’ON in Germany and Masdar in Abu Dhabi) probably a sign of things to come, or else we risk playing and losing the even more dangerous game of energy complacency.

On 30^th June the Metropolitan Police Authority voted on cuts to local police teams that will see each London borough lose five sergeants dedicated to safer neighbourhood policing.  The cuts were narrowly passed with 8 votes for and 7 against the proposals – all Labour Members voted against the plans.  The cuts will mean 150 safer neighbourhood sergeant positions go this year, with another 150 next year.

Murad Qureshi AM, London wide assembly member, said:

“We voted against the cuts, and I’m very disappointed that the cuts will go ahead which will see London boroughs each losing five Safer Neighbourhood sergeants.”

Murad continued “We are witnessing the beginning of the dismantling of the universal provision given to all wards under the safer neighbourhood policing scheme.  These losses will undermine the reassurance and trust that the Police have built up over the past few years in our communities and neighbourhoods.”

ENDS

For further information contact Nikki Salih 020 7983 4400

Murad raised three[1] questions with the Mayor at the last session of Mayor’s Question Time on the 15^th of June.

In response to the main question about the decision to merge the routes, the Mayor responded:

“TfL recently consulted stakeholders on a proposal to withdraw route 412 and divert route 312 at the Swan & Sugar Loaf. TfL is currently considering the feedback received from stakeholders prior to making a final decision. TfL will write to stakeholders in due course once a final decision has been made”

Murad was contacted by local residents who’d signed a petition and were extremely unhappy about the proposed merger.  “The merging of routes 312 & 412 will affect passengers all the way from Norwood Junction to South Croydon.   At the moment the 312 which starts at South Croydon garage is the only bus they can guarantee to get a place on during the morning rush hour.  All other buses are full before they reach the garage including the 466 which will be the only remaining link to East Croydon station”

Murad added “The Mayor and TFL need to start listening to the voice of residents who are best placed to understand what their local transport needs are”

Ends

For further information please contact Nikki Salih, on 020 7983 4400

Powdered milk delivered to empty warehouse in Gaza on the Miles for Smiles convoy

Whilst reporting to the Egyptian Association of UK AGM last night about my recent trip to the Gaza strip via Cairo, l spoke about my surprise  at how the Rafah crossing was not as open as we’d imagined from our shores and indeed how difficult it is still, to get through if you’re a Palestinian.

The previous weekend, l’d visited as part of a humanitarian convoy of medical supplies sent out by “Miles of Smiles” via El-Arish port where a dozen European NGOs moved 30 tonnes of medical supplies and 12 ambulances.  I along with 62 other activitists picked up the supplies from the port and transported it all to the Gaza strip with the consent of the Egyptian authorities. (and subsequently even the Israeli military forces).

When we first entered the Gaza strip, it felt like an open prison, which was how our Prime Minister described it last year.  Movement through the Rafah crossing was slow for most, but in particular for the Palestinians.  The movement of goods and aid via the crossing is a vital life line for Palestinians who live in the Gaza strip and who desperately rely on this channel for their basic sustenance.  Not surprisingly, therefore, we were greeted with welcome arms, although the scale of gratitude was something which still took me a little by surprise.

Whilst there, I noticed also that full Rafah crossing rights were being offered to the Palestinians by Egypt as a reward for supporting Hamas & Fatah as the single representative for the Palestinians living in the West Bank & Gaza. Rumour has it, that there is strong disagreement over who will be the Prime Minister in this region.  What ever happens, one thing for certain is that Egypt will play a key role in the survival of the Gaza strip through the management of the Rafah crossing.  However, sadly, the process is a lot slower then we realise from afar and therefore, making it more open, much quicker would make a real difference to the lives of Palestinians living in the Gaza strip.