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• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 02 July 2020

David Kurten AM: Good morning, everybody. My first question would go to David Bellamy. I think you would be the person to answer this, but if you are not you can pass it on. My question is, what remuneration will the members of the London Transition Board and London Recovery Board be receiving for their service?

• Question by: Caroline Pidgeon
• Meeting date: 02 July 2020

Caroline Pidgeon MBE AM: My questions are to start off with to John O’Brien. I want to ask about support for businesses in London, with a particular focus on the restaurant industry. According to data from the Office for National Statistics, as of July last year there were nearly 16,000 restaurants in London employing around 325,000 people. Clearly, the sector has been hit very hard by COVID-19. Data showed in March, before the pandemic had fully hit, that 71% more food and accommodation businesses closed this March than they had in the previous March. John, I wonder if you could...

• Question by: Leonie Cooper
• Meeting date: 02 July 2020

Léonie Cooper AM: My first question is to David Bellamy and it is about the balance between lives and livelihoods. Many politicians and commentators have portrayed the journey out of lockdown as a trade-off between the economy and health and between lives and livelihoods. Do you agree that this is a false distinction and that there cannot really be a full economic recovery without the public being confident that going about daily life is safe?

• Reference: 2004/0209-1
• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

What proportion of new homes envisaged for the London Thames Gateway will not be deliverable without major enhancement of flood management schemes? When can we expect to see agreement and commencement of a programme of major enhancement of flood management in the London Thames Gateway? .

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

I am sure we will all feel completely safe in the hands of developers here in London, especially putting in an environmental project that they probably do not have very much sympathy for in the first place. I just think it is incredibly premature to start planning homes, houses or buildings before we have actually had any sort of flood management assessment. I think it is expected in 2008 or 2009, the interim results are going to be in May this year, apparently, but plans are already in hand. How can you possibly do that?

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

What you actually said to Jenny (Jones) was that the flood defences will have to be improved because of environmental factors: global warming, sinking land, and the fact that the risk will have increased by 2030. Of course, we do not just flick a switch and the risk doubles in 2030; the risk is increasing all the time incrementally towards that. But you did not say anything, with respect, about the risk management element, which has to take into account the value of what you are protecting as well as the risk of something happening. I am not convinced that...

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

Nor, I assume, do you put your police stations and fire stations and hospitals and emergency services that will need to respond to a flood within the flood zone?

• Question by: Roger Evans
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

Is there a plan which is going to ensure all these things are placed back from the area that is potentially in danger? How do you actually, when you are doing that, speak to local residents and businesses who are in the high risk area and assure them that, just because you have not got public facilities there, that does not meant it is a no-go area?

• Question by: Jenny Jones
• Meeting date: 17 March 2004

Except you cannot actually roll out a Green Grid until you have got the land, and you have to have the land before any development takes place. This is not something you can impose afterwards; it has got to be there at the very beginning.