Search questions

• Reference: 2021/1199
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

I note that on 24 February 2021 Mr Toyin Agbetu - one of your Commissioners for Diversity in the Public Realm resigned, after his blog posts commenting on Jewish people were brought to City Hall’s attention by Jewish News . One of his posts claimed there was an ‘immoral hierarchy of suffering’ which had seen victims of the Holocaust ‘served well by Nazi hunters’ compared to African victims of the slave trade. Agbetu has also claimed that Jews played a leading role in the Atlantic slave trade. In 2007, he also heckled the Queen, during a service at Westminster Abbey...

• Reference: 2021/1200
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

Given that your recruitment due diligence failed to uncover the alleged anti-Semitism of one Commission appointee, what else might it have failed to pick up? How can Londoners have confidence in the people you have selected?

• Reference: 2021/0405
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 25 February 2021

In recent weeks, it has been reported by a number of newspapers and media outlets that during the Coronavirus pandemic London has lost anywhere between half a million and more than a million residents, who have returned to their countries of birth. An estimate by the Economic Statistics Centre of Excellence has warned that London’s population may have plunged by 8 per cent, the first drop in more than 30 years. If this estimate is accurate, what do you estimate the effect will be on the private housing sector?

• Reference: 2021/0043
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 21 January 2021

Is the Mayor happy with the public’s response to his New Years’ fireworks display?

• Reference: 2021/0047
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 21 January 2021

To ask the Mayor what progress has been made in appointments to his Commission for Diversity in the Public Realm?

• Reference: 2020/4340
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 17 December 2020

What discernible impact (if any) has Covid-19 had on the operational effectiveness of the London Fire Brigade?

• Reference: 2020/4067
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 19 November 2020

Given that Historic England - the statutory advisor to central and local government on heritage proposals - has clearly stated its position that contested statues should not be removed, can the Mayor provide assurance that the Commission for Diversity in the Public Realm will abide by that guidance and not recommend the removal of any statues?

• Reference: 2020/4068
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 19 November 2020

Further to that same guidance from Historic England, can the Mayor confirm that he would follow it and not support the removal of the statues of Thomas Guy and Sir Robert Clayton from Guy’s and St Thomas’s Hospitals?

• Reference: 2020/4069
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 19 November 2020

Given the Government’s plans to give the Secretary of State for Housing the final say on planning applications relating to statues, due to their national significance, does the Mayor recognise that public statues in the capital have a national significance and agree that their future is not entirely a matter for local/devolved government?

• Reference: 2020/4070
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 19 November 2020

Your press release of 28 July 2020, announces the formation of a ‘Commission for Diversity in the Public Realm.’ What do you understand to be the meaning of the term ‘public realm’ - most specifically in the context of private property, non-public spaces and government-owned land?