Search questions

• Reference: 2021/1197
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

Is there anything about Operation Midland (the Metropolitan Police investigation into Carl Beech’s bogus claims about a VIP paedophile ring) that you think could have been handled differently?

• Reference: 2021/1198
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

What have been the Metropolitan Police’s clear up rates for murder, burglary, rape and Grievous Bodily Harm over the last five years?

• 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: 2021/1201
• Question by: Peter Whittle
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

On 26 February 2021, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services published its report into the police use of stop and search powers. It raised the prospect of abandoning stop and search for drugs altogether, stating that damage may outweigh the benefits. ‘While suspicions about drugs are stated as the reason in the majority of the half a million stop and searches in England and Wales annually, illicit substances were found on only one in four occasions.’ Does the Metropolitan Police regard one in four as an effective detection rate?

• Reference: 2021/1202
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

Given that the black cab taxi fleet has now shrunk to less than 14,000 vehicles and many drivers are struggling to earn a living, let alone buy a new electric wheelchair accessible taxi for more than £60,000, do you think the black cab has a future in London?

• Reference: 2021/1203
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

Are you aware that less than 0.5% (half a percent) of all private hire vehicles are wheelchair accessible (and most of those are school run mini buses)? What will you do to see that London’s ageing and disabled population can get around if there are no purpose built wheelchair accessible taxis in the future, because they’ve been priced out of the market?

• Reference: 2021/1204
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

What is your future plan for Taxis and Private Hire Vehicles, given, in my view, the poor outcomes from your policies over the last five years?

• Reference: 2021/1205
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

What will you do to rebuild the taxi trade and reverse the declining numbers of black cabs in London seen over the last five years?

• Reference: 2021/1206
• Question by: David Kurten
• Meeting date: 18 March 2021

Uber maintained for a long period of time that the acceptance of private hire bookings by a licensed London PHV Operator acting as agent for drivers would comply with the regulatory regime. Given the recent Appeal Court ruling that Uber drivers are employees, does the mayor believe that Uber have been operating in London outside of the PHV regulatory regime since TfL granted them an Operator Licence in 2012?