The Liberal Democrats are the latest party to launch their London mayoral election manifesto, with a promise to clamp down on sexual offences in the capital.
Candidate Rob Blackie says a new Sexual Offences Unit within the Met Police will double the number of offenders caught in London, following Labour mayor Sadiq Khan’s “shameful” record on the issue.
Video by LDRS
Candidate Rob Blackie says a new Sexual Offences Unit within the Met Police will double the number of offenders caught in London, following Labour mayor Sadiq Khan’s “shameful” record on the issue.
Video by LDRS
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NewsTranscript
00:00 The Mayor's performance on crime has been terrible, particularly on sexual
00:05 offences. We're now catching half as many sexual offenders and rapists as we
00:10 were in 2016 when the Mayor took charge of that. So my key pledge in this manifesto is to double that rate.
00:17 I'll do that by setting up a sexual offences unit in the police and bringing
00:21 more police onto the job, taking them out of the back office, putting them back on
00:25 the front line and focusing them to their time on the crimes that matter to others.
00:30 Your predecessor as candidate, Louisa Porritt, talked about introducing a system of
00:34 road user charging. Why doesn't that feature in the manifesto this time round?
00:38 There's been a lot of change for drivers recently in London and I think the
00:42 system's really got too complex. We just need to what we have to bed in for now
00:46 and really it's not the right time for it.
00:49 The whole idea of road user charging was to simplify, to make it less complex. Would it not do that?
00:53 We're not proposing that. It's not the right time for it.
00:57 Even though the climate crisis has arguably got worse since 2021.
01:01 Road user charging doesn't help the climate crisis. Switching people over to electric cars does.
01:06 That's why we've got a plan in there for more electric car charging so we can accelerate that.
01:11 I was meeting London's taxi drivers yesterday and their biggest challenge in switching over to electric
01:16 is finding fast chargers. Because obviously as a cab driver or delivery driver you drive around all day
01:22 so you need to be able to top up your car with electricity. Those fast chargers are just far too few of them.
01:28 There are just 70 in London that are prioritised for cab drivers and delivery drivers.
01:33 There's obviously over 10,000 electric cabs on the road. We can't get that switch over if we don't make it easier for people.
01:38 We heard from Susan Hall in the last 24 hours that she plans to expand the night tube. Is that a commitment you'll match?
01:44 I love the night tube. It would be great to extend it but first of all we've got to fix tube maintenance.
01:49 There is nothing more frustrating if you're on a tube on your way to work or maybe going to pick up your kids after work
01:56 and it breaks down and you're stuck with all that stress. Night time is a very important time for tubes and tube tracks to be maintained.
02:03 So I would like to extend the night tube but first of all we've got to crack that maintenance problem.
02:08 That's got much worse on the road.
02:10 Would that happen in your first term as Mayor?
02:12 I'd like it to, yes.
02:14 Talk a lot about the polling. You mentioned in your speech there the fact that Susan Hall is way behind Sadiq Khan.
02:19 Is the natural logic of that not that you have even less hope than her of winning?
02:23 Well I'm way up on where we were last time. We've already more than doubled our support in the capital compared to the last election.
02:30 Everyone else is really down. I think we have a great opportunity to go further.
02:34 People are disappointed in the Mayor. They know the Conservatives can't win so it's a great opportunity for us.
02:39 Explain how it's possible for you to win as opposed to Susan Hall who is far ahead of you in the polls.
02:44 Well if we doubled again we'd be well past her.
02:46 How's that going to happen? How are you going to double your support?
02:49 We're getting a clear message out there to people. People are responding well to it.
02:53 We're running one of the biggest campaigns we've ever run in London and people are responding very well to it.
02:57 The Lib Dems haven't held their deposit for over a decade now in this race. What do you put that down to?
03:02 Well I'm running my own campaign obviously and it seems to be doing very well right now.
03:07 We've got a clear message about the Mayor's failures on crime and what we'll do to fix it.
03:12 I think we can move forward in this election with that message.
03:15 Learning from previous mistakes is clearly important. Why did your three previous predecessors fail to cross 5% of the vote?
03:22 The world was different back then. I think right now we're running a great campaign. I'm very happy about how we're doing.