Tory London mayoral candidate Shaun Bailey has waded into the row over a second bailout for Transport for London (TfL). During Prime Minister's Questions this week Boris Johnson was heavily critical of Sadiq Khan, accusing the Mayor of effectively bankrupting TfL prior to the pandemic. Khan hit back on Twitter, saying the funding crisis was solely down to Covid-19.
TfL was initially bailed out in May with a £1.6billion government injection, but less than six months later TfL bosses say that a further £2billion is required just to keep things moving until Christmas! Given that lockdown occurred at the end of March, a collapse within just two months suggests that things were not quite as healthy as Khan suggests. But then of course his bizarre slashing of services at the height of the pandemic wouldn't have helped. In fact the crammed trains that resulted from the reduction only helped the spread of the virus. What a clown.
Bailey told TalkRadio's Dan Wootton yesterday that Khan is correct to say that TfL's deficit had fallen prior to the pandemic, but the level of debt had risen to record levels. Click below for the video.
Wootton is quite right to point out that Khan is only interested in doing mainstream media interviews, in which he knows he will be given an easy ride. The only radio show he is interested in doing is James O'Brien at LBC, who as a centrist Remainer can always be relied on to give his pal a free ride.
