Caroline Pidgeon

Lib Dem London Assembly leader Caroline Pidgeon joined mayoral candidate Brian Paddick to visit London's Chinese Community Centre in Gerrard Street, Soho. The community centre was as usual bustling with activities, from Chinese musical instrument lessons, to a calligraphy and brush painting class under the stewardship of their Chair, Christine Yau, who had kindly facilitated the visit.

Merlene Emerson, Chair of Chinese Lib Dems, had brought together a number of community leaders and experts for a round-table discussion to understand the issues facing the community. Nikki Li, Chinese Team Leader of the grass roots organisation, Citizens UK, shared about their campaigns such as that to stop the proliferation of gambling outlets in Chinatown, as well as their work across London for safer streets and the right to a living wage.

After years of disruption on the Jubilee Line new evidence has come to light revealing some of the real costs of the years of dragged out weekend closures.

Following extensive freedom of information requests Caroline Pidgeon, Leader of the Liberal Democrat London Assembly Group, has now discovered that the costs of the weekend closures since April 2007 on the Jubilee Line include:

• 32 million passengers being affected by the weekend closures, leading to a loss in ticket revenue of a staggering £15.7 million
• Transport for London having to spend £13 million on replacement buses

Commenting on these immense figures Caroline Pidgeon said:

“A year ago the Mayor and Transport for London admitted that the upgrade programme on the Jubilee Line would slip once again. After years of disruption to passengers, communities and businesses they announced a further year of weekend closures which has only just finished.

Caroline Pidgeon is continuing to support action to tackle the high number of accidents and fatalities that face cyclists on London's roads. London faces an especially serious problem with accidents involving collisions between lorries and cyclists at junctions.

A recent question asked by Caroline to the Mayor revealed that in 2009 six cyclists were killed on London's roads in accidents involving a Heavy Goods Vehicle (HGV), and with a further two cyclists killed in accidents involving a refuse lorry and a cement mixer. In 2010 there were two cyclists killed in accidents involving vehicles and two further two fatal collisions including a skip lorry and a cement truck.

Caroline has already given her full support to the campaign by the London Cycling Campaign (LCC) for better training for lorry drivers and recently received the petition that had already gathered more than 10,000 signatures. Read more information about the campaign here.

Caroline Pidgeon is calling for a review to be undertaken of the cycling restrictions that exist across London's Royal Parks.

At present cycling is severely restricted in most of London's Royal Parks (see the extensive restrictions here) - especially in Regent's Park, where cycling is only permitted on the northern section of the Broad Walk, between Chester Road and Outer Circle. Incredibly, such restrictions exist despite the provision in the park of docking stations for the Transport for London's bike hire scheme!

Commenting on the current situation, Caroline said:

"Pedestrians should always have first priority when it comes to pavements, and it is absolutely vital we curb the menace of the small minority of cyclists that ride on pavements on London's streets. However parks are a totally different matter!