Mayor's open government promise is a 'sham'

12.00.00am GMT Wed 20th Nov 2002

Sally Hamwee, Lib Dem Assembly member, today challenged Mayor Ken Livingstone over the 'wall of secrecy' that shields congestion charging contracts from public scrutiny.

Sally Hamwee asked the Mayor at today's Assembly Question Time whether it was not in the public interest to publish the key performance indicators that Capita have to meet, especially since the company has had problems in the past administering other schemes including this summer's fiasco with the Central Criminal Records Bureau.

Commenting afterwards, Sally Hamwee said:

"The public should be allowed to judge whether the contract with Capita for congestion charging are good value for money. However, the Mayor has allowed a wall of secrecy to be set up despite a pledge during his election campaign to 'introduce the most open, accessible and inclusive style of government ever in the UK'."

"Capita are choosing to hide behind 'commercial confidentiality' and the Mayor has allowed them this protection. Yet Londoners could well be picking up a bill for several hundred million pounds if the scheme fails – they have the right to know what the score is.

"The Mayor said he was sympathetic to my concerns but had been advised that confidentiality was the norm in such contracts. He did agree to ask Capita to agree to release relevant information, but of course they may well refuse."

"The Lib Dems look to the Mayor to do all he can to put public information into the public domain and to refuse similar provisions in future deals."