There's light at the end of the tunnel

The popularity of my Fare Deal plan with ordinary Londoners has forced Boris Johnson and his Tory pals to resort to false claims and to expose exactly how out of touch they are.

In late 2011 I launched my plans for a Fare Deal for Londoners - a cut to transport fares of 7 per cent, and a cut in the price of a bus ticket from £1.35 to £1.20.

It's a policy that resonates with Londoners I meet every day, who in every corner of the capital cite raised transport costs as one of their key concerns.

One of the biggest levers City Hall has to help Londoners is the fares regime which the mayor chooses to set.

I am proud to have a record of cutting fares in London over the course of my career, and I am so confident in my plans to cut fares for the third time that should I fail to have delivered this on or by October 7 this year, I will resign.

Even after my Fare Deal cut of 7 per cent, London's fares will still be among the most expensive in the world. It is clear from reading the TfL accounts that the money is there to deliver a fare cut which will save the average Londoner £1,000 over four years.

The maths behind my Fare Deal is simple, but we must take every opportunity to explain it in order to counter the scaremongering of Boris Johnson and his Tory cabal.

In recent weeks they have tried all manner of tactics to discredit my plans, flip-flopping between denying the funds to pay for a fare cut exist at all to saying it will impact on investment, and even going as far as to cook the books to conceal the existence of the funds which will pay for it.

The facts are clear. Under the Tory Mayor, fares have been raised at inflation-busting levels every year since he came to office, with the price of a single bus journey by Oyster up 50 per cent in price since 2008 and zones 1-2 and 1-4 Travelcards both up by 20 per cent.

In addition to that, ridership has increased on public transport and the operating expenditure has been lower than forecast. The result of this is an operating surplus for TfL of £310 million in the first nine months of the current financial year alone.

This very figure is clear and available for all to see in the TfL board papers.

That takes us on to the next Tory myth - that my Fare Deal will damage investment.

Another look at the accounts shows that there are clearly two separate budgets at TfL - the operating budget and the capital budget.

I have always been clear that the Fare Deal is funded only by the former. The capital budget is treated entirely separately.

There's a certain irony of the Tory scaremongering on the subject of transport investment because Boris Johnson cancelled almost every one of my planned investment projects when he came to office.

Most of these benefited outer London, such as the improvements to the Croydon Tramlink, extending the DLR to Dagenham Dock and the construction of a new east London river crossing.

Instead of focusing on making it easier for Londoners to get round the capital - be that through the tram extensions or improving outer London bus services - all we have seen is millions spent on expensive, impractical and out of touch vanity projects such as his infamous Thames airport proposal.

But then if we needed a reminder of exactly how out of touch Boris Johnson and his Tory mates are, step forward Conservative London Assembly member Tony Arbour.

At the assembly's budget meeting on Wednesday of this week Arbour claimed that "relatively few Londoners use London transport."

In actual fact over 1.1 billion journeys were taken on the Tube alone last year.

With Tories who are so out of touch with the day-to-day reality of life in the capital is it any wonder that they fail to feel the pain which ordinary Londoners are feeling?

Should we really be surprised that the Tory Mayor - famed for describing his second salary of £250,000 as "chickenfeed" - has failed to grasp what difference a fare cut worth £250 a year, a thousandth of his second salary after all, will make to people?

Last week Boris Johnson announced his lame plan to put money back into Londoners' pockets - a 1 per cent council tax precept cut which will save the average Londoner £3.10 a year. That's right, 26p a month, or less than 1p a day.

It has been right to freeze the council tax during this mayoral term, and I've said so, as has my running mate Val Shawcross, who faced false smears on this front recently from Boris Johhnson's campaign director Lynton Crosby last week.

My view and the rationale behind the Fare Deal is that in tough times the mayor must do everything to ease the financial pressure on Londoners.

I have made it clear that if elected I will hold council tax down.

However, the reality is that the amount that Johnson is promising to hand back to Londoners would barely pay for the cost of one Tube journey and is dwarfed by his commitment to keep on increasing bus, Tube and train fares.

The Tories are increasingly out of touch with ordinary Londoners. Just look at their policies which are hitting millions of Londoners in the pocket.

Our Fare Deal plan represents the labour movement's alternative which will always put the interests of ordinary Londoners at its heart.

It's vital we expose the damage that the out of touch Tories are doing and rally the widest possible support behind measures to bring greater fairness to lives of millions of Londoners

To find out more about the Fare Deal visit: www.kenlivingstone.com/faredeal