Labour has referred Susan Hall’s mayoral campaign team to the Crown Prosecution Service, calling for it to investigate whether a leaflet breached electoral law.
Lawyers from the party have written to the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), after the Tories produced yellow and black leaflets which said: “Driving charge notice, do not ignore”.
Labour said the leaflets were designed to look like penalty charge notices “to lure voters into opening them”, while inside they contained claims Mayor Sadiq Khan was planning to introduce a pay-per-mile scheme for drivers.
Khan has accused Hall’s team of spreading misinformation, having repeatedly ruled out introducing such a charge.
Labour said the leaflets were designed to look like penalty charge notices “to lure voters into opening them”
CCHQ handout
Writing to the DPP, Labour’s lawyers asked the CPS to investigate whether the leaflets had been properly labelled as political advertising, leading voters to fear “financial loss” by voting for Khan.
Labour MP Karen Buck, who chairs Mr Khan’s campaign, said: “We’re now seeing tactics being used by the Tories which rival even those used in their disgraced 2016 mayoral campaign.
“The Tories are scaremongering people who are already worried about their bills thanks to the catastrophic cost-of-living crisis they created.
“These tactics are legally questionable and certainly mark another low in this desperate Tory campaign characterised by dirty tactics and lies.
“Sadiq has ruled out ever bringing in pay per mile as long as he’s mayor – no ifs, no buts.”
But a spokesperson for Susan Hall said: “This is desperate nonsense from Sadiq Khan’s campaign, intended to distract from his plans to hit every single family in our city with a pay-per-mile charge.
“It’s a plan he’s so proud of, he gloated about in his book and has legally committed Transport for London to deliver.
“Londoners will see through this; Sadiq Khan’s record of dishonesty speaks for itself.”
Writing for GB News earlier this month, the Tory candidate compared his pay-per-mile denials to the expansion of Ulez.
She said: “Sadiq Khan has admitted it himself. He told the world in 2022 that he was planning to bring in pay-per-mile, or ‘smart road user charging’ as he sometimes calls it.
“Last year, he told the Telegraph that he wanted to bring in a Singapore-style system…. In London, that would mean paying several quid every time you drive past a Ulez camera.
“He has already started building the technology for it, at a cost of £150 million.
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“The developers were specifically told that the system needed to accommodate pay-per-mile and they have obliged. He even promised it in his book.” She added: “This charge will be on top of your existing road taxes, meaning you will pay even more than you do now.
“Now there is an election coming up, Sadiq Khan suddenly does not want to talk about this anymore.
“He has written a letter to his TfL commissioner with a pinky promise that he will not bring it in. Sound familiar? He did the same thing last election with the ULEZ expansion.”
