On Wednesday I attended two debates on the proposals to introduce a “toll tax” congestion charge in Manchester.
The first was in the Council Chamber, where my colleague Cllr Ian MacDonald and I introduced a motion calling for local residents to be given final say on the toll tax in a referendum. You can read the Advertiser report on the debate online, but needless to say your Labour Councillors voted down any proposals to consult the public in a referendum.
The second debate took place at Methodist Central Hall in Manchester.
It was organised by Kashif Ali of Manchester Conservatives and featured representatives from all three main political parties (Rob Adlard for the Conservatives, Marc Ramsbottom for the Liberal Democrats and Anthony McCaul for Labour) as well as speakers from Manchester Against Road Tolls (MART) and Clean Air Now UK.
What was interesting was that the Labour representatives in Salford and Manchester took completely contradictory positions in support of the congestion charge.
In Manchester, Anthony McCaul did his primary school teachers proud with a very competent reading of a speech clearly prepared and written for him by someone far higher up the Manchester Labour food chain - Pat Karney perhaps or maybe Richard Leese himself. However the speech set out a utopian vision 0f a public transport paradise to justify support for the congestion charging.
Meanwhile in Salford, John Merry and his colleagues put forward a wet lettuce of an amendment, wringing their hands and saying “we can’t decide anything now, we don’t know anything about this at all until the Government tells us”.
This is nonsense - the plans are available online at www.gmfuturetransport.co.uk. The simple truth is that they are too scared to have this debate before the local elections on May 1st.
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