--- election_year: 2012 party_id: green party_name: Green Party party_leader: Jenny Jones political_spectrum: left victory: false government_outcome: opposition sections: - economy - taxation - health - education - housing - immigration - foreign-policy - environment - transport - law-and-order - welfare - democracy-and-constitution - energy - science-and-technology - local-government --- # Green Party London Mayoral Manifesto 2012 Green Party # Make The Difference Our vision for a more equal, healthy and affordable London London Mayor and Assembly 2012 Election Manifesto 1...........................Foreword by Jenny Jones 2...............................................Introduction 3-4............................Equality and Diversity 4-5..................................Economy and Jobs 5-7...........................................Environment 7-9................................................Transport 9-10...................................................Health 10-12..............................................Housing 12-14.............................Crime and Policing 14-15........................Giving London a Voice 15.................London 2012 Olympic Games 16...............................................Conclusion London needs a strong Green voice. We must cut our carbon emissions and be more responsible global citizens. We must protect green spaces, create jobs and look for creative solutions to the massive shortage of affordable housing. A Green London will be a model for the world in addressing climate change, a city more equal, healthy and affordable for everyone. I urge Londoners to vote Green on May 3rd. JENNY JONES, GREEN PARTY CANDIDATE FOR MAYOR OF LONDON ## ACHIEVING OUR VISION FOR LONDON There is a better way. Like most Londoners, we want to see our city run in a way that makes it a more equal, healthy and affordable place for everyone to live. Our manifesto sets out plans for the Mayor and Assembly. * We will reduce the pay gap between rich and poor, get more families out of poverty, and tackle debt exploitation. * We will rebalance our economy, create more jobs at all skill levels, and support a renaissance of small businesses. * We will enhance green spaces, recycle more waste in modern facilities, and reduce our greenhouse gas emissions to a sustainable level. * We will reduce traffic, make public transport cheaper than driving, and make streets pleasant for walking and cycling. * We will protect health services from privatisation, clean up our dirty air, and make healthy food more easily available. * We will stabilise housing costs, give tenants more control over their homes and rent, and refurbish poor quality homes. * We will restore trust in the police, get officers away from their desks and onto the streets, and avoid cuts to community police. Make the difference this May. The London Assembly elections are held under proportional representation, so vote Green Party and you will elect more Green Assembly Members. **Green Party** MAKE THE DIFFERENCE ## EQUALITY AND DIVERSITY More equal societies are healthier and happier, with lower levels of violent crime. We have to, and can, do something about the shocking levels of income and wealth inequality. We can make London a city where no parent needs to choose between seeing their children in the evening or working a second job to stave off poverty, and where our public services help everybody flourish regardless of their gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, disability, faith or any other form of identity. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: * Secured funding to set up the London Living Wage, which has put £60m in the pockets of low paid workers; * Made City Hall, Transport for London, the fire brigade and the police publish transparent information on the pay gap between the highest and lowest wage; * Helped introduce a scheme for civil partnerships at City Hall in 2000 which paved the way for legislation at the national level. * Promote the Living Wage Foundation’s Employer Mark in the private sector, get public sector employers like councils and Whitehall round a table to shame them all into signing up, and lobby the Government to increase the National Minimum Wage. * Ease the costs of childcare and the shortage of spaces by working with councils to prevent breakfast clubs from closing, co-ordinating local services, shaping the market to increase affordable voluntary and commercial provision, lobbying the Government to increase the number of hours of free childcare in London, and requiring all schools working with Greater London to extend school hours and invest in play schemes before and after school and in school holidays. * Do more to tackle growing personal debts by supporting credit unions who can offer an affordable debt servicing option, banning advertising for payday loan companies on public transport, lobbying for public funding to help service debts and pay for one-off items such as school uniforms, and bring the voluntary and community sector into the London Debt Strategy Group to monitor and co-ordinate services. ## REDUCING PAY AND WEALTH INEQUALITY We can start to reduce the pay gap in London and support reforms that will help ordinary workers gain more power in the workplace if we: * Reduce the pay gap between highest and lowest paid staff in the GLA group to no more than a factor of ten. * Establish a Fair Pay Mark recognising companies who publish their own wage gap and commit to reducing it to no more than 10:1, and pay at least the London Living Wage to all employees and cleaners. Ask companies bidding for contracts to sign up. * Establish a London Fairness Commission to publish annual reports on levels of inequality in London and engage with large employers to identify practical ways of reducing their wage gap. * Promote co-operative business models and trade union recognition to employers, empowering workers to press for more equal pay. ## HELPING ALL LONDONERS FLOURISH We can bring under-represented groups who face daily challenges into the heart of regional government, and secure basic services to support vulnerable Londoners: * Establish a London Youth Assembly drawn from Young Mayors to scrutinise the Mayor of London. * Recognise the enthusiasm, expertise and energy of older people by encouraging employers to offer more parttime and flexible work as an alternative to full-time work or abrupt retirement. * Bring together youth and pensioner organisations for an Intergenerational Summit to identify solutions to injustices that particularly affect the young and/or old. * Recognise the social model of disability, and ensure that disabled people are able to benefit from jobs, homes, skills and other opportunities we can provide. * Promote faith equality, for example through supporting local-level interfaith forums, including non-religious people. * Guarantee sufficient funding for four rape crisis centres in London, making sure that all survivors of sexual ## TACKLING WORKING POVERTY The National Minimum Wage is too low in London, where one in ten full-time workers and two in every five part-time workers are paid less than they need to secure a minimum acceptable quality of life. We will: # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 violence can be given the support they need, and work with councils to set up one-stop shops for domestic violence survivors in every borough. Expand the provision of women’s refuges with specialist skills to help ethnic minority women at risk of ‘honour’ killings or other criminal acts. * Continue our commitment to fight racial and gender discrimination wherever and whenever it occurs, particularly in recruitment and promotion within the GLA group. * Expand the categories of ethnic data used for monitoring and policy development to recognise hidden communities. * Reaffirm the contribution that refugees, asylum seekers and economic migrants can make to London, and do more to ensure people are able to be fully included in their local community and economy, for example by allowing asylum seekers to use their Azure cards as a form of payment on the buses. ## ECONOMY AND JOBS We can rebuild our economy so that it works for all of us, rich and poor, and for the environment. Our plans are based on a renaissance of small businesses and co-operatives creating decent jobs and apprenticeships, and sharing the wealth more equally. Instead of betting on banks and building airports, we will invest in the skills and infrastructure needed by modern industries that will employ Londoners. We can take on the world without destroying the planet. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: * Increased investment in environmental industries and jobs from £300k to £31m a year; * Introduced planning protections for small shops through two major investigations; * Held two mayors to account on jobs and apprenticeships for young people. ## INVESTING IN LONDON'S FUTURE Our future economic success will be underpinned by investment in transport, energy and waste infrastructure, and in affordable housing, to make our labour costs competitive. We will use our influence to change the Government’s approach and our powers to: * Provide land and capital from the London Green Fund to stimulate industries such as renewable energy manufacturing and engineering to rebalance our economy. * Work with the financial services sector to establish a long-term infrastructure investment bond, and support community development organisations and councils to follow suit. * Make the case to Government for fairer ways of raising money for investment. Specifically, enable the taxation of the windfall gain in land values that arise when new transport links are built and planning permission for housing is given. Combined with Tax Increment Financing and our pay-as-you-drive charge, this could unlock a multi-billion pound investment programme over the next decade. ## SUPPORT FOR ENTERPRISE Micro, small and medium sized businesses are London’s economic engine, generating more jobs and keeping more of their profits circulating in the local economy. We will: * Ensure micro and small businesses are properly represented on London’s Local Enterprise Partnership. * Establish at least one Community Enterprise Zone on our land bank with the infrastructure to support small and social enterprises. * Put banking services out to tender and include each bank’s track record in lending to micro and small businesses as an important criterion. * Focus the GLA’s economic development budget on support for small businesses and co-operatives, particularly those that are already established and need support to expand, with mentoring, peer support and short courses. Enable clients to leave feedback on the support services via a dedicated web-based information service. * Maintain the CompeteFor system helping micro and small enterprises bid for public sector contracts, paid with a charge of 0.25% on all contracts. * Tender contracts for large services in parts to ensure that smaller specialist businesses, voluntary and community organisations can bid for them. Put all contracts worth more than £10,000 on CompeteFor and aim to procure at least 15% from small and micro enterprises. # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 * Ensure “best value” takes proper account of the quality of the bid and wider social, economic and environmental implications, rather than always opting for the cheapest. Allowance and cuts to university grants, which will reduce opportunities for young Londoners and hold back research and innovation. * Transfer control of the Mayor’s academy schools back to local authorities, parents and teachers. ## THE LOCAL ECONOMY Decades of big-business government have left our high streets holding on by a thread. We will give communities and councils more power to keep jobs and money in their local economy: * Use planning policy to ensure that by 2020 all neighbourhoods have a range of essential local services such as chemists and newsagents within walking distance. * Lobby the Government to give local authorities much stronger powers to prevent chain stores taking over independent shops, and to control the saturation of certain business types such as takeaways, betting shops and payday loan companies. * Introduce a presumption against any purpose-built car parks for supermarkets and ensure local small shops aren’t disadvantaged by parking standards. * Commission research into “buy local” schemes and work with boroughs and trade bodies to promote those that work. ## ENVIRONMENT We enjoy a natural wealth of parks, street trees and rivers that bring pleasure to millions of Londoners and provide habitats for hundreds of protected species. But we also create unsustainable levels of waste and pollution, and consume unsustainable levels of natural resources. We will invest in solutions like habitat revival, waste recycling and energy efficiency and press the Government to provide us with the powers and resources to do this on a scale that can preserve London and our planet for future generations. We can make London a zero waste city, reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 90% and reduce our ecological footprint by two thirds by 2030. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: * *Secured funding to start refurbishment programmes for homes and offices;* * *Set up the largest new park and animal habitat programmes since the Victorians;* * *Led the pressure that resulted in new planning protections for front gardens.* ## JOBS AND SKILLS We will invest in decent jobs and apprenticeships, supporting people to develop high-quality skills in a range of industries. * Create at least 150,000 high-quality apprenticeships aimed at young people under 25, all paying at least the London Living Wage with half a day’s off-the-job learning per week. Cut paperwork for employers and encourage them to take up the Government funding to make reasonable adjustments for disabled applicants. * Call for the Government to make apprenticeships mandatory across a wide range of industries, following the German model, to improve skills, wages and the quality of the products and services we sell. * Work with education providers to ensure people of all ages are able to retrain or improve their skills with a genuine commitment to lifelong learning. * Continue to oppose tuition fees for further and higher education, cuts to the Education Maintenance ### ZERO WASTE CITY We can make it easy to reduce the waste we produce and recycle or compost it, building new waste facilities to reach 80% recycling rates with no waste going to landfill by 2030. * Lobby the Government to give the Mayor the power to roll out a consistent set of recycling services across London boroughs to end the confusing and unnecessary differences. In the meantime, push boroughs to ensure every home has a simple service for separated recyclables and food waste collected on a weekly basis * Become self-sufficient in waste processing by 2030, building a new generation of small and smart waste facilities while blocking any that fail to meet our standards: * no new landfill or mass-burn incineration; # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 * building more, smaller waste facilities to minimise the impact on any one local community and to avoid locking in a demand for waste that removes incentives to reduce waste; * ensure the waste hierarchy is applied so that recycling facilities don't take waste that can be reused, and that clean energy from waste facilities don't take waste that can be recycled; * and ensure the impact on the local area in terms of traffic, air pollution and noise is acceptable. * Continue to support legislation to eliminate the use of free, throwaway carrier bags, and ensure all events funded by City Hall are carrier bag free. * Lobby the Government to tighten up packaging regulations to remove materials that can't be recycled from our shelves, and require manufacturers to use a certain percentage of recycled and biodegradable content in their packaging. ## SECURING OUR ENERGY SUPPLY Every city with modern, decentralised energy systems got there with strong public leadership, not by waiting for the market. We aim to slash our energy usage by half and generate at least a third of our energy within London by 2030: * Roll out the RE:NEW home insulation programme to over a million homes (see housing section). * Expand the RE:FIT workplace refurbishment programme to cover small and medium sized businesses, and work with the business community to widen its reach. * Develop district energy anchors using housing estates, hospitals, prisons, universities and regeneration projects on public land, and work with neighbouring businesses to plug into these new energy networks. * Seek capital funds from Government, the EU and from local Community Infrastructure Levy funds to enable the GLA and boroughs to unlock energy projects by subsidising expensive infrastructure. * Maximise the opportunity for creating energy from food waste, including by sending all public sector food waste and parks waste to anaerobic digesters. * Use Mayor’s planning powers to veto developments that miss major energy opportunities, and give more support to boroughs negotiating with developers. * Work with the Government and the utility regulators to co-ordinate companies laying pipework for large district energy schemes in the same way that water utilities are able to lay tens of thousands of miles of new water pipes. ## WALKING THE TALK To show London's businesses, public authorities and charities what's possible, we will: * Cut the GLA group’s building energy usage by 10% in the first year of office, saving £2.7m, upgrade all buildings to be ‘A’ rated wherever possible by 2016, and become a zero carbon public service by 2020. * Aim to switch a third of London’s 54,000 traffic signals to LED lights. * Introduce the best recycling practices across the GLA group when waste contracts are up for renewal, so that all waste is segregated and recycled or composted, and zero waste is sent to landfill by 2016. * Switch at least 1,500 vehicles to electric or used cooking oil engines. ## BOOSTING GREEN SPACE London is nothing without its network of parks and open spaces, providing a welcome breathing space for people and habitats for wildlife. We will: * Ensure that all Londoners are within reach of parks, play spaces and animal habitats by guaranteeing sufficient funding to drive forward the All London Green Grid, and by working with councils, schools, youth groups and disability organisations to promote access to nature through schemes such as the VisitWoods web site. * Set up a support team in City Hall for boroughs to map and implement local opportunities to enhance green and blue infrastructure such as wildlife corridors, trees that naturally cool the area, and natural flood plains. Introduce a planning requirement for developers to take up these opportunities. * Give green spaces and gardens on housing estates the same level of protection as private back gardens, and encourage social landlords to make the most of them for play, growing food and for biodiversity through schemes such as Neighbourhood Greens. * Ensure no development leads to the net loss either of permeable land or of water storage capacity. * Restore 15km of rivers and expand other sustainable urban drainage systems to better protect London from flooding. * Play a leading role in creating and enhancing London’s woodland and street trees, including protecting trees from felling and overzealous pruning, promoting tree conservation areas and establishing a supported network of community woodlands. * Work to remove motor traffic and petrol leaf blowers from London’s parks, starting with the Royal Parks. ## **PROTECTING ANIMALS** We can take a lead in caring for animals, whether they are companion, farm, or wild animals in the city limits: * Reinstate the Animal Protection Officer in the GLA. * Ensure that all purchasing across the GLA group conforms to strict animal welfare rules, including non-animal tested cleaning products and free-range meat and eggs. * Encourage a reduction in the consumption of meat and dairy in catering procurement decisions. * Work with the Government, charities and providers of veterinary services to improve access to veterinary care for those on low incomes, to promote dog and cat neutering and microchipping, and to crack down on irresponsible pet shops. * Work with housing providers to promote positive pet policies that encourage responsible pet ownership and enforce against those that act irresponsibly. * Ensure the Metropolitan Police Wildlife Crime unit is adequately resourced, and that best practice on dangerous dogs is shared across the police force. ## **TRANSPORT** We can make it easier, cheaper and more pleasant to walk, cycle and take public transport than to drive. More affordable fares, less congested roads and safer streets can all be achieved by prioritising people and public transport over cars. We don’t need to accept ever-rising congestion on increasingly polluted roads, where a small mistake on your bike can carry the death sentence. Our plans will deliver immediate improvements while setting in motion plans to transform our transport network. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: - Provided crucial support to campaigns that scrapped a motorway bridge over the Thames and a third runway at Heathrow; - Started a smarter travel unit to support people swapping their car for the bus or bike; - Tripled the cycling budget and introduced plans for cycle hire and cycle superhighways. ## **MORE AFFORDABLE PUBLIC TRANSPORT** We can keep fare rises below inflation during this Mayoral term, paid for by raising the congestion charge, introducing a higher “gas guzzler” charge for the most polluting vehicles, and introducing a new congestion charge for Heathrow airport. We will deliver further fare cuts by introducing a pay-as-you-drive charge to unblock London’s congested and polluted streets. This Oyster-like system will replace the congestion charge, cover the whole of Greater London, and be designed to ensure that: - All income goes into making the transport network better, including a fare cut and investment in smarter travel and new infrastructure. - The average Londoner is substantially better off if you walk, cycle or take public transport more. - Congestion and overall traffic levels are reduced to improve London’s economic competitiveness, reduce air pollution and cut carbon dioxide emissions. - No personal data is collected unless it is absolutely necessary for the system to function, and privacy is strictly protected. ## **A BETTER TRANSPORT NETWORK** Everyone should be able to get to their job, local shops and schools on public transport. We will: # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 * Start bringing all local neighbourhoods up to a basic level of public transport access to essential local services. Introduce a ringfenced Outer London fund to invest in areas where half of trips are still made by car. * Urgently increase bus capacity on overcrowded routes and ensure capacity on the bus network grows with demand to prevent further overcrowding. * Expand orbital bus services and break them up into shorter bus routes to improve reliability, allowing passengers to continue from one bus to the next on the same ticket within one hour. * Make sure all bus stops are accessible by 2018 and immediately review bus driver training with the involvement of older and disabled people's groups. * Trial allowing people to stop some buses on demand at night so that they can walk home without fear of violent crime. * Ditch the confrontational style with the unions, which clearly hasn’t worked, to resolve disputes before they result in strikes. * Aim to make at least one third of the tube network step-free by 2018. * Ensure all tube and train stations have staff on hand to help older and disabled people, and parents and carers with children, and to provide reassurance for passengers late at night. * Provide concessionary travel for carers, increase funding for Dial-a-Ride and Taxicard and aim to provide equal access to door-to-door services across London. * Lobby the Government to bring all rail services back into public ownership, with London’s commuter rail services run directly by Transport for London. * Work with the Government and Train Operating Companies to ensure that train services start as early as the tube and end as late as the tube with at least four trains per hour for all stations so that Londoners can get home swiftly and safely wherever they live. * Complete Crossrail, ensuring that the full Abbey Wood leg is included and that the proposed new station at Kensal Green (North Kensington) is included. * Oppose High Speed Rail 2 as currently designed and lobby for high speed rail services that substantially reduce our reliance on flights, are more energy efficient than Eurostar, that take full account of social costs such as relocation and the loss of social housing, and that provide benefits to people from all walks of life not just rich business people. * Plan for investment in new tramways, light rail services and tube lines to improve connectivity and relieve pressure on overcrowded routes. These will include the cross-river tram and extending the Croydon tram to Sutton. ## SMARTER TRAVEL We can help people get around more without a car, or even ditch it: * Incentivise smarter travel with a scheme to trade your car in and get the value plus a bonus on an Oyster card, car club credits and bike shop vouchers. * Rapidly increase the space available for car club parking within controlled parking zones, with a target for every home to be within 5 minutes of a shared car by 2016. * Ringfence council funds to ensure they all invest in smarter travel policies like workplace travel plans. * Only build new roads and river crossings for public transport, cycling and walking and oppose airport expansion in London and the Thames Estuary. * Push for more freight and waste to be shipped on the rivers and canals, reducing congestion and dangerous traffic on the roads. Protect access to canals and river wharves from property development. ## CALMER STREETS FOR PEOPLE NOT CARS We can make all streets where Londoners work, live and shop safe, convenient and pleasant to walk and cycle along. * Put a walking and cycling representative on the TfL Board and change their planning tools so that pedestrians and cyclists are treated as more important than cars, re-introducing the road user hierarchy. * Introduce a 20mph limit on all streets where we live, work and shop and put speed limiters on all public service vehicles to reduce danger to pedestrians and cyclists, reduce rat-running through residential areas, smooth and calm the flow of traffic in congested areas, and let parents and their children reclaim quiet residential streets as public space for play. * Adopt the Dutch street design principles for Cycle Superhighways and the London Cycle Network+ to provide clear, dedicated and safe space to cyclists on main roads. Increase funding to complete these projects and the London Greenways. * Rebuild London’s most dangerous junctions to provide safe, dedicated space for pedestrians and cyclists, removing all gyratory systems and pedestrianising more public spaces. Transform at least one iconic space a year, starting with Parliament Square. * Expand the Cycle Hire scheme north and south to reach all parts of inner London where there is considerable demand. * Expand cycle training in schools, and prioritise improvements to the road network around them, so that an extra 100,000 children and their parents cycle to school. * Encourage boroughs to use on-street car parking spaces to provide cycle parking in areas where people lack secure cycle parking in their flats and houses, and expand the honeypot cycle theft schemes across London to disrupt the cycle theft gangs. * Ban HGVs from narrow main roads, and push for all HGV drivers in London to be required to register with FORS or equivalent and undergo cycle awareness training. * Review traffic lights to ensure they give pedestrians and cyclists enough time, give cyclists a head start at difficult junctions and roll out simple measures like countdown signs and ‘Trixi’ mirrors to make them safer. * Create a pedestrian zone extending across central London from east to west, enabling people to walk right through central London on traffic-free roads. * Extend the temporary Christmas pedestrian zone in the West End to every Sunday and promote the “Summer Streets” concept popularised in New York to all town centres in London. ## HEALTH We believe in a properly funded, publicly provided health service. We will argue consistently against attempts to privatise or weaken the NHS, while pushing for better access to services in areas such as mental health and family planning. We can make London a healthier place to live and prevent illness by cleaning our polluted air, improving access to healthy food and refurbishing unhealthy homes. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: * *Secured cross-party support for the Low Emission Zone and other pollution schemes;* * *Set up London Food which has gone on to train almost 2,000 school and hospital catering staff to provide healthy food;* * *Supported local campaigns against privatisation and hospital closures.* ### A PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE We will play a strong, strategic role in health to soften the blow of the Government’s privatisation agenda, ensuring that the NHS is accountable to elected representatives and the public: * Develop a model equalities framework for GP consortia, providing resources and training for consortia to implement the framework in partnership with local health and wellbeing boards. * Campaign for better health services in London, including better access to contraception and family planning services, better resources for mental health services both in the community and in hospitals, and free prescriptions, eye tests and dental treatment. * Make the reduction of income and wealth inequality a key aim of London’s Health Inequalities Strategy, because life expectancy, infant mortality, low birth- weight and self-rated health are worse, and mental health problems more common, in more unequal societies. * Treat drug addiction as a health issue instead of waiting for it to become a crime issue. Bring more addicts into health care rather than the courts by rolling out the Camberwell heroin prescription trial. Build on the consensus among health, policing and educators against blanket prohibition of less dangerous drugs, which pushes people into danger and underpins a lot of organised crime. * Introduce a new way of accounting for support given to informal carers and other “co-producers” and encourage health services to collaborate with local people in providing services like elderly care. ## AIR POLLUTION We will clean London’s air and comply with air quality laws, urgently developing plans to meet this commitment whether the Government plays its part or not: * Ensure that air pollution is monitored in the right places, and publicise bad air episodes widely but particularly to vulnerable people such as children and the elderly as part of a concerted campaign to improve the public’s understanding of the problem. * Require all schools, retirement homes and care homes to develop air quality action plans that reduce pollution in their local area and protect children and residents during bad air episodes. * Tighten up the Low Emission Zone standards and make sure they are properly enforced through vehicle checks, with a new ban on idling for parked vehicles. Introduce a Very Low Emission Zone in central London to exclude all but the cleanest vehicles. * Retrofit all buses immediately if technology is shown to work, and ensure that all new buses are low emission hybrid, hydrogen or electric models within one year of being elected, and that the entire fleet runs on this technology by 2016. * Buy a fleet of low emission taxis for drivers to rent if they can’t afford to buy one, and set up a clean vehicle fund with low cost loans for small and medium sized businesses to replace dirty vehicles with electric equivalents, offering them a discount on pay-as-you-go driving charges so it is cost neutral. * Work with the Government and Network Rail to reduce emissions from trains and planes. Push for the closure of City Airport, and convert it into the first Community Enterprise Zone. Lobby to ban night flights over London. * Ensure all planning applications are air quality neutral, and require new developments to reduce air pollution in the most heavily polluted areas. ## HEALTHY FOOD In these austere times we can help millions of Londoners improve their health while saving money: * Require boroughs to map food poverty and to identify opportunities to introduce new street markets, allotments and community gardens in areas where it is hard to buy or grow healthy food. * In the London Plan require boroughs to create exclusion zones around schools where fast food shops aren’t allowed, and to resist a saturation of fast food shops in any part of their borough. * Support and significantly expand London’s street markets, provide for them in major regeneration projects, and drive forward the recommendations of recent reviews by trade associations, the Government, Parliament, City Hall and the London First Retail Commission. * End the sponsorship of sporting events by junk food companies, and ensure all events given support by the GLA group offer healthy food options. * Support schools, hospitals, prisons and care homes to grow their own food, offer more healthy food including organic, vegetarian and vegan options, and remove all junk food and drinks vending machines. * Introduce standards in the London Plan so that every new home has space to grow food, whether in a garden, large balcony, roof garden or allotment plot. ## HOUSING We want affordable and healthy homes for ordinary Londoners, not a playground for foreign speculators and rogue landlords. We will only use money and land for housing that ordinary Londoners can afford, we will give tenants more control over their homes, and we will refurbish over one million cold homes. To achieve these aims we will put co-operatives at the heart of our housing policy, while lobbying the Government to bring in radical reforms to bring down the cost of land and protect private tenants. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: * Supported local co-operatives building affordable homes and refurbishing empty homes; Gained cross-party support for major reforms of private rented housing; Helped block cuts to homelessness services. ## GENUINELY AFFORDABLE HOUSING The Government and the Mayor have stretched the definition of “affordable” to breaking point. We will only use public land and money to build homes that ordinary Londoners can afford, and we will stand up against attacks on our dwindling stock of social housing: * Publish annually a London Affordable Rent figure for the average household, and only continue to provide land and public funding to build new affordable rent and social rent homes that are under that cap. * Aim to build at least 15,000 homes per year at or below this rent level, of which 40% will be family-sized, 15% will be wheelchair accessible and all will be built to the lifetime homes standard. * Establish the London Mutual Housing Company to help councils, housing associations and co-operatives take a much stronger role in assembling sites for development, including a much more concerted programme of public compulsory purchase, and parcel out land into smaller plots to encourage a more competitive marketplace between developers. * Build more homes suitable for under-occupying people to downsize to, whether they own or rent their home, including exemplar community housing for isolated older people. * Set up a clearing house to offer all publicly owned derelict land to Community Land Trusts and to make all suitable publicly-owned empty homes available to self-help co-operatives to bring them back into short-life or permanent use. * Replace intermediate products such as “shared ownership” that don’t stay permanently affordable with co-operative home ownership and rental models. * Lobby for comprehensive and smart reforms of the private rented sector to bring down rents, to make tenants more secure in their homes with a default secure five year tenancy agreement, to protect tenants from exploitative landlords and lettings agents, and to improve the condition of private rented housing, along with tax reforms such as capital allowances to help responsible landlords invest in their properties. * Set up an ethical lettings agency for private tenants, and a web site for tenants to post feedback on landlords and letting/managing agents, and promote both to students through universities and students’ unions. * Work with councils to roll out blanket licensing for landlords, and clamp down on rogue landlord hotspots. * Oppose all elements of the Government’s housing agenda that weaken security and raise rents for social tenants, and that reduce public spending on housing benefit by hurting tenants rather than making houses cheaper. * Review the approach to mixed and balanced communities to ensure social rented housing is built in wealthy areas. ## HIGH QUALITY HOUSING Homes aren't affordable if they're expensive to heat, so we want to ensure all homes have low running costs and high environmental standards: * Ensure all affordable homes are built to high energy and water efficiency standards with a trial fund for enhanced building control checks after completion, making them affordable to run as well as to rent or buy. * Bring together funding from boroughs, the Government, the Public Works Loan Board, the Feed-in-Tariff revenue, energy supplier obligations and Green Deal providers to roll out the RE:NEW home insulation scheme to at least one million homes in London by 2015, bring them up to an enhanced Decent Homes standard, ending fuel poverty and cutting CO2 emissions by at least 2 million tonnes. Combine with a citywide programme to install efficient district energy systems. ## ENHANCING LOCAL COMMUNITIES We want to develop a different approach to regeneration based on partnership with existing local residents and businesses, rather than seeking to flatten deprived neighbourhoods: * Build policies for major regeneration projects (Opportunity Areas) up from neighbourhood plans, providing the community with financial support and expert advice. * Ensure regeneration partners have a good understanding of working collaboratively with local communities and co-operative housing groups. * Support tenants who want to transfer their homes to a # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 resident-controlled housing co-operative, particularly where homes are under threat of demolition, to promote community ownership and resilience. * Introduce a new Lifetime Neighbourhood Level, scoring areas by how easy it is to walk or cycle to essential services and amenities such as schools, chemists, post offices, newsagents, community centres, play spaces, parks and allotments, and by how effectively crime and poor accessibility have been designed out. Set targets to bring the whole of London up to a minimum standard. * Ensure all GLA group premises open their toilets to the public where feasible, and encourage employers and other public sector organisations to follow suit. * Preserve buildings of historical, architectural or community importance, especially those under threat from demolition. ## HOMELESSNESS We need an antidote to the Government's toxic cocktail of benefit cuts, rising living costs, falling housing budgets and cuts to local authority services: * Lobby boroughs and the Government to protect homelessness funding, and press for the London Councils grant scheme to be taken over by City Hall so we can protect essential services that operate across more than one borough. * Co-ordinate and release information to show the movement of homeless and vulnerable families between boroughs to ensure they are given adequate services. * Offer empty homes owned by the GLA group to self-help co-operatives who can work with homeless people to bring them back into use and house themselves. ## CRIME AND POLICING We can get police officers out from behind their desks and onto the streets, working more closely with local residents and traders and getting more intelligence from local people who trust them. We will ensure that the police support people escaping a life of crime while getting tough on those who refuse to change. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: Exposed a loss of lower cost community support officers and civilian staff that will put the police back behind their desks; Reversed cuts to road safety policing resulting in big falls in casualties from collisions; Secured reforms to training and tactics on stop and search and the policing of protest. ## BUDGET CUTS As a cross-party investigation by the London Assembly concluded, officer numbers are a bad way to measure whether the police have the resources to keep London safe. So we will: * Call for a moratorium on cuts to the police budget until after the London 2012 Games and the outcome of the August 2011 disturbance enquiries. * Increase the proportion of special constables, community support officers and staff carrying out roles that need not be done by more expensive police officers such as detection work, so that warranted officers can get out from behind desks and onto the street. * Act on HMIC advice to save 12% of the budget by cutting out waste in areas such as overtime and surveillance, and reinvest this money in preventative work based on the outcome of disturbance inquiries. ## COMMUNITY POLICING We will make your local police service work more closely with local residents and businesses to keep a visible presence on the streets: * Protect and expand Safer Neighbourhood Teams with a community support officer recruitment drive from the local community, making the teams more representative in order to restore trust in the police. Depending on support from Government, introduce a “buy one, get one free” offer for community support officers to borough commanders. * Train people as reserve PCSOs, working with groups such as traders, tenants and residents’ associations to provide a well-trained, constant presence on the streets that can also help the police respond to major incidents like the August 2011 disturbances. ## GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 * Protect community police stations and counters from closure. * Get more police officers out of their cars and onto foot or bicycle, providing a visible presence on the streets. * Improve the online crime reporting system so that you immediately get the crime report number and can track the progress of your report, to encourage greater reporting of “minor” crimes such as those affecting small businesses. * Divert more resources into restorative justice initiatives which rehabilitate offenders and give greater victim support. * Improve enforcement of the rules of the road with safety cameras, an increase in the traffic police budget and a crackdown on uninsured drivers. Require Safer Neighbourhood Teams to work with local cycling and pedestrian groups to enforce speed limits and take action against dangerous driving, cycling and walking. ## GANGS AND VIOLENT CRIME Gangs are a small but highly dangerous feature of some parts of the capital. We will ensure gang members are offered a way out while getting tough on those that refuse. * Work with boroughs and community organisations to roll out a “community initiative” response to gangs following the successful approaches trialled in Glasgow and Waltham Forest. Confront gang members with the impact of violent crime on their local area, offer those who sign up an intensive programme of mentoring, training and job support, and offer a one-stop-shop for housing and other local services. * To complement this, roll out a fully-funded anti-gang policing initiative to take firm enforcement action against those who break their pledge. * Undermine the criminal drug trade that sustains gangs by campaigning for the decriminalisation of all drugs and the legalisation of less harmful drugs like cannabis. Banning drugs has been totally ineffective, driven young people to more dangerous new substances and fuelled gang violence. We need a drugs policy that is evidence based. ## A POLICE SERVICE FOR ALL LONDONERS The police can only keep our streets safe if they have the confidence of the local community, so we will introduce reforms to assure every law-abiding Londoner that the police are on their side: * Commission community and voluntary organisations to investigate ways in which the police could improve their relationship with their local community, particularly in areas with high levels of violent crime. Require Borough Commanders to act on local findings. * Pledge that the police will do all it can to eradicate hateful and anti-social behaviour such as racism, sexism and crime against disabled people, investing in programmes that are proven to change attitudes and prevent violence. * Guarantee a liaison officer in every borough to work with Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender communities and send officers to schools to challenge anti-LGBT prejudice. Each borough will also draw up an Anti-Homophobia Action Plan to remedy local hate crime hotspots working with the Gay-Straight Alliance. * Secure the provision of a one-stop shop for domestic violence services in every borough, with an advertising budget to reach women particularly in communities who face cultural barriers in talking to the police. * Lead a London-wide review of training, resources and delivery of local health, police, child, adult and community services to ensure harmful practices such as female genital mutilation, honour killings and forced marriage are prevented and the perpetrators are prosecuted. * Ensure all police officers receive adequate disability equality training. * Call for comprehensive reform of the IPCC so that the police watchdog has real teeth. * End the arbitrary, race-based, blanket use of stop and search and other tactics that alienate the communities the police most need to work with, and introduce independent oversight of stop and search powers. ## LIBERTY A society that tries to sacrifice civil liberties for security will have neither: * Scrap the controversial Territorial Support Group and # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 use their funding to train more ordinary police officers for public order situations. * End the use of “kettling" tactics to contain lawful demonstrations. * Stamp out the problems of deaths in custody and police shootings by putting CCTV cameras in all police vans and calling for independent inquiries into every death. * Carry out an audit of all databases carrying the personal details of Londoners, remove all databases and records that aren’t operationally necessary and publish a complete list of databases so that the public can find out what information the police hold on them. ## GIVING LONDON A VOICE Government doesn’t need to feel so remote. London needs a clear direction from City Hall, but we will only transform the capital into a more equal, affordable and healthy place to live and work by working with its residents and workers. ### Greens on the London Assembly have already: Led investigations into community involvement in planning policy; Worked closely with local groups to make our roads safer for cycling, got funding and support for community housing projects, and stopped damaging projects in their tracks; Pushed for open data and other information to be released. ## POWER FOR THE GRASSROOTS London needs a strong regional voice, but we currently put too much power in the hands of the Mayor and undemocratic institutions: * Lobby for a third GLA Act to give the Assembly enhanced powers to amend the budget and strategies and to call in the Mayor’s decisions; also to give the Mayor further powers to raise funds through income and eco-taxes in order to implement their strategies. * Promote and support the establishment of Parish Councils and other local forums through the Mayoralty and on the Assembly. * Campaign for the abolition of the City of London Corporation, giving its residents the same democratic rights as any other London borough, removing its special status under Freedom of Information legislation, removing the City Remembrancer from Parliament and bringing its funds including the City Cash under the control of the Mayor of London. * Encourage councils to experiment with ways of giving direct power to local people, such as participatory budgeting. ## OPEN GOVERNANCE We will open up City Hall to scrutiny from the press and the public: * Hold a weekly press conference to enable proper press scrutiny. * Open all formal meetings discussing major investment decisions to the public and publish full papers and minutes of non-confidential items. * Appoint members from a cross-party selection of elected politicians to MOPC to ensure we police by consensus not by one-party politics. * Sign up to the Code of Practice for Official Statistics to restore trust in the Mayor’s use of statistics. * Ensure data underpinning all strategies and key decisions is published in the London Datastore. ## WORKING WITH LONDONERS By involving more people we can develop better policies and deliver better outcomes, harnessing the collective intelligence and energy of this great city: * Encourage policy and project teams to adopt an agile, “try early, try often” approach working with the Assembly and other partners. This is more appropriate in a turbulent, complex world than grand City Hall initiatives that too often result in u-turns. * Work with public, private, charity and community partners to share and update data, for example with “citizen scientists” to maintain records of our natural environment, and with cycling and mapping communities to develop cycling maps. Establish an annual competition to foster creative approaches to collaboration. * Require all future technology projects across the GLA # GREEN PARTY MAYORAL & ASSEMBLY MANIFESTO 2012 group to use open standards and encourage the use of open source software as much as possible to promote enterprise and innovation, reduce the danger of being tied to particular vendors, and to promote free and open technology. * Work more collaboratively with the voluntary and community sector, for example by making this a condition of major regeneration contracts, particularly with minority, ethnic and disabled communities to be more involved in shaping their local area. Meet with key community organisations as often as with business groups. * Explore innovative new methods of scrutiny on the London Assembly that use the closer involvement of community and business groups, particularly where the evidence base or recommendations could benefit from collaboration or crowdsourcing. ## LONDON 2012 OLYMPIC GAMES ### LAST MINUTE PREPARATIONS By May there will be little room to change plans, but we can do a few things to promote a more equal, healthy and open Games. * Make sure all bus stops near the Games venues are accessible, and that staffing at stations near to venues will be sufficient to help older and disabled visitors. * Put a 20mph speed limit on the Olympic Route Network priority lanes designed to carry VIPs, allow cyclists and buses into the lanes and urgently redesign dangerous or unpleasant road junctions to prioritise pedestrians and cyclists approaching the venues. * Set up a system to give out unused corporate tickets to young Londoners on the day of events, and press the IOC and LOCOG to levy penalties on corporations with hospitality tickets that refuse to take part. * Open urgent dialogue with the Government, LOCOG, the IOC and the Metropolitan Police Service to review plans to protect women, minority groups and free speech. ## LEGACY COMMITMENTS Our entire manifesto will be applied to the legacy from the Games, but we want to ensure the Olympic Park is a beacon for London’s future, and that the Games change the culture of sport. * Ensure all green spaces are returned to community use or as wildlife habitats promptly after the Games have finished. * Develop at least half of the homes, business and communities facilities on the Olympic Park through a Community Land Trust to give local residents control over permanently affordable and co-operatively managed community assets, promoting resilience and self-sufficiency. * Deliver a zero carbon and zero waste Olympic Park by 2025. * Convert Olympic Route Network priority lanes to dedicated cycle lanes and/or wider pavements where possible. * Develop a better culture of sports in the capital, for example by promoting supporter-trust owned clubs and by encouraging sporting clubs to reduce unequal pay amongst non-sporting employees through the adoption of our Fair Pay Mark. * Press sports clubs to make greater contributions to their local community before they are given public funds. * Expose the hypocrisy of junk food companies sponsoring sporting events and establish an ethical sponsorship pledge for clubs to voluntarily seek more appropriate sponsors. * Offer usable properties and land that will lie unused for more than six months to community sports organisations on a peppercorn rent. * Work with local sports organisations to make it easier to start a youth sports club, including help finding pitches and coaches and with completing the CRB check process. 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