Fury as Sadiq Khan hikes travel prices – charging schoolkids, raising Tube prices and increasing Congestion-charge

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In a double dose of bad news, the Mayor announced plans to whack up the charges for vehicles driving in central London from June, and commuters travelling will face higher costs in the coming months too.

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Today's changes come despite a plea from the Government for Brits to drive to work if they can - and stay off public transport.

Free travel for 1.5 million London schoolchildren will be temporarily axed, the Evening Standard reported.

Fares are set to be hiked by one percent above inflation - around 2.5 per cent - as part of the deal the Mayor sealed with the Government yesterday. That will add an extra £36 a year onto a monthly travel card.

And the congestion charge will go up from £11.50 to £15 from June 1st, and the hours it will apply will be extended, the Mayor confirmed this morning.

It's currently only applied between 7am and 6pm on a week day, but will be extended to 10pm and run seven days a week.

The 30 per cent hike will particularly hit white van man and other tradespeople who have to travel around the capital for work.

But the Mayor blamed the Government for forcing him to act - saying the £1.6billion bailout was the "only deal on the table".

He said that all NHS and care home workers will be reimbursed for any coronavirus-related journeys, including their commute.

But furious politicians lashed out at the news.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen told MailOnline: "The Labour Mayor of London seems to be everything he can to sabotage the capital's economic recovery from the Covid-crisis.

"First it was a lack of public transport services in cahoots with his union paymasters and now this. This risks forcing more people on to the Tube and increasing the rate of infection again.

"What is Khan thinking? Londoners might wonder whose side he's on."

Tory candidate Shaun Bailey added:  "TfL’s bailout was only necessary because of the financial negligence shown by Sadiq Khan. To try to deflect responsibility for his policy failures isn’t just a failure of leadership, it is a lie.

"The Mayor is lying when he says the Government has forced this u-turn. He had planned a fares increase as early as last year.

"Most Londoners are now grateful that the terms of Sadiq Khan’s humiliating bailout should now limit the damage he is able to inflict on our transport network for the duration of his term in office.”

Howard Cox, Founder of the FairFuelUK Campaigncomments: "Sadiq Khan has truly shown his ego driven political colours, yet again.

"His latest chronic anti-driver policy will kill off many of London’s struggling small and medium sized businesses, the haulage industry, van distributors and hardworking motorists.

"FairFuelUK will lobby this idealistic administration to stop their financial carnage of millions of drivers, who have no choice but to use their vehicles every day for work, medical visits and community support."

And members of the public reacted angrily online.

"Pathetic!" one person tweeted at the Mayor.

Another responded: "I think it's time London had a new mayor."

"This will totally mess me up when I'm told to go back to work soon. Brilliant," one said.

Someone else tweeted: "I can honestly say I don’t know one person that thinks he’s doing a good job, if the job involved how many selfies and freebies can be taken he’d be the best we’ve ever had."

The news comes the day after the Government forced the Mayor to accept
Mr Khan had threatened to pull bus, Tube and rail services from Monday to help ease his budget blackhole if the Government did not come up with the cash.

The £1.1billion cash and £500million loan came with rules that he must increase fares for Londoners to help plug the huge hole in the finances.

And he handed huge chunks of control of TfL to the Government too.

This afternoon photographs were seen of Mr Khan taking his own private police-funded Land Rover to work, instead of getting the tube as he has done in the past, thought to cost up to £100,000.

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The Labour mayor will have to get Tubes running back to 100 per cent capacity as soon as possible and use No10’s Stay Alert campaigns on the network.

Londoners who have a Freedom Pass – used by one million adults who are over 60 to travel free on the Tube and buses – will be suspended during the morning and evening rush hours.

But disabled passengers will not lose their free travel passes.

Mr Khan said today: "I want to be completely honest and upfront with Londoners – this is not the deal I wanted.

"But it was the only deal the Government put on the table and I had no choice but to accept it to keep the Tubes and buses running."

London has the lowest R rate of infection in the nation at just 0.4, but the mayor’s cuts could have sent it soaring again.

Mr Khan said TfL was losing £600million a month keeping the network running on its reduced service. Its income was down 90 per cent due to lost fares, advertising revenue and congestion charge payments.

He said: “We’ve been involved in weeks and weeks of negotiation with the Government and it’s really hard in getting support from them.”

Meanwhile, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps yesterday stressed people had a “civic duty” to avoid public transport if possible during the crisis.

However, this morning commuters hit out over crowded Tubes and buses today as Sadiq Khan was slammed for failing to "follow up" on a PPE deal to protect TfL staff.

Worried passengers posted pictures of busy carriages this morning, with one sarcastically saying "I felt so safe on the tube this morning", adding "second wave anyone?".

Mr Bailey criticised the mayor's handling of giving PPE to London transport staff, and his threat to pull services from Monday in a funding war.

He told Good Morning Britain: "I went out and found PPE for the mayor and gave him the number of providers who could give him 1.5million pieces of PPE.

"He failed to follow up on it."

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Mr Khan was heavily criticised when the lockdown began for being slow to give bus and rail workers proper protection against the killer virus - with dozens of TfL workers dying on the frontline.

And today he continued to play the blame game while admitting full services won't be back by Monday, despite being required to in the deal and passengers continuing to crush into reduced trains.

An angry commuter today tweeted: "So why isn’t Sadiq Khan monitoring this? Management and people’s safety is the mayors priority."