A senior Labour councillor said that the council had no plans to introduce an ultra-low emission zone (ULEZ) in Brighton and Hove.
Trevor Muten spoke out after anti-ULEZ campaigner Laura King voiced fears that drivers could face paying a £12.50 daily charge as they do in central London.
Ms King presented a petition headed “No to ULEZ or other discriminatory traffic schemes in Brighton and Hove”, signed by more than 2,000 people, to Brighton and Hove City Council last week.
When she presented the petition at the full council meeting last Thursday (20 July), she linked the idea with the “car-free city” proposals put forward by the Climate Assembly.
But, because the petition did not have 1,250 signatures by the cut-off point of noon on Thursday 6 July, it was not debated at the meeting at Hove Town Hall.
Instead, it was referred to the next meeting of the council’s Transport and Sustainability Committee, on a date yet to be published.
Councillor Muten, who chairs the Transport and Sustainability Committee, said today (Tuesday 25 July) that there were no plans for a Brighton and Hove ULEZ.
He said: “The Labour administration is not pursuing a car-free city because it would be a catastrophe for our disabled residents, tradespeople and others who need to use cars to live with dignity and earn a living.
“We are, however, committed to a longer-term modal shift (swapping forms of transport) to a low-carbon transport system where EVs (electric vehicles) and hydrogen are considered the norm and combustion engine vehicles are phased out.
“We are taking a responsible and robust approach to addressing climate change but one which is tailored to Brighton and Hove and our need for an integrated, city-wide transport network.”
At the full council meeting, Ms King said that there had been no public consultation about a ULEZ and proposing one would be a “clear case of taxation without representation”.
She said that every traffic scheme, changes to Madeira Drive, other road closures and temporary cycle lanes created during the coronavirus pandemic were about creating engineered gridlock.
The purpose, she said, was to discourage visitors and residents from driving, irrespective of the lack of viable transport alternatives, with no park and ride and sketchy coach and train services.
She said that the changes were made irrespective of the economic cost to Brighton and Hove – and “presumably to drive emissions up in order to justify a ULEZ charging scheme”.
But, she said: “The proposed ULEZ and Low Traffic Neighbourhood (LTN in Hanover) schemes are both unnecessary – as Brighton and Hove is not a high-emissions industrial city – despite the council’s best efforts to make it so – but a breezy seaside city – 30 times smaller than London.”
Councillors first agreed to look into the idea of a car-free city by 2023 in January 2020, when former Green councillor Amy Heley received unanimous cross-party support for her motion asking for a report into costs and a feasibility study.
But when the report about creating a “liveable city” went before councillors again a year later – after a delay because of the pandemic – support was restricted to the Greens and Labour.
Former Conservative councillors Lee Wares and Vanessa Brown abstained from a vote in January 2021 that approved a further detailed report into options for a car-free city centre and a ULEZ covering a wider area.
At the time, Councillor Wares said that he wanted to see “real” consultation with residents rather than the council “dictating” to people.
At the same meeting, Labour councillor Gill Williams raised concerns about people accessing the Royal Sussex County Hospital accident and emergency department.
Her Labour colleague, councillor Gary Wilkinson supported more electric bike hubs and asked for a more detailed business case.
i do not trust them a inch = labour speak with forked tongue +
Think of it this way, it would be political suicide to do this.
Deep in his Withdean bunker, Green ‘leader’ Steve Davis is having a ‘Downfall ‘ moment
Time to say goodbye to filthy diesel engines in our city. Choking our kids and emitting vast amounts of carbon
Utterly shameful from this cowardly and hypocritical council. Prioritising cars over our children and grandchildrens lungs. Cllr Muten has not answered a single email I have sent him, which says a lot about how he works, he can not face up to the implications of what he is doing. From scrapping bike lanes , Valley Gardens and now working to keep our city’s air below UN safe standards. None of these things were in their manifesto, I dread to think what is next in his sights but I assume it will be the timed road closures outside schools.
I was rather hoping after the Greens got ousted at the last election that this knee-jerk reactionary approach to local issues would also have been gone.
Your first two lines are like the worst responses of the last Green administration – playing the ‘what about our children?’ card, rather than engaging in rational debate.
It’s like the Brighton Greens learnt from the Daily Mail and Express approach to exaggerate truth and to sidestep logic, and then they took it for their own. We certainly had that with the Old Shoreham Road cycle lane debacle, where despite the fake PR photos of kids and families ‘loving their new cycle lane’, they were never to be seen again after the cameras had departed, and only the single lane traffic jam and the pointless empty cycle lane remained. (And the truth was that most normal cyclists, like me, were nearby on New Church road, which is flat.)
Read the article. An integrated city transport policy will of course consider children and their safety and air pollution. But it will also consider the needs of our commuters and visitors and local residents, along with the elderly and those with mobility issues. etc.
Martin, quick question. What bike.lanes have been officially cancelled? None is the answer.
If you care for pollution to be removed, park and ride is the answer not grid locking roads with badly designed road schemes from the last, frankly appalling green administration
Mmmm. Is Labour saying they have “no plans to introduce an ultra-low emission zone (ULEZ) in Brighton and Hove” the same as “ruling ULEZ out”? Let us hope so. What cars run on is not our fault. There are dozens of fuel options out there, but the big conglomerates decided which were the most profitable for them and now we are getting the blame. Well done Ms King on getting the issue this far. It just goes to show we must never give up fighting for our city.
It was actually the government. A massive feeder for the private second hand car market was the company car leasing fleets. Government was convinced by “scientists” at the time that diesel was a cleaner fuel. So company car fleets got tax breaks for buying diesels. Then it turns out this was not the case and the backpedaling happened. But by then the car makers has switched to diesels as nobody bought petrol. Now they are told only electric after 2030 so they will not go back to petrol.
Councillor Muten said:
“We are taking a responsible and robust approach to addressing climate change but one which is tailored to Brighton and Hove and our need for an integrated, city-wide transport network.”
Three cheers for a grown up approach at last.
The idea of a ‘car free’ Brighton is a non-starter to begin with, because you cannot stop residents with cars from accessing their property or their parking spaces, and nor should you ban visitors arriving by car unless you provide a decent park and ride scheme, with parking areas to the north, west and east of the city. We also have taxis, as an essential local service.
The ‘car free’ fantasy is one invented by those who seem to have no understanding about how most working people have to live. Not everyone is lucky enough to be able to walk or to cycle to work. If you live in say, Steyning, there no way you commute to Brighton on a bicycle, or indeed by current public transport. Hopeful you car share, but all options should be considered. The needs of local residents, commuters and visitors need to be considered, as well as the national and global issues of climate change.
The last Green council seemed keen to close or to narrow roads wherever possible. And it’s not like they were offering alternatives – like a new tram route or better bus services. If you take a carrot and stick approach to reducing traffic, this was stick but with no carrot.
Creating more traffic jams and gridlocked city centre areas just results in pollution hotspots – as we saw with an earlier administration when they unnecessarily removed the bus stops at the wider sections of North Street, meaning the buses can no longer overtake each other when one stops for passengers, and thereby creating the worst polluted hotspot in the city. Such poor thinking.
ULEZ is then a further stick approach – or simply a new and unaffordable tax on motorists which is unlikely to achieve its stated goals. For commuters and trades people like me, a ULEZ charge would put me out of a job, because I couldn’t pass on the daily charge on to clients, and there’s no way I can change my works van for an £40K electric version.
Let’s hope the lobbyists get kicked out of the council’s transport department, and then the grown ups look at a map and ask the basic question of how residents and visitors get from A to B when crossing the city. An integrated transport strategy is needed, as with any modern city or large town.
Let’s get the city moving again. The current closure of the seafront A259 – due the Royal Albion Hotel fire – already shows what a disaster it would be to remove the Palace Pier roundabout in favour of cycling and pedestrian routes which could so easily be directed elsewhere.
An inconvenient truth for the keyboard warrior activists like you is that many people cycle because they have no other means of transport – they can’t afford a car and rely on a bike to get to work. Still, I’m sure they’ll take comfort by your elitist, patronising comment that they are indeed the lucky ones that they can cycle to work!
Reg, please don’t try and close down a discussion by calling someone a ‘keyboard warrior activist’.
I’m guessing you must have struggled to read what I wrote.
I too had a period of my life when the only form of transport I had was my bike – which I built myself, after finding an old discarded frame – and I’m certainly not dissing bike ownership.
When I say some people are ‘lucky enough’ to walk or cycle to work it’s where they live close enough to do that, or when their job doesn’t entail transporting heavy toolboxes around.
So the hope with this new council is that they have understanding and empathy with every household situation, and that a new integrated transport policy considers all forms of transport. The last administration got it badly wrong, and never listened – which are two of the reasons they were voted out.
Reg, travelling from Lewes road to central hove on a bus takes 45 mins, train similar as you have to change at Brighton. Car 10 mins, half the cost. That is not exactly amazing is it. That’s why people drive, because our public transport is actually a joke.
I drive not because I’m selfish ect ect. But simply I do not have 1 hour 30 mins/ 2 hours that I can waste every day of my life sat on a bus averaging 5mph.
Happy to not drive if we have fast cross city transport. I suspect I’m not the only person.
There has not been any joined up proper mass transit plan made for this city ever, and it’s really about time it happened.
Unfortunately a bike isn’t the answer as this is not flat Amsterdam, it’s hilly as hell South downs.
You don’t have to have an electric car to pass the ULEZ test, just one that is not highly polluting. On average that is only 10% of cars on the road. There would also be schemes to help people upgrade to less polluting vehicles.
You talk some sense in complaining about the unthoughtout traffic schemes that simply create pollution hotspots (we have one in Rottingdean High street) and the terrible public transport, especially if you live in outlying parts of the city. I also have a disabled partner and do need to drive, so I understand that ‘active’ transpoirt is not an option for many. But don’t then go on to such misleading comments.
Quite apart from ‘normal’ car users, Brighton is blighted with aggressively noisy vehicles, both motorbikes and cars, with tampered exhausts. These are not only antisocially noisy, but emit illegal amounts of pollution. This has been going on for decades but nobody is doing anything about it!
Worse still, Brighton is constantly invaded by gangs of petrol head ‘visitors’ whenever we have decent weather.
Applying ULEZ to the whole of Brighton might be the only way to stop these morons.
We need to get our priorities right. Yes, think about the needs of responsible residents, but also urgently do everythibng we can to cut pollution!
Well done Laura
Call it what they like ULEZ is just a stealth TAX
On the less well off people who can’t afford
Compliant vehicles
Most progressive cities in Europe are restricting cars in city centres to preserve the wealth and vitality of businesses and to create an environment that people want to visit. This isn’t the 1970s anymore where low car ownership levels meant you could easily drive into town and pretty much park anywhere. There are advantages with increased car ownership but also responsibilities to not let uncontrolled access to city centres make them places nobody wants to spend time in.
But these cities are also providing practical alternatives including rapid-transit and park-and-ride whereas our previous administration focused almost solely on encouraging cycling and penalising motorists.
Looks at VG3 where the design was forged by a Green Party councillor who was employed by Sustrans, in consultation with pro-cycling activists.
VG3 dedicated up to 5 lanes to cars. If that was designed by a cycling activist I’d hate to see a cycle hating activist like you design the area. Presumably you would have bulldozed the war memorial to make a motorway.
Make no mistake ,the car omissions and associated transport is just a money making enterprise which the council and central government will benefit . If they really are against all this dirty air thing – ban the whole lot and have a good transport alternative. Is it me but all this Environmental global warming , why dont they tell the truth by informing us about flying these toxic jets around – it’s a bit odd but the temperature of the world dropped when all passenger jets were grounded due to Covid 19 and 911.
our city centre already has restrictions for cars. You can’t just drive into the very centre – these routes are limited to buses, taxis and cycles and disabled residents (with limited car access for residents with complex routes so that properties can be accessed). This is backed up with fines – B&H is in the top five nationally for levels of fines.
There are already many controls. Should there be more? Well, I’d say a first step as virtually every progressive city in Europe and the UK already has would be an effective park-and-ride site.
These are not progressive cities, but instead part of the agenda 2030 to remove ALL private vehicles from the majority, unless you are friend of the WEF. Do not be so naive to believe that car free cities are designed to benefit us. Their purpose is to create 15 minute prisons, like in China.
Central Brighton lol is about as car friendly as the scrap yard. You cannot drive to central Brighton and pop in a shop. It’s mostly car free already.
The issue is we have god awful public transport and no park and ride.
If you want to preserve the wealth and vitality of businesses and to create an environment that people want to visit. Maybe time to sort out a park and ride. Laughable that the green crew still have not woken up to the cold hard fact that the only way to get people to use public transport is to actually provide it in the first place. Seems obvious to me
TBF a ULEZ was ruled out a couple of years back. At a consultation around the proposed Hanover LTN officers disclosed that with the rise of electric and cleaner vehicles and the length of time and cost to get the ULEZ running it would never be worth doing and proved too costly. The more pressing matter is reopening the A259 as we can now see that removal of the roundabout would never be feasible, going West to East is a nightmare.
Nathan Adler,
A If what you say is true, it would seem that information was never shared with the rest of the Brighton and Hove electorate.
B That doesn’t explain why the Greens were pushing for ‘London style’ ULEZ in Brighton and Hove as recently as March this year and Labour refused to be drawn publicly on their local plans for ULEZ until now.
C We know that Labour Leader Keir Starmer was fully pro-ULEZ until Labour’s loss in the Hillingdon by-election last week, so we can only assume last week’s results now factor into the council’s response since local Labour get their orders from central office.
While I admire folks that take the time and trouble to take on the political establishment, I do have to wonder what Laura King’s wider political motives are having heard a podcast from her during the local elections on a website called the great climate con?
Though not affected by it I was interested to find out how the London ULEZ applies, I came across this website called Buyacar on how to dodge the charge.
Which cars are ULEZ-compliant?
The scheme is designed to improve London’s air quality, so only diesel vehicles that meet the latest emissions standards, known as Euro 6, will be ULEZ-compliant. If your vehicle doesn’t qualify and you drive into the zone regularly, upgrading to a ULEZ-compliant vehicle could prove worthwhile – some van drivers could afford to finance a new van for less than the cost of the daily charge.
The Euro 6 standard was introduced in September 2015 for cars and September 2016 for vans. Almost every diesel car registered since that date will be compliant, as well as a handful of vehicles that complied with the standard early.
Virtually all petrol cars sold from 2005, plus some registered between 2001 and 2005, petrol vans sold after 2006 and motorbikes registered after July 2007 are ULEZ-compliant.
Electric vehicles are automatically compliant as they produce zero tailpipe emissions.
ULEZ-compliant cars will also avoid charges in clean air zones being set up from 2020 in cities that include Birmingham, Bath and Manchester. They will also escape a Glasgow ban on cars that fail to meet these minimum emission standards from 2022.
Some vehicles are ULEZ-compliant, despite not meeting emissions standards. These include cars built more than 40 years ago, with a historic tax class and some agricultural, military and circus vehicles.
ULEZ-compliant petrol cars
To be ULEZ-compliant, petrol cars must meet Euro 4 emissions standards
This includes virtually every petrol car registered since January 2006
Cars that meet more recent Euro 5 and Euro 6 standards are also exempt from the charge
Around 12.7 million of the 18.3 million petrol cars on the road when the charge was introduced were already ULEZ compliant, according to Department for Transport figures.
This widespread availability means that it should be easy to find a cheap model that’s not subject to the London charge. Furthermore, with compliant cars dating back to 2006 and even 2001 in some cases, entry prices for petrol models that don’t require you to pay the charge are far lower than for diesel models.
Petrol car deals
ULEZ-compliant diesel cars
Only Euro 6-compliant diesel cars are exempt from ULEZ charges
Almost every diesel car registered since September 2015 meets the standard
Some earlier models do too. Euro 6-compliant cars date back as far as 2012
A large proportion of diesel cars on the road have to pay to drive into the ULEZ. Department for Transport statistics published at the introduction of the ULEZ charges show that there were 12.9 million diesel cars on the road with around 9.5 million of those being registered before Euro 6 became mandatory, meaning that drivers are likely to have to pay the ULEZ charge for those vehicles.
Thanks for all that interesting information.
I drive a van for my work and when the one I owned for 17 years rusted away I had to spend £10,000 on a ten year old van, to replace it. That outlay broke me, not least because I earn less than £30K per year.
My ‘new’ van apparently doesn’t comply to Euro6, and the costs to convert it to pass ULEZ, with the official mechanic accreditation etc. are quoted at £6K-£7K
So this is what your typical tradesperson is up against. Electric vans are not affordable – or practical. ULEZ is not affordable for most people.
While I admire folks that dedicate the time and effort into taking on the political establishment, I have to question what Laura King’s wider political objectives are having listened to a podcast she made during the election to the climate change con website?
She is a conspiracy theorist that got less than a few hundred voted at the recent council elections. Her views were therefore firmly rejected by the electorate.
SO WHAT
It seems that the majority of “conspiracy theories” have come true over the past three years. I would trust a conspiracy theorist over anyone in politics whose nature is to lie.
thanks for this alert = i look forward to read the pod cast
What do you think about a tram system running along the coast?
Pointless, I live in bevingdean and work in central hove lol. That’s where a tram system is needed as all busses in the mornings are full.
Does that mean the existing ULEZ on North Street will be scrapped?
A ULEZ that encouraged cleaner engines, hybrid buses to be purchased by the main operator?
A ULEZ that no motorist in Brighton has to pay?
A ULEZ that gives us cleaner air protecting our health?
A ULEZ that has made the area more attractive to visit, and resulting in less empty retail units (bar Habitat closing and 1st Stop Travel halving in size)?
Come on, wake up and smell the diesel fumes……!!!!
North Street? HAHa! Not a good example. That is one of the most polluted streets in the UK thanks to the way the buses have to queue up after the Green council remodelled it to remove the bus stop laybys…
Fantastic! Finally, a good decision and great news for all the people of Brighton and Hove. It was never about cleaning up the air, it was a stealth tax and nothing more. There is nothing wrong with the quality of the air down here. We are surrounded by fields and trees to the north, and the ocean to the south. Doesn’t get much better than that.
They need to get rid of all the buses that are running through the streets and just have buzz bee buses (like the old number 7 buses) running from London road to western road then you get your connection bus from there. As there are far too many buses running along the same roads from London road to western road. That would cut a lot of pollution.
Hmm have buzz buses running, not going to work, shortage of drivers already, but who is going to pay the additional running costs.
Hmm, given that a double decker bus can transport something like 60-90 people and you’d only need it to replace a small number of cars to reduce pollution, and at many times of the day these buses are full, I’m not sure that would work
What about Rottingdean. (as pictured above) ?
Actually since removing the “anti pollution” flower stand on one side of the road the traffic moves freely again.
I’M agsinst any form of ULEZ, but dont lie about the Rottingdean planter. I travel through there every day for the lsst 20 years. Traffic was always bad before the plant pot was installed, it didnt get any worse or better when it was there, and certainly hasnt improved in the last week now its gone. So its a non story as related to congestion, and always has been.
ULEZ in Brighton wouldn’t go far enough and might make things worse. Anyone who has paid to drive in Brighton will probably stick and drive a bit more to get their money’s worth. We need noise cameras and speed cameras and hefty fines as well. Unfortunately it will never happen because politicians are total cowards
In the dense central part of Brighton and Hove, many (if not most) people do not have cars or drive, yet suffer from enhanced air and noise pollution, and have to use their council tax to subsidise road maintance for heavy cars that cause more damage to the roads, and take up a lot of space. Generally bus riders, cyclists and pedestrians who need to travel into the centre are less well off than car drivers doing the same. Polices that promote active transport and push more traffic out of the centre will make it easier for emergency, delivery and other service vehicles to move around the city, while creating a better enivroment for businesses. Not sure the ULEZ is the best way to promote these objectives, but it seems a valuable tool we should be considering in areas like hanover, kemptown, Lewes road and London Road that have a high density of people and businesses