The London Evening Standard today has the story that there has been a bust-up between the mayor and the government over Boris Johnson’s decision to suspend the next stage of the Low Emission Zone and abolish the western half of the congestion charge zone.

Greater London was made into Europe’s largest low emission zone under Ken Livingstone. The zone imposes stricter pollution standards on lorries.

During the mayoral election Johnson’s campaign team sought to hide his real view on the issue, but once he was safely ensconced in City Hall he moved to scupper the next phase of the zone’s development, which would have seen it extended to small lorries and vans.

At the same time, Johnson is committed to abolishing the western half of the congestion charging zone even though his own figures state that 30,000 extra cars will drive into the area as a result, and despite it cutting off millions of pounds of much-needed revenue for Transport for London that could be spent on better public transport or holding down fares.

David Williams in the Standard today reports that Johnson is at loggerheads with the government over his decision. He writes:

A row between Boris Johnson and ministers over spiralling air pollution in London is being covered up, campaigners claim.

Former air quality minister Lord Hunt met the Mayor in January, in a bid to head off a £300 million fine from the European Union after the capital exceeded airborne pollution limits.

The Government’s plans to avoid the penalty were thrown into disarray by the Mayor’s decision to scrap the western Congestion Charge zone next year and drop phase three of the capital’s Low Emission Zone.

Lord Hunt was thought to be hoping to get a commitment of low emission replacements for these schemes, but the Mayor may have refused.

Simon Birkett, of the Campaign for Clean Air in London, said the meetings had remained cloaked in secrecy despite an eight-month battle to uncover the truth.

Williams adds:

The European Commission has begun legal proceedings against the UK and is expected to escalate its action unless Britain produces a new plan to combat air pollution in London. This could cost £300 million.

The Government applied for an exemption to avert the fines until 2011, giving more time to tackle soaring pollution. But then Mr Johnson scrapped the two zones.

The Government is thought to have told him it expected him to replace the two schemes with something equally effective, or better.

Suspending the LEZ and abolishing the western extension of the congestion charge combine into a worse-case scenario for those who work and live in greater London. Londoners’ air will be worse, congestion in central London will deteroriate, bus reliability will almost certainly suffer – and the transport budget will lose revenue it desperately needs that will inevitably be passed onto public transport users through higher fares.

Boris Johnson’s reckless ideological promotion of drivers at the expense of all other Londoners could not be more perfectly demonstrated than with this story.