Whatever happened to London Mayor Boris Johnson’s bicycle?? Apparently he has spent over £4,698 in taxi bills since taking up his position, according to details published yesterday.

That enormous amount includes one bill for £237.50 to travel across two postcodes, from his former home in Furlong Road, N7 to Foxglove Close, N9.

The Evening Standard’s Paul Waugh said on his blog:

The Mayor’s aides point out that the cost is because in some remoter areas – such as industrial estates – he would find it hard to get a cab at short notice and so has to keep the meter running until he finishes his event. But that doesn’t seem to work for areas where getting a cab is not really a problem. He ran up a bill for £186.25 for travelling from City Hall to his home in Furlong Road and then Chelsea Park SW11.

Similarly, he had a bill for £111 to travel from City Hall to Queen Elizabeth Gates in the wilds of W1.

According to Adam Bienkov, under GLA rules he can only claim for taxis: “when public transport is unavailable or impractical”

Boris seems to have missed that bit.

The taxi expenses bill, available in full here, was already delayed by the Tory administration.

Bienkov adds:

Perhaps the simple truth is that like his hero Maggie Thatcher, and his old pal Andrew Gilligan, traveling on “mainstream” public transport is something strictly for the plebs

No national newspaper has seen fit to say anything on how Boris Johnson’s “value for taxpayers” mantra continues to be exposed as a fraud.

A spokesperson for the Mayor said his “preferred mode of transport is his bike which accounts for the vast majority of his personal and official journeys”.

“For greater distances he tries to use public transport. On occasions however over the past 14 months taking taxis has been unavoidable. That is very much the exception and the figures show he takes fewer than three taxis a week on average.”

There were also, unsurprisingly, attempts to blame the previous administration for Johnson’s behaviour.

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