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I think this right in aggregate, Joss, and it worries me that Labour is backing away from green fiscal/investment policy. As you know, Matthew L and I led arguments for this last time round, and the urgency wasn't quite as high then. But I do think there's an inordinate amount of crap being talked about the ULEZ and the biggest problem is that 'we've' failed to dial up the latent support for it. The biggest single group of voters on the ULEZ will be people who don't care much either way, but like all of us will benefit from clean air.

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Did my last blog on exactly that. But what last night shows is 'we' are losing that Ulez argument with important voters.

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I'm not really sure it does, Joss. I think it shows that the Tories narrowly beat Labour by fighting a better, clearer campaign with their core vote. The turnout was 46% so the Tories got circa 20% of the area's electorate to vote for them, a proportion of whom would have done anyway. Perhaps the ULEZ effect is the difference in votes between the swing in Uxbridge and Yorks. So in aggregate I totally agree that we have a problem with ensuring that policy costs are borne fairly and by the state, but ULEZ is a very poor example.

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I agree with you both on the importance of focusing on green policies that save (rather than cost) voter's money. Mind you, I gulp as I say that, because it's going to be incredibly difficult to decarbonise road transport without road pricing. In that respect, this is a hell of a set-back.

But I also agree with Andrew about not being overly spooked by the electoral implications of the Uxbridge vote. In that respect, I think Adam Ramsay's analysis is spot on: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/uxbridge-south-ruislip-ulez-expansion-sadiq-khan-conservative-labour/.

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