London’s Mayor is claiming that councils rebelling against his plans to expand London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone to the whole of the capital will be responsible for hundreds of deaths if they are successful in blocking the plan.

The Telegraph reports Sadiq Khan has sent a letter to the four outer London councils currently considering a legal challenge to block the expansion, in which he calls on them to stop their action and tells them to think of “hundreds of bereaved families” in the boroughs because of pollution.

It quotes the London Mayor as writing: “Instead of wasting a huge amount of your precious local authority budgets and money raised through your residents paying council tax, I urge you to do the right thing by focusing on the health of those you represent, including the children in your borough growing up with stunted lungs, and the hundreds of bereaved families in your borough grieving because their loved ones have lost their lives.”

The letter comes after the boroughs of Bromley, Bexley, Harrow and Hillingdon banded together to look at launching a legal challenge against Mr Khan’s plan, sending the Mayor a pre-action protocol letter outlining their intention last month.

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