London Mayoral hopeful Daniel Korski was a key figure in David Cameron’s attempts to protect Uber from tough regulation in the capital proposed by then-mayor, Boris Johnson. According to the Guardian’s Uber Files investigation, after the largely unregulated growth of Uber in London, Johnson was considering new rules for the taxi app. Uber was riding high at the time, having eaten into the business of black cabs and ruining many private hire offices, but the company faced accusations from critics that it was operating on the edges of the law. In September 2015 TfL launched a consultation document on some possible new restrictions on the company, like capping driver numbers or asking customers to wait five minutes between booking and getting in the vehicle.

Amid a flurry of lobbying by Uber to stop the changes it appears Korski, who, in his capacity as a Downing Street digital advisor, sent emails to TfL, the mayor’s office and Uber discussing the consultation. The emails didn’t come to light easily — at one point Downing Street faced accusations of a ‘cover-up’ when it denied Korski’s correspondence existed, only for TfL to then publish the emails anyway. But they eventually revealed that Korski was making the case in favour of Uber, accusing TfL of attempting “insane and luddite things” concerning the consultation.

Thanks to London Spy on Substack for much of this inside information.

Alarm bells started to ring at TfL with the disclosure that the number of students currently being tested to become London taxi drivers has fallen to its lowest level yet, to just 552. In November 2019 the number of candidates studying the Knowledge of London (‘KoL’) at the testing stages, otherwise known as ‘Appearances’, dropped below 1,000 for the first time and stood at 943. In addition, 714 candidates had not yet reached the testing stages but were signed on to the KoL and learning the capital’s road network. Fast forward post-pandemic restrictions to August 2021 and the number of KoL candidates at the testing stages tumbled further to just 552, and worryingly only a further 363 candidates are currently waiting to reach the testing stages. Unsurprisingly TfL now no longer publish the results relating to the number of KoL students actively learning, so a cynic like myself could conclude that those in the early stages could now only be in double figures, and as around 70 per cent of students training to become licensed London taxi drivers DO NOT COMPLETE the Knowledge of London testing process, in two years we could be seeing only a couple of dozen qualifying a year.

If our licence or badge is lost or stolen we have to report it as soon as possible. So when I relinquished my documents I’d expected TfL to acknowledge receipt. Not so. Now I’ve had my first communication from them in 2 years telling me all I need to know about ULEZ. It would seem that security comes second place to generating a revenue stream.

At the beginning of this year, TfL introduced a new regulation that requires all new cabs to be “zero-emissions capable”, i.e. hybrid or electric. But, as the (paywalled) Times reports, even though, “more than 40 per cent of private hire cars and black cabs in the city are now electric,” drivers are still finding it hard to charge them because London only has an average of 131 public charging points per 100,000 people.