Mark Harper pledges to block mayors from imposing new Ulez zones as he ‘kicks tyres’ on expansion

In an interview with GB News, Mr Harper said that ministers support the amendment by former deputy London Mayor Lord Moylan to the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill going through Parliament to give communities a veto over future schemes.

He said: "Daniel Moylan's put down an amendment which the Government is going to support, which would mean in the future schemes like this would have to be supported by local councils or they wouldn't be able to run in those councils areas."

The law change would not be retrospective - so could not be used to block the ULEZ expansion in Greater London - but would be in force by next year.

He said: "You can't make it retrospective, it's going forward.

"But I think it'll be useful protection against this plan to have more road user charging in London, which Sadiq Khan plans to do in the future.

"I don't know the exact timetable, but it will be on the statute book next year."

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Mr Harper said he had "kicked the tyres" of internal legal advice that he could not block the expansion in London.

He said: "I took legal advice from outside the department just to test it, to really kick the tyres, to see where there was anything that we could do that would stand up and actually stop this coming into force."

Mr Harper said it would be unfair of Transport for London to fine people who could not get online to pay the charge because its website had crashed.

He said: "If you're putting a scheme in place and you haven't enabled it to work properly, then clearly seems to be very reasonable to punish people for doing that."

Mr Harper said that he hoped HM Revenue and Customs would treat attempts by small business owners to claim back the £12.50 daily charge on tax returns in a "fair and reasonable" way.

"This is an expense which those that are running a business can claim back against tax. I think there are some rule, clear rules about that if they're using it exclusively for their business and I hope that those rules are followed.

"I think tax managers do what they normally do which is you know implement the rules in a fair and reasonable way. That will obviously help it a bit, but it doesn't defray most of the cost."

Turning to the disruption the airlines, Mr Harper admitted that the disruption for some Britons stranded overseas by the air traffic control issues in the UK could drag on into the weekend.

Asked if the problems could go on for longer than five days, he said: "I think most people hopefully will be dealt with relatively promptly.

"There may well be people, a small number of people who are affected for longer."

He was due to meet with the airlines today to remind them of their duty to fly passengers home who have been left overseas.

Mr Harper denied a report that the problems had been caused by an incorrectly filed flight plan by French authorities.

"No, I don't know where that stories come from. We're looking into the root cause of it."

Additional reporting by Rebeca Newnes