Andrew Dismore

At today’s London Assembly plenary meeting , Labour Assembly Member for Barnet and Camden Andrew Dismore AM challenged Mayor Johnson, as chair of TfL, over the decision to accept tourism  advertisements for ‘northern Cyprus’.

Mr Dismore asked the Mayor:

‘Will TfL still be accepting advertising placed by ‘northern Cyprus’ in the future?

‘Do you accept the adverts have caused widespread  distress and serious  offence to  Greek Cypriots in London and my  constituents and the adverts mislead the public who might not realise that many of the businesses that would benefit from such tourism are built on illegally expropriated  land. The airport in ‘northern Cyprus’ does not comply with ICAO safety standards either.’

Mr Dismore repeatedly asked the Mayor if he had read the letter from the Cyprus High Commissioner, but the Mayor declined to answer whether he had.

After the meeting, Mr Dismore added:

‘The Mayor’s response was woefully insensitive and inadequate. He would not even acknowledge the offence caused, let alone what distress there would be   when the Transport Commissioner confirmed there would be no objection to similar adverts in the future.

‘I wrote to the Mayor and TfL about this weeks ago and I still have not had a reply, but even worse when I asked the Mayor  no less than five times if he had read the letter from the Cyprus High Commissioner all I got was evasion,  which clearly  infers that the Mayor has not done so.  This shows how little importance the Mayor  attaches to this important community’s views.

‘ I put to the Mayor that the advertisements are in breach of TfL’s advertising policy, paragraphs 3 (d) (likely to cause widespread or serious offence) , 3(k) (contain messages relating to public controversy and sensitivity) and 3(p) (relate to a political cause). The Mayor replied that he did not want to politicise advertising  but this is exactly what he has done and proposes to allow in the future.

‘ TfL should never  have accepted these adverts but it is clear that they will continue to do so with the green light given to them by the Mayor, who has  shown  utter  disrespect  for London’s Greek Cypriot community.’