LONDON: Mayor of London Lord Sadiq Khan says he has fallen victim to a scam after he was convicted and fined for not taxing a 24-year-old Nissan Micra.
The Labour politician, 55, was prosecuted last month by the DVLA for keeping an unlicensed vehicle and ended up being handed a £220 fine by a court in Herefordshire, after the case was dealt with in private in a fast-track court process.
His office insisted the vehicle did not belong to Lord Khan and it has been wrongly registered in his name.
In a strongly-worded statement on Wednesday morning, a spokesperson for the mayor said he is the victim in this case and should not have been prosecuted and convicted. “This is a scam, which is a crime,” the spokesperson said.
“It’s not the first time the mayor has been victim of a scam involving people falsely stating that Sadiq is the owner of a vehicle.
“Such behaviour is illegal, and the DVLA are aware.”
After Lord Khan expanded the Ultra Low Emission Zone (Ulez) to cover the whole of London, he faced a wave of protests, including from motorists who said they planned to register their car in the mayor’s name – supposedly to make him liable for the £12.50 daily charge.
The prosecution was brought by the DVLA through the Single Justice Procedure, a controversial fast-track court process which allows magistrates to sit in private to deal with low-level criminal cases.
