London mayor election 2024 - Andreas Michli: Gym owner and candidate would scrap ULEZ and LTNs

A gym owner and fitness entrepreneur has launched his campaign to run for mayor of London with a mission to make the capital "healthier and stronger".

Andreas Michli said he was driven to run as an independent candidate after he was "radicalised by lockdown". The 37-year-old was fined for attempting to keep his Wood Green gym open during lockdown, but the charges were later overturned in court.

“Running for mayor of London is something I never thought I would get involved in. I feel I’ve been pushed into this role,” the father of two told LondonWorld.

“For far too long politicians are not being held accountable for their actions. There’s not a lot of due process involved. We’re starting to move away from a democratic society. I want to serve the people’s voice and needs.”

On ULEZ

Michli said if he is elected mayor he will abolish the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ), net-zero targets and low-traffic neighbourhoods (LTNs).

“I feel ULEZ has been an unpopular policy because Sadiq Khan has taken a very authoritarian approach to it. He’s done it with very little consultation, he’s manipulated figures and statistics. I think that’s why so many Londoners disagree with it,” he said.

He said he has been consulting with experts in the field of transport and says we need to “provide more methods of transportation rather than fixing fines to individual areas of transportation”.

Crime and Policing

Other policies put forward by Michli include police officers being required to have “significantly higher physical standards for entry, closer to military standards”.

He wants to increase police officers' salaries and to ban all political messaging from the Met Police.

His website says: “Any officer participating in a political event – eg LGBT pride, pro-Palestine, pro-Israel –  in uniform to be fired on the spot without severance and banned from working in the public sector ever again.”

To tackle knife crime in London, Michli said he would form an expert-led "knife crime commission" with the powers to trial new initiatives at borough and city levels.

Public health

As a gym owner, Michli has a number of proposed policies relating to public health including introducing publicly subsidised gym memberships and banning advertising on hyper-processed foods including “plant-based” meat alternatives and fast foods.

“I want to make everything better but the main policy would be around health. I want to make London a healthier and stronger city,” he said.

Mayoral candidates

Michli will run against at least six other candidates in the mayoral elections, which are set to take place on May 2 2024.

The candidates so far are Rob Blackie for the Liberal Democrats, Howard Cox for Reform UK, Zoe Garbett for the Green Party, Susan Hall for the Conservative Party.

CEO and university chancellor Natalie Campbell is running as an independent candidate, while Sadiq Khan is preparing to fight for a third term as the Labour mayor of London.

Next year will see the first London mayoral election using a 'first past the post' system. Previously, it followed a supplementary vote system.