After an extraordinary meeting of the London assembly yesterday, all three opposition parties were calling for the resignation of Lee Jasper, Mayor Ken Livingstone's race adviser, over the aide’s involvement in the London Development Agency (LDA) funding of 13 suspect projects.

Assembly members questioned Livingstone and senior LDA officials over the funding scandal at the special session, which uncovered damaging emails showing Jasper repeatedly pestered LDA to provide more and more funding and prevented it from acting against one project even when it acted ‘illegally’, the Evening Standard reports.

Contrary to Livingstone’s claim ‘every penny is accounted for’, the emails also revealed hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money was paid to projects without any paperwork to show for them; at least £137,000 were paid without an LDA sign-off; and a £300,000 contract was awarded to one of Jasper's friends without the normal tender process or competition.

Assembly members also heard the development agency would be fast-tracking plans for a more rigorous regime of checks on grant-funded projects following the accusations against the agency.

Further reading:

LDA: accounting problems are 'historic'

Livingstone: 'Accountants can't judge art'

Read story in the Evening Standard