Great cities need great leaders - a serious Mayor for London candidate who knows what London needs to make a real difference to the lives of every person, regardless of their background, sex, or colour.

I have today launched my campaign to be the next Conservative Mayor for London with a pledge to introduce US-style policing to tackle the capital's violent street crime.

Zero tolerance of even minor crime, street by street monitoring and publication of crime figures, the recruitment of a top American police officer as London's crime tsar, an extra 600 police to guard Tube stations, and an end to police patrolling in pairs are the highlights of crime-fighting package.

I would cut the "Ken Tax" - the £290 a year Ken Livingstone costs the average London household - increased by £165 a year since he took over City Hall in 2000.

I would make significant savings by phasing out at least 100 jobs at City Hall, by scrapping a second Ken tax - the congestion charge and the planned extension of the charge to West London - and by slashing the money spent on Left-wing stunts and propaganda.

We know that by following the budget proposals put forward by the GLA Conservative Group, the GLA part of the council tax could be frozen at current levels. But my ambition is to go further and give a tax refund to Londoners in future years.

I would insist that council taxpayers received two bills each year - one from their borough council and another from the GLA so they could see how much they were paying for City Hall.

I have real life experience - I’m a 50 year-old mother of four, businesswoman with 25 years experience in senior management roles for big companies such as P&O, and a councillor in Kensington and Chelsea. I am also chairman of the community relations group.

After six years of Ken Livingstone's mismanagement, deceit and posturing, London wants some straight-talking from its mayor and some clear priorities for action. Above all Londoners want firm measures to tackle violent crime.

Since 1990 in New York, murders are down 76 per cent, rape down 48 per cent, assault down 61 per cent, robbery down 76 per cent, burglary 80 per cent and car crime down 88 per cent. Serious crime has more than halved in New York - a city of 7 million people just like London - in 16 years.

Yet look what's happened in London - big increases in violent crime, not decreases. We are losing the war on crime when cities in the USA, every bit as challenging as ours, are winning the war on crime.

Only last week, the Evening Standard published figures showing that gun-point muggings have jumped by one third in a year. Nearly 1,500 people were mugged at gunpoint last year, with Lambeth, Hackney, Brent and Southwark real hotspots for the kind of thing we once associated with big American cities.

Last year, violent crime on the London Underground rose 15 per cent. These sort of increases should not be tolerated in our capital city.

I want zero tolerance for even minor crime. Break a window, swear at someone in the street, beg aggressively or deal drugs on a street corner, and you are going to be arrested, tried and convicted.

London has 50,000 streets and 31,000 police. I will make every police officer responsible for a street or a collection of streets.

Every night the crimes committed on those streets will be fed through to the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and to me. They will be on Sir Ian Blair's desk in the morning and they will be on mine. And if there is a crime hotspot - whether it's Oxford Street or the Old Kent Road, I will want to know why and what's being done about it.

I will also give the figures to the media so they can publicise the areas where crime is out of control and where the police are winning the battle.

And I will be out there in the front line myself on a regular basis supporting our police officers in their fight against crime.

The Mayor's most important role is public safety, and restoring pride to Londoners as they go about their daily lives.

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