‘What a worry the Ulez must be for you both,’ said a friend with a nod to the pick-up truck parked outside our house.

It was kind of him to wonder. The builder boyfriend drives an old Mitsubishi L200 to work in London every day and like almost every other working man he cannot afford to buy a new vehicle that is Ulez compliant so you would presume he has to pay the charge. But that’s not quite how it’s turning out.

If I might speak for the working man for a second, because not many seem to be doing that, let me explain with an anecdote from the life of the builder boyfriend, who came home the other day in a buoyant mood to tell me this. He had been working on a large house where he and a plumber were among four or five men retained by a wealthy lady with an electric Audi parked outside.

This lady, who was nice enough, came out of her house as the workmen sat drinking their tea and struck up a conversation on a topic she evidently thought they might find sympathetic of her.

‘I do feel so sorry for you chaps,’ she said, ‘with the Ulez expansion.’ The men kept drinking and said nothing. ‘I suppose you’ll all have to get rid of your old vans now.’

And she glanced at the BB’s black L200 ‘Warrior’ and the plumber’s panel van. And still the men sat quietly drinking their tea.

In the end, the plumber piped up: ‘We ain’t getting rid of nothing, love,’ he said. ‘I can’t afford a new van.’ And the BB shook his head to indicate that neither could he.

‘But then how will you afford to pay this charge?’ said the good lady. And the plumber laughed and said: ‘We ain’t paying it, love. You are.’

It fell to the builder boyfriend to explain to the lady that if they were still on her job in a few weeks’ time, when the Ulez is expanded to all London boroughs, their bills at the end of each week would include a new item. On top of labour and materials, the £12.50 a day Ulez would be added.

For her renovation job, that came to an extra £250 a week at least.

As I understand it, it was no use her wondering if she might get a better deal out of another set of tradesmen. Everyone the BB has spoken to in his world has said the same thing: we’re not buying new vans, and we’re not paying the emissions charge.

This Ulez may well represent a small fightback for the common man, or poetic justice of sorts, or just an ironic turn up for the books. Perhaps you might call it schadenfreude at the expense of the electric Audi drivers who thought it was not something to concern them.

Because they will have to foot the bill.

Of course, you could argue that low-income people will also face the rising cost of getting in tradesmen, but then again, the working classes are more likely to be able to fix their own stuff or get a deal out of a mate.

More specifically, the BB has heard on the QT from his mechanic that poorer people are bringing in their old bangers for MOT as usual as the 29 August deadline approaches, because they are registering them as a car used to drive their old granny.

Sadiq Khan has provided an opt-out, you see. Those who can register a non-compliant car with the DVLA as necessary to transport a disabled friend or relative will be exempt from the charge. He really does think of everything. There is no Ulez problem for any Khan supporter who can find an old granny to put in his old car once a week.

So it does look like Ulez will be hitting the responsible, upstanding professionals who have dutifully gone out and bought expensive electric cars. Those who do not know how to plug a leak or unblock a gutter must now pay £12.50 a day extra to get a working-class oik to come to their rescue in an old van choking black smoke. The builder b will fix any roof in London so long as the owner pays his congestion and Ulez charges. And so far, people have.

There are so few workers who can buy new vehicles that the playing field seems to have been levelled with everyone hiking their rates.

The builder boyfriend and I once bumped into Sadiq Khan at a friend’s party in Richmond. He and his wife and their entourage arrived in a fleet of luxury Range Rovers.

Now the BB has worked out how to survive the Ulez until we leave for Ireland, that doesn’t bother me as much.