Make them drive dodgems
BBC News | UK | Plans to charge drivers for jams [Talking Point] – The title is misleading, it should read “Plans to charge drivers per mile on all roads”. Now, I’m an open minded person (most of the time), and I can see how this *might* work. But there are many many issues which are going to make it fail. They propose to scrap the road fund licence, good, but they only plan to cut fuel duty “by between 2p and 12p”. Now, ignoring my general cynicism, that’s more likely to be 2p rather than 12p isn’t it, which means that the overall cost of motoring for everyone is going to go up. Again.
Easing congestion is obviously a good agenda, but the congestion is only there because people have no choice but to be there. There are STILL no viable alternatives (and please, don’t start on about trains, I’ve already covered that), I’ve said this hundreds and hundreds of times, and so have the rest of the damned country, and yet the government just won’t do anything about it. Why? Because they know that if they improve rail services, their revenue from taxes on motoring will plummet.
In addition, just how many drivers do you think are going to accept a nasty black box fixed to their dashboard by the government? That’s right. None. The big brother rammifications of this are tremendous, and from a government that spends all its time simpering over civil liberties, this smacks of hypocrisy. There is no way on earth I am going to let the government know where my car (and therefore probably myself) is at any given time, no way. I’m also not going to let anyone mount an ugly box on the dashboard of a potentially expensive car, that’s something they’ll have to think harder about. A box in the boot, maybe, but that still doesn’t solve the big brother aspects.
Think again, Tony. You’re on the right track, but you need to go away and come up with another idea. With this one, you might aswell give us all dodgems to drive.
I also had to laugh at this one idiot in the talking point, who’s one of those irritating ex-pats who jumped ship and jeer at the UK from their oh-so-much-better home on the continent. He says
“I already pay my road tax in Germany – should I pay again in Britain? In which case all UK cars would soon find themselves being charged in the rest of Europe!“
Clearly he’s never seen a European road toll booth in his life, which is astonishing considering he lives there. UK motorists do pay road taxes in any EU country they find themselves in, while European drivers come over here and get it all for free, bar perhaps the fuel cost, but even then it’s possible to fill up your juggernaut at Calais and drive to Edinburgh and back without having to even go near a petrol station. What an idiot.