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http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/tm_headline=toll-of-the-tolls%26method=full%26objectid=18581976%26siteid=94762-name_page.html

TOLL OF THE TOLLS

Traffic Road charging could cripple the economy and cost thousands of jobs

By Vanessa Allen And Jake Morris

ROAD charging would be fatal to the tourism and haulage industries and bring small businesses to their knees, the Government has been warned.

Bosses backing the Mirror's Say No to Tolls campaign said the plan would cost the economy millions.

And it could bump up prices on everyday goods and services as small businesses are forced to pass on charges to their customers.

A total of 669,751 people have now signed a petition calling on the Prime Minister to scrap plans for road pricing, which would see drivers charged up to £1.34 a mile.

Yesterday Mirror readers and supporters signed up at a rate of one every two seconds. Our campaign also won support from motor racing legend Sir Stirling Moss.

He said: "I'm going to be signing. These charges are just too much." Britain's 30 million drivers already pay some of the world's highest road taxes and fuel duty.

Under road pricing, they would be charged different rates depending on what roads they used and what time of day they travelled. Critics argue that the system's infrastructure would cost up to £314billion alone.

From all quarters there were warnings that it would leave British hauliers facing financial ruin, drive British holidaymakers abroad, put off foreign tourists and hit small businesses.

Road charging would penalise rural drivers, the elderly and the disabled, who are most reliant on private transport and hit charities that need volunteer drivers.

Peter Roberts, who started the online petition against the scheme, said he was amazed by the response.

He added: "Thank you to the Mirror and to Mirror readers for supporting the petition.

"But the best way for people to register their anger is to use democracy at the May 4 local elections.

"Don't vote for people who support road taxing."

Among those who signed the petition was Patrick, from Norfolk, who said: "We pay so much tax we should have the best roads in the world."

Louis Winner, from Norfolk, added: "I live in a village so it's a necessity for me to drive.

Abdullah, from Leicester, said: "The cost just keeps on adding up and now they want to charge us for every mile we drive. No thanks!"

BUSINESS

THE scheme could destroy thousands of small businesses and risk jobs, employers warned yesterday.

They called for exemptions for "essential journeys" such as for tradesmen who cannot take their tools by public transport.

The Federation of Small Businesses, in its largest survey on transport, said most firms could not change their travel patterns.

It claims road charging would not stop congestion but increase costs at the expense of jobs.

Federation spokesman Steve Collie said: "Any road charging measures must target non-essential journeys only.

"A tradesman going to a house cannot take his tools on the bus.

"Businesses need access to the road network at all times to service the needs of their customers."

Britain's 4.3million small firms, employ 12 million people and produce 50 per cent of UK output.

And the Federation warns an increase in costs for such a large sector would only harm the economy.

Mr Collie said: "Tackling congestion would be welcome.

"But charging would hit firms very hard - costing the Government more lost tax revenue than it would raise by road charging. "The Government must recognise journeys would only be taxed at the expense of the economy."

HAULAGE

HAULIERS fear financial ruin if tolls are introduced.

Campaigners say they should be exempt because they have to use the roads - just as taxi drivers are excused the London congestion charge as it is a necessary part of their job.

Kate Gibbs of the Road Haulage Association said: "Road charging could be a disaster for many small haulage firms. It could absolutely cripple them.

"The haulage industry is a vital service. Without it you are not going to have any products on the shelves in our shops.

"When prices rise the customer can say enough is enough. But what is the haulier supposed to do? He will just have to swallow the charge himself. Profit margins are already tighter than ever."

The RHA also fear foreign hauliers who do not have satellite tracking installed could drive around uncharged.

In July 2005 the Government scrapped plans for a Lorry Road User Charge scheme, saying they wanted to include it as part of a wider look into road charging. British and foreign hauliers would have been charged but with rebates for those who filled up with fuel here, helping to make the UK haulage industry more competitive.

TOURISM

MORE Britons will holiday abroad if they have to pay road charges here, hoteliers warned.

Up to 80 per cent of us use the car for UK holidays, says the British Hospitality Association. That rises to 90 per cent for remote areas such as Cumbria, Devon and Cornwall, where B&B owners and independent hoteliers could face bankruptcy without British tourists.

Graham Grose, BHA chairman and a hotelier in Devon, said: "Road charging would have serious consequences for many hoteliers, who already face intense competition from the rest of Europe and the USA.

"We suffer from a malaise of over-taxation, we have high labour costs, high energy costs and high local taxation. One day there will be a straw that breaks the camel's back and this could be it. We're near saturation."

Robin Barker, deputy chief executive of South West Tourism, said road charging could have "a huge economic impact" on the region. "The relative costs would make driving prohibitive. If the result was that people chose America it would have a massive effect here."

COUNTRYSIDE

RURAL drivers say living in the country means making a journey by car - or not making it at all.

Though charges for using quiet roads are likely to be significantly lower than on motorways, it still seems likely that under the plans, every journey will be charged.

Oliver Harwood, of the Country Land and Business Association, said a car is essential in rural areas.

He added: "The worry for us is that you are never going to have good enough public transport in rural areas to be able to rely on it for daily life. A bus into town every couple of hours is fine. But you are never going to get one every 10 or 20 minutes and nor do we demand one.

"We don't make any comment on what happens in the towns. But having a congestion charge somewhere rural just isn't realistic.

"People need to get to school, work and generally get around and to do this they need a car. You can't live in most rural parishes without a motor vehicle.

"We object to being discriminated against and then not seeing our services improve. It's a double whammy."

JOIN THE CAMPAIGN:GO TO http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/traveltax AND SIGN UP

mirrornews@mirror.co.uk

So tradesmen who cannot take their tools on public transport would be expempt, but hauliers would not? When was the last time you saw a truck driver carrying 20 tonnes of aggregate on the local bus?

Presumably busses won't be paying this charge, otherwise fares would go up, meaning noone could travel at all without paying this tax, 'driving' us back to the middle ages! What about empty busses, or private coaches? Would any vehicle with 8 or more passengers be exampt? Cue sales of minibusses going through the roof!

Whatever happened to 'no taxation without representation'? If such overwhelming opposition is shown to a tax then it must not be permitted to be introduced, per one of the major underpinnings of our democracy!

Can't people just wait and see before coming to conclusions about road charging?

The way i would like to see it being used is that it would be cheaper than now to drive on rural little used roads and really expensive to drive on a congested bus/rail route. This would be a good thing, and would of course not apply as much to leisure travelers or tourists traveling off peak.

Yes.
Transport and public transport will be zero-charged. private transport will be at a higher rate. Road tax will not go. Fuel tax will not go.
Why should rural residents travel at a lower rate ? Rural roads need repair etc...and they are more easily damaged than main roads.
Let's not pussy-foot the thing, the system will be used to maximise income and minimise travel. Mr "A" lives in a town, so to escape the toll he will travel via the B roads ?
No. Mr "A" will find that his travel will be more expensive than going by the "A" roads. That's the advantage of using a GPS based system. Never mind the errors....the possibilities are endless...and Mr Blair has already said that he sees no reason why the txpayer should subsidise roads for the use of drivers http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/tm_headline=tony-toll-tax%26method=full%26objectid=18586579%26siteid=89520-name_page.html
Face it, if the gov can ignore nearly a million signatories.....but then, people will have forgotten soon..

One wonders how many taxpayers AREN'T drivers?

_________________
I won't slave for beggar's pay,
likewise gold and jewels,
but I would slave to learn the way
to sink your ship of fools

Nice idea, but we have lots of little rural roads that run parrallel to the M4 where I live. Indeed when an accident blocked the m4 on my daily commute we (motorway drivers) would take to them in our droves.

What will road pricing of this type introduce?

_________________
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.

Upton Sinclair

Given that such a small percentage of VED and fuel duty is invested in the road network, shouldn't it be drivers seeing no reason why they should subsidise the taxpayer?

_________________
Why can't we just use Common Sense?

I voted against road pricing, on the grounds that none of this government's new taxes has ever shown any tangible benefit for the people it was designed to help.

As for developing a computerised road pricing system, Just look at the government's record on failed IT projects. I have a friend who was working on one such project for the CSA and told me that "it wasn't as bad as the newspapers say - it's ten times bloody worse"! What makes anyone believe that this government could successfully implement a £314bn system of road pricing?

Plus, as usual, this government has shown that it has no clue about the countryside, and life in rural Britain where people have no choice but to use cars.

Why does anyone believe that road pricing will cut congestion? I seem to remember that the London Congestion Charge was presented as a means of solving congestion in the capital. It worked for a while, until drivers found that the alternatives to paying it were even more inconvenient, costly and time consuming. Before very long, congestion levels were back to what they were before the charge was introduced. No change there then.

Anyone aged about 50+ will recall that the price of petrol doubled between August 1973 and a year later. Did that result in fewer cars on the roads? No it did not. And the reason? Because most of the traffic we see is carrying out essential journeys. If road pricing is introduced, does it mean that everyone will start working a four day work to try to save money? Hardly.
Do roads exist solely for drivers? How does Blair think the food and supplies that non drivers buy at the supermarket actually get there - by being carried there on foot? How does he think that a nondriver needing medical treatment will get to hospital, and how will the doctors and other medical staff have made the journey there? But no, in Blair's parallel world, it's only drivers who benefit from roads.

What would happen if everyone refused to travel or indeed told them to stick their black box up their back box? Prisons are full, there are only another 8,000 places being built by 2012. If only 10,000 people told them get stuffed then that would be enough to collapse the whole thing. If 700,000 people signed is it reasonable to suggest that 10% of those would be incensed enough to tell them to stick it? How would they deal with that when the entire prison population is only about 100,000 ish (dunno the exact number) it is way more than the extra places that are being built.

It will only take one person to miss their hospital treatment and die because they couldn't afford the road tolls to open up a whole corporate manslaughter area. If you prevent people from having medical treatment is this not an infringement of their human rights anyway? Freedom to travel should be enshrined in the human rights act if it isn't already.

Not me, and I work in computers. If you think the CSA is bad, then try looking at the new NHS Spine stuff..

This could be the stuff of nightmares - how on earth could you prove your innocence when a mistake was made? You'd have to be able to independantly account for every journey..



Actually, there already a road pricing system; it's called 'Fuel Duty' - you even spend more on congested roads. And it's very cheap to administer.



Building a decent public transportation infrastructure is hard work. Slapping extra charges on motorists is easy.





I would really like to know what proportion of the people who actually contribute net taxes to this country (i.e. Private sector employees and businessmen) DON'T use the roads. You can't subsidise yourself!

To put this into perspective, government has failed to provide a satisfactory public transport infra-structure, despite the facts that other countries have managed to do so and that thery have known for over 40 years that a workable transport would be needed.
Now, instead of admitting their errors and moving with alacrity to correct the problem, we, the taxpayer and worker, are to be punished with draconian mileage rtaxes if we dare to wish to use the roads we have already paid for in order to get to our place of work so that we can work and pay more taxes. We, the travelling public, are to be punished for the failure of central and local gov't to provide a workable alternative.
And still, despite the talk of pricing us off the busiest roads at the busiest times, i.e. when we are trying to get to work, there is still no plan or policy for creating a viable alternative.
WE could have 'Maglev' trains by now, this technology was pioneered in the UK in the late 60's, but no funding was made available and the prototype languishes near Peterborough station as a monument to gov't short-sightnedness. We ripped out our trams in the 50's and our trolleybuses in the 60's (polution free towns, anyone?). Our trains are a disgrace because with 7-year franchises for the operating companies, they can't make proper long-term plans and have only 7 years to plan for.
Someone is going to make a fortune offering British drivers foreign registered, taxed and insured cars to drive here with a rolling 6-month contract. That will be quite legal and the EU won't change its rules to suit the UK tax regime.
I wonder how they'll fit their black boxes to classic cars with positive earth or 6 volt electrical systems.
Another letter to my MP coming up!

I'll remember that when as a non rail user, my taxes go towards subsidising railways etc.

Can anyone explain to me why our fuel duty, which is:
a perfect road pricing tax
which penalises the motorist who uses a 'gas-guzzler'.
Allows the consumer to much how much it will cost.
Is nigh on impossible to dodge.
Costs almost nothing to administer

is being replaced with a scheme that:
Will cost billions to implement,
Will never actually work
Any person over the age of 10 can dodge,
Does not effectively penalise gas-guzzlers
Encourages people to fail to register their vehicles

Er, didn't they tell you the GPS road charging would be on top of fuel duty?

_________________
"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

No, I must have missed that point.

I truly despair at the state of this country. I'm off to read a nice novel, oooh here's a good one, by Mr. George Orwell......

It's also a PERFECT carbon tax. 100% perfect. (For what THAT'S worth...)

_________________
Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

I know it's been briefly mentioned round here before but I am absolutely convinced that this will not be implemented. It's just such a ludicrously impossible system that will destroy the economy. I'm in little doubt that it is all government spin - scare us for a few years and then ditch it in favour of doubling fuel duty; thus prompting sighs of relief instead of mass-riots

_________________
Why can't we just use Common Sense?

Yup, sorry, I knew I had missed one.



There is something so ominously scary in this, that I suspect it to be the case. We should not overlook the fact that this has in fact been happening all over Europe, so I don't doubt that it will happen here.