Well, it's quite a fillip to the old self-image to get an email from the actual Prime Minister, Tony the Bliar himself. Of course, the fact that one million eight hundred thousand other people got the same email does rather take the shine off, but still it's a shitty old world these days and we have to take what little satisfaction we can when ever the opportunity arises. Below is the text of Tony Bliar's email, but first let me share with you some extracts from a report published recently by the Institute for Public Policy Research. It's called "Steering Through Change: winning the debate on road pricing" and was written for the IPPR by Jenny Bird and James Morris.
We'll mention this report later, but first we'd just like to include a quote from it:
"Ensuring that road pricing is seen as an attempt to tackle congestion also relies on the perception that, if road pricing does not work, it will not be used. This means presenting road pricing as an area to explore, not a fait accompli. It is also valuable to put it in the context of increasing congestion.
"In the long run, climate change may also have an important role to play in the messages around road charging (and scheme design), but at the moment it is more effective in a role of galvanising support than in neutralising opposition".
OK? Now read Tony Bliar's message about the road-pricing email, and see if anything rings a bell
"Thank you for taking the time to register your views about road pricing on the Downing Street website.
"This petition was posted shortly before we published the Eddington Study, an independent review of Britain's transport network. This study set out long-term challenges and options for our transport network.
"It made clear that congestion is a major problem to which there is no easy answer. One aspect of the study was highlighting how road pricing could provide a solution to these problems and that advances in technology put these plans within our reach. Of course it would be ten years or more before any national scheme was technologically, never mind politically, feasible.
"That is the backdrop to this issue. As my response makes clear, this is not about imposing "stealth taxes" or introducing "Big Brother" surveillance. This is a complex subject, which cannot be resolved without a thorough investigation of all the options, combined with a full and frank debate about the choices we face at a local and national level. That's why I hope this detailed response will address your concerns and set out how we intend to take this issue forward. I see this email as the beginning, not the end of the debate, and the links below provide an opportunity for you to take it further (we did. They didn't - GOS).
"But let me be clear straight away: we have not made any decision about national road pricing. Indeed we are simply not yet in a position to do so. We are, for now, working with some local authorities that are interested in establishing local schemes to help address local congestion problems. Pricing is not being forced on any area, but any schemes would teach us more about how road pricing would work and inform decisions on a national scheme. And funds raised from these local schemes will be used to improve transport in those areas.
"One thing I suspect we can all agree is that congestion is bad. It's bad for business because it disrupts the delivery of goods and services. It affects people's quality of life. And it is bad for the environment. That is why tackling congestion is a key priority for any Government.
"Congestion is predicted to increase by 25% by 2015. This is being driven by economic prosperity. There are 6 million more vehicles on the road now than in 1997, and predictions are that this trend will continue.
"Part of the solution is to improve public transport, and to make the most of the existing road network. We have more than doubled investment since 1997, spending £2.5 billion this year on buses and over £4 billion on trains - helping to explain why more people are using them than for decades. And we're committed to sustaining this investment, with over £140 billion of investment planned between now and 2015. We're also putting a great deal of effort into improving traffic flows - for example, over 1000 Highways Agency Traffic Officers now help to keep motorway traffic moving.
"But all the evidence shows that improving public transport and tackling traffic bottlenecks will not by themselves prevent congestion getting worse. So we have a difficult choice to make about how we tackle the expected increase in congestion. This is a challenge that all political leaders have to face up to, and not just in the UK. For example, road pricing schemes are already in operation in Italy, Norway and Singapore, and others, such as the Netherlands, are developing schemes. Towns and cities across the world are looking at road pricing as a means of addressing congestion.
"One option would be to allow congestion to grow unchecked. Given the forecast growth in traffic, doing nothing would mean that journeys within and between cities would take longer, and be less reliable. I think that would be bad for businesses, individuals and the environment. And the costs on us all will be real - congestion could cost an extra £22 billion in wasted time in England by 2025, of which £10-12 billion would be the direct cost on businesses.
"A second option would be to try to build our way out of congestion. We could, of course, add new lanes to our motorways, widen roads in our congested city centres, and build new routes across the countryside. Certainly in some places new capacity will be part of the story. That is why we are widening the M25, M1 and M62. But I think people agree that we cannot simply build more and more roads, particularly when the evidence suggests that traffic quickly grows to fill any new capacity.
"Tackling congestion in this way would also be extremely costly, requiring substantial sums to be diverted from other services such as education and health, or increases in taxes. If I tell you that one mile of new motorway costs as much as £30m, you'll have an idea of the sums this approach would entail.
"That is why I believe that at least we need to explore the contribution road pricing can make to tackling congestion. It would not be in anyone's interests, especially those of motorists, to slam the door shut on road pricing without exploring it further.
"It has been calculated that a national scheme - as part of a wider package of measures - could cut congestion significantly through small changes in our overall travel patterns. But any technology used would have to give definite guarantees about privacy being protected - as it should be. Existing technologies, such as mobile phones and pay-as-you-drive insurance schemes, may well be able to play a role here, by ensuring that the Government doesn't hold information about where vehicles have been. But there may also be opportunities presented by developments in new technology. Just as new medical technology is changing the NHS, so there will be changes in the transport sector. Our aim is to relieve traffic jams, not create a "Big Brother" society.
"I know many people's biggest worry about road pricing is that it will be a "stealth tax" on motorists. It won't. Road pricing is about tackling congestion.
"Clearly if we decided to move towards a system of national road pricing, there could be a case for moving away from the current system of motoring taxation. This could mean that those who use their car less, or can travel at less congested times, in less congested areas, for example in rural areas, would benefit from lower motoring costs overall. Those who travel longer distances at peak times and in more congested areas would pay more. But those are decisions for the future. At this stage, when no firm decision has been taken as to whether we will move towards a national scheme, stories about possible costs are simply not credible, since they depend on so many variables yet to be investigated, never mind decided.
"Before we take any decisions about a national pricing scheme, we know that we have to have a system that works. A system that respects our privacy as individuals. A system that is fair. I fully accept that we don't have all the answers yet. That is why we are not rushing headlong into a national road pricing scheme. Before we take any decisions there would be further consultations. The public will, of course, have their say, as will Parliament.
"We want to continue this debate, so that we can build a consensus around the best way to reduce congestion, protect the environment and support our businesses. If you want to find out more, please visit the attached links to more detailed information, and which also give opportunities to engage in further debate.
Yours sincerely,
Tony Blair"
So. Not just another cynical attempt to manipulate public opinion at all. Oh no. Far from it. Perish the thought.
And Tony Bliar wants a system that is fair. Good man, can't argue with that. And he wants a system that will charge us in proportion to the use we make of the road network. OK, not too stupid. And he wants a system that will not only address the issue of congestion, but also that of emissions. Right .
But haven't we already got one?
I'll answer my own question. Yes, we bloody well have. It's called Fuel Tax!
Petrol tax is fair because it's our own choice whether to drive a little tree-hugger-mobile or a f*ck-off great gas-guzzler. The GOS has just sold his much-loved but hideously wasteful old Mercedes and bought a tiny little foreign buzz-box which does about five zillion miles to the gallon. To be fair, he bought it because it's rather a nice little car, goes round corners quickly and is fitted with hot-and-cold running acronyms like ABS, ITC, EBFD, LWB, TDI, CSTCC, PAS and AIDS (no, sorry, that's something else, isn't it?). He only realised he'd done something tree-huggery when he received the congratulatory testimonial signed by George Monbiot and Michael Meacher and the little stick-on halo for the windscreen. You should just see how smug he's become. Totally sickening.
Petrol tax charges us in proportion to the use we make of the road system because if you drive a long way, you use more petrol so you pay more tax.
Petrol tax addresses the issue of congestion because (a) it makes petrol so expensive that it keeps poor people off the road and confines them in the council estates where they belong, and (b) if you insist on unreasonably spending lots of time sitting in traffic jams which are, of course, all your fault, you'll keep the engine running to power the CD player and the aircon so you'll use more petrol and pay more tax (it hasn't worked, sadly - we're still congested. Nothing to do with not having enough roads, of course).
And petrol tax addresses the issue of emissions because, as we said before, if you drive a gas-guzzler that makes lots of emissions you'll use more petrol and pay more tax than the GOS does. Serves you bloody right, an' all.
So all in all it's rather hard to see what all the fuss is about. We've already got a perfectly good system of road-pricing so why should we have another one? Just to rip more money off us? But no, road pricing isn't a stealth tax. Tony Bliar says so.
There have of course been many pronouncements from major representative organisations (not the government, then!) about this issue recently. The RAC, the AA, the Road Haulage Association, British Chambers of Commerce, the CBI, the Federation of Small Businesses, Friends of the Earth, Transport 1800 (sorry, Transport 2000. Freudian slip!) - they've all stuck their oar in. Some are anti-road pricing, others want to wait and see, others are in favour. Transport 2000 actually want you to buy the entire f*cking road before you can drive on it, but they're a bunch of loonies from way back. What's very noticeable is that even when people admit some support for the idea of road pricing, they always, without exception, add the proviso that all the revenue raised must be ploughed back into improved roads and public transport facilities.
This is, of course, pie in the sky. You only have to look at the government's record to see that we have as much chance of getting major road improvements as we have of finishing Wembley stadium on time. The government profits to the tune of £42 billion a year from road-users. And how much does it spend on new roads? Just £1.6 billion (figures from the British Chambers of Commerce).
Friends of the Earth, Transport 2000 and many others are guilty of the most outrageous falsehood and non sequitur: they repeatedly allege that building new roads is not the answer to congestion because "new roads simply generate even more traffic".
It's an interesting idea. How does it work, exactly? Is it a sort of magical effect whereby the touch of tarmac on soil stimulates cars to rise mysteriously from the ground like the skeleton warriors in Jason and the Argonauts? Or are there thousands of households where the husband looks up from his breakfast newspaper and says "Ee bah goom, lass, they's built new road oop yonder, tha knaws. Happen ah'll pop down to't garage on way to't mill an' order a coople more cars "? (Sorry about the accent. I'm from Suffolk).
Or perhaps businesses up and down the country receive telephone messages from their staff - "Sorry, can't make it in today. They've opened a new bypass at Middleton-in-Teesdale and I've got to go up and drive on it"? Or maybe it's like cockroaches. If you keep a dirty kitchen with food lying around, cockroaches will thrive and increase in number. Perhaps it's the same with cars - build 'em a new road and they breed!
What a lot of drivel. It's perfectly true that the number of vehicles on our roads has increased and is increasing. It's also true that new roads have tended to get filled up with traffic. But that's because they didn't build the roads big enough in the first place. It isn't the roads that are causing the cars, for God's sake. Just how stupid do these w*nkers think we are?
The fact is that this government scrapped a perfectly good road-building programme, cancelled bypass schemes, cancelled major road upgrades like the A40 into London even after land and property had been purchased and demolished, installed bus lanes thus halving the capacity of dual carriageways, removed parking spaces thus forcing people to drive round and round looking for one, splashed red, green, and white paint everywhere to narrow roads and reduce their capacity in the name of elfin safety, and generally failed to anticipate that the number of vehicles on the roads was going to grow steadily because there are more people eligible to drive (not enough old people dying, the selfish bastards) and we are becoming, God only knows how, more affluent.
Now that their road policies have been shown to be ineffective and short-sighted, they're trying to turn the whole thing round and make it our fault. It's our fault the roads are congested, so we must suffer. It's our fault that CO2 is rising so we must suffer. It's our fault we're fat, or smoke, so we must suffer.
And we, poor coons, we tolerate it. We have such an instinct for self-flagellation in this country that we like nothing so much as a really good guilt-trip - and it allows a lot of self-important so-called "experts" to flourish and make themselves feel important, people who can't really do anything, don't produce anything, don't contribute to our society in any worthwhile way, they just exist to tell others what to do and how to live their lives.
We've been trawling through the internet about road-pricing, and came across the Department for Transport's website, which has a FAQ page. These are some of the questions
Question: Will road pricing be about spying on people?
Their answer: No. Road pricing is about tackling congestion. Respecting privacy will be a central consideration in any scheme design. Indeed, any scheme established will not be interested in the details of which shops a driver goes to, any more than a mobile phone company cares who a customer is talking to.
(Our answer: Yes, what do you think?)
Question: Would I get a speeding ticket with my bill if I break the speed limit?
Their answer: The purpose of a road pricing scheme would be to tackle congestion. Of course, we want people to use the roads responsibly, but we would not be designing systems with the purpose of monitoring speeds and sending out tickets.
(Our answer: But on the other hand, if the system happens to lend itself, well, what the hell ?)
Question: Will I have to pay for a 'black box' in my car?
Their answer: As no decision has been taken about whether to have a national road pricing scheme, no decision has been made about the potential technologies.
(Our answer: Yes, of course you will. I mean, they aren't going to pay for it, are they? Get real!)
Question: Will everyone have to pay £1.34 for every mile they drive?
Their answer: No. This figure came from a feasibility study carried out for the Government in 2004. The study illustrated several theoretical road pricing schemes, of which some had £1.34 per mile as their highest rate. The lowest rate in these illustrations was 2p per mile. Very few people would pay the highest rate.
(Our answer: No. It'll be more. But there'll be exemptions for MPs, cabinet ministers, CD plates, Ken Livingprune and all Muslims)
Question: When are you going to introduce national road pricing?
Their answer: No decisions have yet been made.
(Our answer: When we bloody feel like it, you pleb)
Question: What are you doing about congestion in the meantime?
Their answer: We are already investing in the road network and public transport, including new road capacity where that is justified. We are also improving the way roads are managed, helping traffic to flow better. But that won't be enough in the long term as the number of vehicles on the road continues to increase. This is why we are interested in exploring how road pricing might work.
(Our answer: Not a lot. Why the hell should we care about congestion? It's not us that's sitting in the traffic-jams. We've got helicopters and stuff)
Question: Why can't you build more roads to reduce congestion?
Their answer: While there is a case for new capacity on some roads, and that is being provided, we cannot build our way out of congestion. It would be unaffordable and environmentally unacceptable. And in our most congested urban areas there is often simply no room for new roads.
(Our answer: This is crap. It's a bit like Margaret Thatcher saying "you don't solve a problem by just throwing money at it" - if the problem is lack of money then that's exactly the way to solve it. In this case, if there aren't enough roads, the way to solve the problem is to build more. I suppose the logic is a bit too obvious for most politicians)
From the Department of Transport Press Office came a Press Release announcing the Draft Transport Bill. The release says "The Draft Bill would update the existing powers that allow the development of road pricing pilot schemes. It would give greater freedom to local authorities to implement schemes whilst ensuring that schemes in different places are consistent and inter-operable. Pilot schemes would tackle congestion where it is already a problem, or is predicted to be, and would support the government's work to explore the potential for a national system of road pricing."
Interesting use of language here. They are "exploring the potential" of road-pricing. They're not asking people of they want it. They're not even trying to see if it would be acceptable to most people. They're planning to do it regardless, and the word "potential" just means they want to know how much money they can make out of it.
The Institute for Public Policy Research, whose advice Tony Bliar has clearly taken when he pretends that no decisions have been made and that the government is simply trying to initiate a debate about road pricing, make great play with the results of an opinion poll they got a firm called eFeedback Ltd. to run.
The opinion poll was produced in four versions, and different people answered different versions. Presumably they are trying to determine which version of the poll produced the results they wanted.
Each of the four versions of the poll was predicated on a slightly different premise. Version 1 stipulated "Road tax would be scrapped and instead you would be charged per mile you drive . petrol tax would stay the same as it is now".
The second version said "As well as paying road tax and petrol tax, you would pay an additional charge per mile you drive".
Version 3 said "Instead of paying petrol tax, you would pay per mile you drive. Petrol tax would be scrapped Road tax would stay the same as it is now".
And the last version said "Road tax and petrol tax would be scrapped. Instead you would pay per mile you drive."
Not that it mattered much one way or the other, because as polls go it was pretty much a sham. How many drivers are there in the UK today? Did somebody say 30 million? And how many people did they get to complete their survey?
One thousand, one hundred and fifty. Not exactly a representative sample on which to base policy advice to HM government.
Only 24 people from Northern Ireland, 82 from Scotland and 33 from the North-East completed the survey, while the figure for the South East was 221. The figures were then "weighted" to make them, supposedly, representative of the entire UK population.
The man who created the infamous ePetition on the No.10 Downing Street website was Peter Roberts. Just why his petition got 1.8 million signatures is hard to fathom, because it's not the only one on the website that opposes road pricing. It did, though, for whatever reason, and has certainly been a major achievement if only because of the media interest it got.
So it seems only fair to let Peter Roberts have the last word .
"Our road network struggles today with the demands placed upon it.
"This manifests itself as congestion when people travel to and from work.
"Outside these times, congestion is generally minimal and mainly found around badly designed junctions, roadworks, or where the free flow of traffic is compromised.
"Our government propose introducing a road pricing system to increase the cost of congested roads coinciding with your travel to and from work. This journey is not optional for most people and increasing the cost to work will have a minimal impact on congestion.
"There are many alternatives to a complex and expensive road pricing system. Initially, our government must address the design of our roads with the ambition of increasing capacity and flow rates. Today, most road engineering appears designed to reduce capacity and reduce traffic flow. We see dual carriageways reduced to single lanes, traffic lights on free flowing roundabouts and bus stops pushed out into the road preventing cars passing when the bus is stationary.
"Before we even consider this massive, complex and hugely expensive road pricing system, we should offer a comprehensive network of free school buses, staggered school opening times, decent park & ride schemes, tax breaks for people working from home and encourage commercial vehicle movements outside peak journey times.
"Road pricing is an intrusive and highly expensive way of modifying transport choices. Its cost needs to be recovered before any benefit from taxation and adding additional bureaucracy to an already complex scheme is wasteful and unnecessary.
"A simple form of distance pricing is to incorporate road tax into the cost of fuel. This removes the possibility of evasion and increases tax on inefficient vehicles. It's an effective, inexpensive and acceptable way of using price to affect travel choices."
The GOS says: Peter's own website is called Traveltax.
The No.10 website with all the petitions is well worth a browse. There are a great many petitions and the subjects include lots of the things the GOS has written about in the last couple of years, as well as some pretty vital things that are not such common knowledge. Did you know, for instance, that there is a proposal to introduce restrictions on photography in public places? We didn't. Now what the hell is the point of that?
either on this site or on the World Wide Web.
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