A Tangled Web

For Whom the Road Tolls



Isn't New Labour creating a wonderful country? Just think, in a few years time we will live in a society where to discipline children with force greater than a mosquito alighting on one's arm will be classed as child abuse; where the liberty of people who smoke (I am a non-smoker, by the way) in public places will be curtailed by tyrannical legislation; and where the poor, victimised motorist will have to shell out an unprecedented amount of money to travel the length and breadth of this sceptered isle.



Car drivers in the United Kingdom already pay the most extortionate fuel and road levies in the European Union. Less than 1/10 of the money collected via the Road Fund Licence is actually spent on the road network. Yet here we a government, which has already had the cheek to open one tolled section of the M6 (in addition to acquiescing to congestion charging in the capital), wishing to open further sections of motorway where we will have to make extra payments for the privilege of access.



It is all well and good for certain pressure groups to extol the virtues of motorway charging in France. Not only do the French have a far superior system to ourselves, the cost of fuel in that country is far below what we pay here. Some will argue road tolling illustrates a government preference for car usage over public transport. I, on the other hand, believe road tolling to be another example of this administration's utter dislike of our freedom of choice.