10:14am Friday 10th July 2009
RE: Last week’s letter saying taxes on motoring, cigarettes and alcohol are the backbone of Government income.
GRANTED that we, as drivers, provide substantial Government revenue as mentioned by David Fagan (Letters, July 3), we also impose high social costs.
The fact is that now we require something like a monopoly use of the historical general purpose public highway.
Some of the social costs transmute into money costs as the National Health Service has to provide schemes to get us to work more, often off-road, and put us together after crashes.
Buses, sadly, are not exempt from fuel tax. Railways’ huge licence fees subsidise the Government.
People giving up booze and fags would reduce revenue, but also reduce NHS costs.
The big adjustments needed to our travel behaviour will take time – major reforms always have. Local authorities lose on providing parking as the town centre land needed could be used commercially much more profitably.
Jim Whitehead, Belmont Road, Chesham,
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