Very good... I don't suppose any of them got away with it. Also, what is the point of vehicle tax? What does it pay for?
Thats a strange article on BBC News. Its title says its about Road Tax but it spends most its time re-running the usual guff about the relationship between cars and cycles. Of course all the standard cyclist outrage is included in the comments at the end and I on't see why they should be given space to comment, after all they don't even pay road tax!
For goodness sake my comment was based on irony, it was satire heavily laced with sarcasm. Do we really need to have a smiley after anything that is humorous?
Please don't start the damn cyclists off again... We'll never hear then end of their self-righteous ramblings !
The point is the same as for Income Tax, VAT, Stamp Duty, duties on tobacco, alcohol & fuel ... The yield of general taxes all goes in the same pot, and pays for everything. Very few taxes are hypothecated (linked to specific expenditure), one famous exception being TV Licenses paying for the BBC. Is anyone suggesting that road taxes income should be spent only on roads? The writer of the BBC piece seems to be arguing that because road tax is not hypothecated to roads, somehow that means that drivers who do pay road tax don't therefore have more moral right to use the roads than cyclists who don't pay. Not very convincingly.
If it's a 'pollution' tax, then surely it would be fairer to abolish this tax and tax the fuel on forecourt (yes, more than they do at the moment :frown. I'm sure a half decent accountant could work out the revenue from VED and then divide that by the number of liters sold at the pumps. The tax man would still take the same amount of money. Simples. The confusion comes from the many layers of taxation applied. You're taxed on the purchase of a car (VAT), taxed to have it on the road (VED), taxed to run it (Fuel duty) and let's not forget, you've been taxed on the the money to pay for all this tax (Income, CG tax or other)
Well, as well as the Italian bike I drive a Spanish car, so doesn't that mean I should lob a donkey off an apartment block then go for a four hour lunch?
The problem with them trying to make it into a "pollution tax" is that once everyone has a less polluting vehicle the revenue generated from it decreases - then they have to find that same money from somewhere else... Counter-productive. Whereas at the moment it's NOT in reality a pollution tax. If it was it would be set at a level that discouraged the use of big cars, instead of the cost of a tank and a half of petrol. At the moment it is set at a level that people will complain about, but still pay. It's similar to the government saying that they want people to stop smoking - where in reality they can't afford for people to stop smoking because of all the tax it generates ( and don't come out with the "smoking costs the NHS millions..." argument. Look at the facts and see JUST how much money is actually generated from tax on tobacco - it's immense ! ). And as for adding the tax to the cost of the fuel - we already have just about the most heavily taxed vehicle fuel in the world ( duty and VAT ) - just how much more expensive do you want to make it ? Very little of the tax raised from fuel ever gets spent on the roads, just as VED never does...
They certainly have got a sense of humour, our year old Audi £30 a year, Our 7 year old 3 series touring £280 a year
