Matt B wrote:
> Simon Mason wrote:
> > Following on from Spindrift's recent encounter, here is an appropriate
> > response in our local rag.
> > Sorry for dodgy image, but I used my camera instead of cranking up the
> > scanner:
> > Hull Daily Mail.
> >
> > http://www.simonmason.karoo.net/zmail.htm
>
> Very good! Do people still believe that VED is used to build roads?
> Given that the amount raised more or less exactly matches the amount
> spent maintaining roads it's an easy mistake to make perhaps.
Slight correction. Matches more or less exactly the amount spent on
building and maintaining trunk roads, excluding policing and healthcare
costs.
> It would probably be better to abolish VED completely to avoid the
> confusion, and to raise the deficit from fair taxes. Ability to pay
> springs to mind, not personal transport choice.
Oh I don't know.. how about taxing per amount of pollution? As it is
known that cars driven for longer journeys are more fuel efficient, and
driving in congestion is bad, we could easily base it on that.
Now, how could we do that in a way which is easy to administer?
Then we have the problem of the irresponsible and ignorant taking
dangerous machinery on the road in an unsafe state. How about some
simple mechanism to check that?
Actually, I am with you here Matt. I think a small levy on top of the
annual MOT charge, say about 15 quid, should cover the admin costs,
abolish VED, and give out the tax disc as a tax/MOT disc. I'd also like
to see a system of notifiable minor vehicle defects where minor
problems are not sufficient to be kept off the road but have to be
dealt with and signed off by an authorised body (eg MOT registered
garage) within eg 14 days [1]. In these days There would be a small
charge to cover admin, equivalent to a bottom end FPN. It would only
apply to testing that the notified defect had been fixed.
With the computerised MOT it should be trivial to deal with.
It would be a suitable scheme that would ensure vehicles are less badly
maintained (especially with regard to things like lights being out of
alignment/borked) and such like.
...d
[1] A similar system exists in Norway. I had to get my headlamp
alignment checked after removing the condensation from it, and have the
GB sticker removed from the back. Easily done for a very modest fee
(about 200 NKr which is a 'phew I got off really lightly' trip to a
Norwegian garage). The garage took the paperwork and that was the last
I heard of it.