Will the government listen?

Today is the last day of the much publicised online petition against the plan to introduce "road charging" on the UK's roads and although the petition currently runs at 1.6 million signatures noises are already coming from within Whitehall that the powers that be still intend to press ahead with this idea regardless of public opinion.

Something that our government don't seem to realise is that the idea of a democracy is that they are elected on the basis that they manage the country on our behalf; what it does not mean is that they can ride roughshod over public opinion. But who ever said the UK was a democracy?

The real problem is that they aren't looking at transport policy in the right way. For many years now our government has tried to force us out of our cars into public transport by increasing taxes on car use but have not provided us with a usable public transport system. More recently public transport has started to get hit by attempts to stop us from using it, airlines because of the supposed links to global warming and trains because they're so full of people who can't afford to drive anymore that they can't take the load!

The reason our government wants to charge us is because (they say) charging will reduce congestion on the most used of our roads. More and more, global warming is cited as an additional reason why congestion is bad. However government, both central and local, are the ones who have caused the congestion in the first place and they really should deal with that first.

First of all, we need a proper "joined up" public transport system. The problem there is that doing this isn't cheap or quick - it's why it hasn't happened so far. However in the meantime they need to deal with the other problems!

As much as the tree huggers whinge and moan, the real answer is to free up the traffic on our roads. In many parts of the country speed limits have been lowered and traffic calming schemes installed on the grounds of safety when these schemes may actually be making things worse. Unfortunatly much of road safety planning seems to have been hijacked by the environmentalists who have discovered they can kill the car by the back door. Lets get something straight here - slowing cars down can actually increase the polution they produce, driving them over humps and through chicanes actually damages the suspension components and wears down the brakes more quickly making the cars unsafe and constant stop-start driving wears out engine components more quickly making them burn oil and fuel less efficiently. Also consider that buildings near road humps are also being damaged by vibrations caused by vehicles passing over them and air quality is reduced because of the additional emissions caused by the stop-start traffic.

The answer - if people are driving fast through a housing estate or a village, it's because people need to get somewhere and there is no better route. Build a bypass, give these cars somewhere else to go where they can run at proper speeds hence reducing polution... and congestion!

As I've already mentioned, the slowing down of our traffic is being done on the grounds of road safety, but again there is a flaw. Road safety policy the last few years has been based on the simple theory that "going fast is dangerous, going slow is not". This is also flawed because the human mind reacts differently under different circumstances. Try driving slowly on a long straight road and your mind will start to wander as you get bored. If you're driving slowly because of speed cameras then you'll be watching the speedo and not the road, that's hardly safe! Ok, so clearly if you're going to try doing 60mph through a village or housing estate that is clearly going to be dangerous (so please don't!) but we're starting to see 30mph and 40mph speed limits where they are clearly not appropriate to the road and that is dangerous!

So, one of the answers to polution being caused by vehicles is to let them run at optimum speeds away from built up areas and this means clearing congestion. The way to help congestion is to provide roads that are designed to let traffic flow freely so that they can run at optimum speeds. Then the problems with public transport need to be dealt with... and that will cost money, but that money should be earned by a health economy, not through stealth taxes imposed through speed cameras and higher fuel prices.

More tax...

It's February the 1st and here in the UK it means that if you're flying somewhere you now have to pay more tax on your airline tickets - between £5 and £10 depending on your destination. The reason for this? We're told the tax has been imposed on environmental grounds. So like the fuel on petrol and diesel, road pricing and the plans to charge us based on whats in our rubbish bins, we're being forced to pay a tax which in the longer term will probably have little impact on the environment.

Whatever you believe about global warming/climate change, one thing that should be made clear is that increasing taxes won't do any good. Yes, increased taxes will change people's habits and those who can't afford to pay extra will make the choice not to pay - they will either just stop buying that which is taxed or find a way around it - as we see with the amount of tobacco and alcohol which is brought into the country from mainland Europe and the number of people on the Irish border who drive over to fill up their cars.

Soon the UK will start to return to the position it was in many years ago... driving and flying will be reduced to a priviledge of the rich, those who can afford to pay the extortionate taxes. Royalty and government won't care... the likes of Prince Charles and Gordon Brown will still be able to fly when and where they want, as will the music and movie stars and the board members of big companies. People such as you and I, the people who work for a living, those of us who need to drive to work because of poor public transport or have kids to ferry to the never-ending number of clubs and events will have to cut back. Many of us will ask for pay raises, some of us will get them. The prices our employers charge to their customers will increase. Inflation is the result.

Who wins? The people certainly don't.

I remember the jokes from when I was younger about the government taxing the air that we breathe... given that even breathing has some environmental impact will that day really be far away now?