MSE Leaders' Debate: Petrol Prices

d77_2

The problem with putting "vehicle licence", I call it road tax , on fuel is that not everyone pays the same. I have a motorcycle that pays £50 a year and there are cars on the road that pay £435. There are some people that do under 1,000 miles a year and some that do over 15,000 miles, so how much to put on the price of fuel?

With the Conservatives fair fuel stabiliser, I'm interested in knowing what a fair fuel base rate is. As far as I'm concerened, if it's over £1 it's too high! As someone else has also pointed out, the pound is currently weak against the dollar, if this was remedied fuel prices would drop.

I think that fuel prices are to high, over the last 2 years duty has risen at around 5.8p a year above inflation, which was 0% for a big part of those 2 years.

I am also fed up with the constat evironmental chat. The car is being used as a scapegoat. 75% of the countries polution does NOT come from vehicles. The CO2 emmitted by the households of this country is higher than that emmitted by vehicles. They should stop imposing all these extra taxes and overly high costs on motorists in the name of the environment,

They also need to stop with the political, placebo solutions such as electric and hybrid cars which are NOT the way forward. They need to go back in time to 1908 when Henry Ford started producing the Model T. Mr Ford was expecting his car to run on ethanol, not gasoline, as it is a renewable energy source and better both environmentally and as a fuel. However the polititions wanted to use Gasoline and that's how this mess all got started. Every petrol car on the road could be converted to use ethanol, all that is needed is a lubricating additive in the fuel, which could be added by the suppliers. Not only does this provide a solution with no changes for the end users, it also keeps cars on the road meaning no scrappage, it is a better solution all round.

custardy

d77 wrote: »

The problem with putting "vehicle licence", I call it road tax , on fuel is that not everyone pays the same. I have a motorcycle that pays £50 a year and there are cars on the road that pay £435. There are some people that do under 1,000 miles a year and some that do over 15,000 miles, so how much to put on the price of fuel?

but thats the argument for,im paying £200 or so a year for my car to sit on my drive
i haven't driven it in nearly 3 weeks now but i still want the option of being able to drive it as required
theres no real incentive for me not to use my car bar the ever rising cost of fuel
i still pay the same tax,insurance,MOT costs as someone doing 15,000 miles a year
okay less wear and tear and maybe slightly cheaper insurance
however my worry is once another tax is added to fuel it will be like opening pandoras box

i too hate all this green parp spouted by all parties,however they should push the health benefits of other methods of travel
perhaps look at increasing bike use by providing secure cycle parking areas
maybe an equivilent road tax discount for joining a government run cycle insurance/registration system?
im no worse/better off but you get insurance and car drivers get the bikes registered like the always whine about

d77_2

custardy wrote: »

but thats the argument for,im paying £200 or so a year for my car to sit on my drive
i haven't driven it in nearly 3 weeks now but i still want the option of being able to drive it as required
theres no real incentive for me not to use my car bar the ever rising cost of fuel
i still pay the same tax,insurance,MOT costs as someone doing 15,000 miles a year
okay less wear and tear and maybe slightly cheaper insurance
however my worry is once another tax is added to fuel it will be like opening pandoras box

i too hate all this green parp spouted by all parties,however they should push the health benefits of other methods of travel
perhaps look at increasing bike use by providing secure cycle parking areas
maybe an equivilent road tax discount for joining a government run cycle insurance/registration system?
im no worse/better off but you get insurance and car drivers get the bikes registered like the always whine about

I don't see how that's an argument for?

Take my motorcycle, I use it as it does more MPG than my car, causes less conjestion, and is just an all round good option for journeys with one person who doesn't need to carry much. If road tax was moved into fuel, it would have to be set at an average price from all tax brackets, from mopeds to juggernaughts, which is from £15 to £950, half the difference is £467.50, which would then have to be divided up into an average yearly disance to get the cost to add on per litre. So I'd be paying a hell of a lot more for road tax on my motorcycle than I do at the moment, but the people with new supercars and chelsea tractors will benefit as they'd be paying less.

For it to be a fair system, there would need to be staggered tax rates implemented at the pump, one for cars, one for bikes, and one for HGVs. The problem is that the current road tax system is so disjointed, there are 13 different tax brackets each for normal and alternative fuel cars produced after the 1st of March 2001, it's insane.

Of course, the classic car brethren would not like this as they do not have to pay road tax, and I'm sure all the greens in their electric boxes and hybrids would pipe up too.

I agree with you about insentives to cycle. There are people at my work who live 5 minutes away but still drive in. It's too far for me to ride, so I use a bike with an engine.

I'd also like to see more effort put in to getting more parents and children to walk to school. They often live close enough, but still drive, half the time in oversized SUVs. I used to walk a mile to school and a mile home every day, why can't people manage it these days?