Road charging 'will go ahead' - Road charging: your say

Road-charging has really stirred up a hornet's nest in the news lately, and it looks like it has stirred your passions, too, judging by the amount of e-mails we've received on the subject.

Here's a selection of your comments:

For road charging
We have to tackle global warming and congestion - building more roads is a farce. It is easy to sign against something, but how many of those people have got an alternative? The vast majority would oppose a motorway at the bottom of their garden.
Greg and Wendy

I do VERY little mileage - I work through a VPN (Virtual Private Network) so I can be anywhere in the world! It’s not expensive to set up and working from home gives me more freedom.
Ryan Youle


Against road charging
Just another tax, for the war?
William Stevens

I am against road-charging at any time. We are charged enough with road tax and petrol tax as it is. If you want us to stop using our cars then get your act together regarding public transport, and by that I don't mean price it to such an extent that it becomes unaffordable to use or selling it off to the private sector so that they can bleed us dry, either.

When are the government actually going to renationalise the transport system and take it in hand, as in hire the people who will run it efficiently and to our benefit? Address the problem at the root and you will resolve the fiasco that you are in at the moment.

Ignore the people’s views and you will see such a ground force of discontent that will make the petrol strike pale into insignificance. You can count me in any march regarding the above.
Mariette King

How can pay as you go 'cut' congestion? All it means is we will be paying more money to use the roads that we own as a country.

Also the part about paying more at times where there is a lot of congestion. What will that do? People need to travel at certain times. It's just a fact.
James McDonald

Definitely very much against it. Public transport is inconvenient and expensive in the majority of cases. I am not totally against public transport, but I don't see how the Government can have such a definite anti-driving stance when it is not prepared to invest money into public transport thereby encouraging more people to use it.
Linda Briscoe

If the government wants to decongest our roads they should take a look at Scandinavia. During a recent holiday in Finland, Norway and Sweden I was amazed at the lack of motorways (they don't need them) and trucks (they sell them to us) because freight goes by rail or sea. Then, they could take a look at Canada where, I am told, freight has priority on the railway. Once again I found the roads to be pretty empty.
T.L Haig

How on Earth can anyone justify charging money for every mile they drive as a way of "reducing congestion"?

I admit I don't perhaps have the years of road experience older drivers have, but I feel, from a younger driver's point of view, that in many respects this seems another way of driving young drivers off the road! OK, so you only have to be 17 to learn to drive (I know this is a separate issue, but...), but soon you'll have to be 30 to be able to afford to drive!

And who, I ask, is this going to hit hardest? "The high mileage drivers who do many business miles". Of course it's not going to hit them! Their companies are just going to swallow the costs of course! It's going to end up being the everyday Tom, Dick or Harry like you and me who feels the bite the most!

It seems to me, and an awful lot of other people I know, that this is just another method for the Government to screw every last penny out of all our hard-earned cash!

I think it is outrageous
Samuel Blundell

People that have to travel will have no alternative than to pay, it will make little or no difference to congestion. Just another form of TAX!
Tom Field

I live in The Highlands of Scotland and have to travel 27 miles each way to work every day.

I cannot get public transport as it is unreliable and does not run at the times I have to be at work - I am a NHS worker.

As far as penalising the polluters it is the aircraft that should be made to pay.
John Dalziel

Definitley against another tax against motorists - all of whom have the chance to vote this government out next time
R Middleton

Road charging is not theway to cut congestion. It will result in rural roads becoming 'rat runs' as drivers try to find cheaper routes.

In the short term, the government should spend more time finding ways of reducing the amount of heavy freight on the roads by transferring goods to trains and water-borne alternatives.
Guy Wilkes

Road Charging will only reduce the private motorists who will look to drive elsewhere, not those on business who will pass the cost on.

Far better to reduce traffic by increasing the price fuel which is easy to collect, makes people think twice about using cars, reduces carbon dioxide emissions by penalising thirsty vehicles, and incentivises the purchase of fuel efficient cars.

It will also encourage local shopping and employment. Extra money raised can be used to bring down the costs of public transport.
Michael Forrest

If one lives around eight miles from the nearest shop, to charge to get to our nearest town on a per mile basis is absurd and will yet again hit the countryside hardest, especially as where we live there is only an infrequent - twice-daily - bus service and no train service!

So inevitably we are opposed to this scheme of road charging
Anthony Rowell

Road charging will make no difference to congestion levels - people will simply pay more to travel the same amount. It is not as if there is a credible alternative to car use unless you happen to live in the South East or a metropolitan area. My 10-minute journey to work in the car would take me an hour by public transport and cost around three times the same journey by car.

As far as I can see, road charging is both a cynical way of raising more tax from the poor motorist and more control freakary from an obsessive government.
Nick Smith