Apathy 'loses case'
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• An attempt to launch a legal challenge against the Government's high vehicle and diesel taxes looks set to fail because of lack of interest.
South Coast-based transport consultant Cohn Ward says he has had "not much of a response" to the public appeal he made in March urging hauliers and the trade associations to try to fund a legal challenge on the grounds that the Treasury is breaking European rules by putting hauliers in an anti-competitive position.
Ward hoped to generate a fighting fund to finance legal advice on this issue. If there appeared to be a case he had hoped the Government could have been challenged before the European Court of Justice (CM11-17 March).
"They just don't want to support it—that's the industry all over," says Ward, of Ward International Consulting.
Competition lawyers say a legal challenge could be worth exploring. The lack of interest in the initiative comes despite the thousands of hauliers who have taken to the streets in recent weeks to protest over high VED and diesel duties.