Rood costs tax attacked by FTA
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GOVERNMENT claims that commercial vehicle taxation should be increased because trucks and vans do not pull their weight on road costs, have come under renewed attack from the Freight Transport Association.
Figures released this week by the FTA reveal that goods vehicles not only pay their fair share of track costs — they also pay 50 per cent too much!
This fresh challenge to the Government comes at a time when the Department of Transport is pencilling in the final details of the White Paper on transport policy, scheduled to be unveiled in May.
Shortfall
It was last year's Consultative Document on transport which sparked the row over track costs. The Green Paper claimed that commercial vehicles did not pay their way when it came to the costs of the road system, and suggested that taxation should be raised to get back the shortfall.
Both the FTA and the Road Haulage Association criticised the way in which the Government had allocated costs. This had been done on past levels of road spending, but the associations countered by saying that future expenditure should be the criteria.
Update
Figures produced in a joint effort by the associations last July showed that, with an anticipated decline in future road expenditure of 11 per cent, light vans would be paying two and a half times the amount needed to cover their track costs.
And even at the heavier end of the industry, vehicles would more than pay their fair share.
Now the FTA, with its new figures, has taken into account the cuts in the road programme, announced in July and December. A spokesman for the FTA told CM the updated figures reveal that for all classes of goods vehicles, present taxation is pulling in 50 per cent more than the costs they cause. Heavy goods vehicles were paying out 20 per cent more.
The FTA accepts that there are some categories of vehicles which do not meet their full costs, but says this is made up by other classes of truck.