MEP calls for help to beat EU road toll plan
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by Karen Miles A Euro MP is calling on hauliers to help him defeat European plans to introduce tolls across European Union trunk roads.
West Midlands Conservative MEP Philip Bradbourn wants operators to let him know their views an European Commission suggestions that the burden of truck tax could be shifted away from vehicle and diesel duties and towards road tolls.
The EC says OK operators could benefit from any reform of the EU's vehicle and diesel duties because the UK's higher tax burdens would be replaced with road tolls to be paid equally by all EU operators.
No firm proposals have been made by EU Transport Commissioner Loyola de Palacio, but a report for the EC last September argued that flexible tolls could discourage the trucks that cause the most pollution and road damage. Time-sensitive tolls could also encourage off-peak operation. The initiative looks unlikely to get very far because all 15 governments of the EU would have to approve any tax changes. But Bradbourn fears that if the plans do ever come to fruition. UK operators would face even higher taxes. "I would be highly sceptical about any rounding down for the UK," he says. 1 have never heard of any government ever agreeing to tax less. There is likely to be a levelling up in the rest of Europe rather than a levelling down in the UK.
"I'm trying to make sure the Commission is aware how much opposition there is across Europe and that they shouldn't actually proceed with it," he adds.
• Contact Philip Bradbourn, European Parliament, Office ASP 14 E 169, rue Wiertz, 1040 Brussels, Belgium.