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Haulage costs up £10-150 a week?

16th April 1976, Page 4
16th April 1976
Page 4
Page 4, 16th April 1976 — Haulage costs up £10-150 a week?
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

by CM reporter IT WILL cost hauliers between £10 and £50 a week more to run their vehicles if proposals in the Government's Green Paper on Transport Policy get the go-ahead.

For although the consultative document accepts that in the future the vast majority of freight will still be moved by road, it says that the lorry is not paying its way.

And to restore the balance it suggests that taxes be increased to a level which would put up the annual average operating costs for all commercial vehicles by 5 per cent and some of the heaviest vehicles by 15 per cent.

Using the current CM Tables of Operating Costs this means that a 10-ton rigid, covering 800 miles a week, could cost an extra £10 a week and a 32-ton art ic, covering 1,000 miles a week, could cost an extra £52.50.

To justify such huge increases in taxes the paper claims that in the past few years the levels of fuel and licence taxes have fallen behind the pace of inflation.

Recent estimates showed that the cost of providing roads and maintaining them because of the wear and tear from goods vehicles was significantly more than the taxes levied. Goods vehicles over 3.5 tons gross vehicle weight contributed only about 80 per cent of the costs which could be laid at their door during 1975/76.

To counter this trend the paper suggests that lorry taxation should be related to the costs caused by the different types.

"This would mean steeper tax increases for heavy lorries, particularly for those with few axles and high axle loading which cause disproportionate damage to the roads they use."

To begin the process of recording data about lorry axles and laden weights for assessing the new approach to lorry taxation, the Government has taken powers in this year's Finance Bill, says the report. This is understood to mean that information about vehicle types and capacities will be asked for in 0-licence applications and renewals in future.

Estimates of the additional environmental costs cannot be made with the same degree of accuracy, the report goes on, but they are likely to be significant.

These tax changes would not be expected to radically alter the volume of road freight traffic. But bulk traffic over long journeys would have the greatest incentive to switch to rail, and empty and part-loading running would be discouraged.

Although these proposals have still to be discussed with the industry the Government says in the Green Paper that any tax increases would have to be phased over a period to give both the road haulage industry and the vehicle manufacturers time to adjust.

The aim of the document is to get an overall coherent and integrated transport policy for Britain. Its publication will be followed by three months of consultations after which the Government will publish its final plans.

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