QIX trade unions are to participate in an approach to
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the Chancellor of the Exchequer to protest against the present level of taxation on oil fuel and to present a case for immediate relief. They are the Transport and General Workers' Union, National Union of General and Municipal Workers, National Union of Railwaymen, National Union of Vehicle Builders, Electrical Trades Union and .the Amalgamated Engineering Union.
The National Council for the Omnibus Industry and the National Joint Industrial Council for the Road Passenger Transport Industry are presenting the case to the Chancellor on behalf of both sides of the industry. A spokesman of the councils said last week that it was iniquitous that bus travel should be classed as a super-luxury. Most bus journeys were made for essential purposes.
"During the last three Budgets the tax has been raised to the fantastic figure of over 200 per cent., a burden which has necessarily had to be passed on to the travelling public. It is difficult to visualize a more certain way of stimulating conditions of inflation," he stated.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer has replied to a letter from Lord Sandhurst, chairman of the British Road Federation, in which a case for a reduction in the fuel tax was made out. "I have noted your suggestions and will certainly bear them in mind when I review the level of the oil duty," stated the Chancellor. "I can assure you that I appreciate the importance which you and your members attach to the matter."
Lord Sandhurst pointed out that a cut in the fuel duty would decrease the cost of transport, the rearmament programme and capital expenditure projects, in particular housing.
At the current rate of 2s. 6d. per gallon the estimated tax yield in the year ending March, 1953, will be f233m., compared with £181m. in 1952, £125m. in 1951 and £50m. in 1950. In three years, therefore, the volume of taxation will have multiplied five times, said Lord Sandhurst.
NEW BAN ON HORSES?
TN the House of Commons, on I Monday, Mr. Gurney Braithwaite, Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport, said that he was considering with the Commissioners of Police whether existing restrictions on the use of horse-drawn vehicles in the City and West End of London should be extended.
ROADS WILL NOT BENEFIT " 'THERE is as yet little indication of
1 any further investment in the roads on a scale in proportion to needs," says The Financial Times, reporting the Government's decision to relax restrictions imposed on capital investment at the end of 1951. The railways, however, will benefit.
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