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Labour backtracks over road pricing plans
Page 7
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CM COVER STORY
THE GOVERNMENT has admitted that the recession played a part in its decision to drop proposals for a national road charging scheme.
Last week, transport secretary Lord Adonis announced that the Department for Transport has scrapped the plans — which would have seen charges of up to £1.30 per mile levied during peak times. "We are not proceeding with national roaduser charging in the next Parliament," he says. "It will not be in the manifesto for the next election. I don't believe, as Britain is coming out of recession, that this is the time to put road charging on the agenda."
Adonis believes that local programmes are still a possibility, but that any council looking to charge motorists would "have to prove they had public support': Shadow transport secretary Theresa Villiers says: "Yet again, Labour confirms that its manifesto promise and flagship policy on roads has bitten the dust.
"We have been telling them for years that a national spy-in-the-sky road pricing scheme is unnecessary and unwanted, and we are pleased to see them following our lead."
Jack Semple, Road Haulage Association policy director, says road pricing should be an option for any government if it was linked to the construction of a particularly important road-building project.
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