I EDITOR'S COMMENT SAME OLD SONG It would be easy
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to dismiss this with: "Well they would say that wouldn't they". What is more disturbing is that the Labour Party seems to think that by investing more money in the railways, freight traffic will inevitably move away from the roads, and to hell with market economics.
It is no accident that close to 80% of freight traffic goes by road: it is the most flexible and cost effective way of carrying goods from A to B. Ask the Royal Mail what it thinks about rail, Suppose we do put more freight on the rails, how does it get to the railhead? By truck. And how does it get to the customer at the end of that rail journey? By truck. And how will it bridge all those missing links in the rail network? By truck.
Understandably, British Rail wants to have more money spent on its network, especially with the advent of the Channel Tunnel. It clearly sees a golden opportunity to win back business from hauliers and will no doubt be lobbying hard for more cash. Well and good, but will the road haulage industry be offered a similar level of investment, without the strings? After all, the Government's promise to spend El 3bn on the roads isn't only for the benefit of truck operators; it's for everybody using the roads, and using them to the detriment of the haulier who finds himself increasingly frustrated by congestion. If British Rail gets more money for its railway, will it be fighting for track space with other railway companies? Probably not.
Leaving aside the question of how many trucks it takes to match the atmospheric pollution of a coal-fired power station, it is no good for Labour to simply say that the "polluter must pay". What must be decided is who are the biggest polluters, and how can they be curbed. The simple fact is that there are many more cars (driven by far more voters) pumping out far more pollutants than there are trucks.
And when going Green bangs up transport costs, resulting in more expensive goods and higher inflation, will it really be the polluter who pays?
Labour's plans to revamp VED to favour fuel-efficient vehicles is also off beam: truck diesel engineers are already predicting that the trade off for more clean engines could well be in fuel economy.
The debate over protecting our environment is too important to tie down with party political dogma, be it of the left, the right or the centre. We all want to save the world for our children. But there are no quick fixes.