Any motorists reading the next sentence may want to dismember me. Motoring in this country must become more expensive.

Outrageous, some might say. The British motorist is already clobbered at every turn. It costs more to drive in this country than anywhere else in Europe and costs are rising all the time. Motorists pay far more than their fare share of taxes and end up subsidising the exchequer as it is. Stuff and nonsense. Let’s try a few facts instead.

Britain is not the most expensive country in Europe. Have people forgotten how much they had to fork out in tolls the last time they drove on a French or Italian motorway? We come about half way down the league table.

Nor are our costs rising all the time. It is cheaper to drive in Britain now than it has ever been. Over the next few years it will become much cheaper still as cars become more efficient. In ten years from now it will cost 20 per cent less to run a car than it does today.

Yes, we hand a great dollop of duty to the Treasury every time we fill our tank, but we would have to fork out more still if we were to meet the true costs of motoring. Building and repairing roads is only a small part of it. Cars are bad for our health and bad for the environment.

The bill for treating all those people with diseases caused by the filth that comes from our tailpipes is £11 billion. Then there are the 320,000 people who are injured in crashes. And how do you put a price on death? In 2000 there were 3,409 road deaths. A child under the age of 14 is more likely to be killed in a car crash than in any other way.


I could go on, but what’s the point? We love our cars and a boring lecture from me about the consequences of global warming and congested city centres and all the rest of it is not going to make a blind bit of difference. It’s the freedom our cars give us, isn’t it?

We talk about that freedom as though we were Toad of Toad Hall parping his way around the leafy, empty lanes of England. As Toad might say: “Pah!”

Freedom to get out of our noisy cities on a bank holiday weekend and drive to the quiet beauty of the Lake District? Fine, except that it means sitting on the M6 in a 50-mile tailback. When we get there, frazzled and fed up and dreading the journey back again, we meet the other million motorists who had exactly the same idea. So much for peace and quiet.

'We talk about freedom as though we were Toad of Toad Hall, parping his way around the leafy, empty lanes of England.'
Freedom to live in the country and drive to our city offices in the morning? Fine again, except that you have to leave so early and get back so late to beat the traffic jams that you’d be better living in town with a window box.

Freedom to drive our kids to work in the morning? Great, if you want them to get fat and lazy and asthmatic from all those fumes from a million mums idling their engines outside the school gates.

Freedom to drive around our cities? In London’s rush hour you don’t move at all for 28 per cent of the time. And rush hour lasts almost all day.

This is all madness and it has to stop. And, for one reason or another, it will stop. Either we pay or we queue. There really is no choice.

Space on our roads is like any other commodity. If there is too much demand and too little supply it must be managed. Stalin dealt with the problem of shortages in the Soviet Union by allowing the queues to form. It was rationing by queuing. We have been doing much the same in this country with the roads. We need a more sophisticated mechanism and road pricing provides it.

Of course there will be problems. Rich people can absorb the charges. Poor people, especially those who live in rural areas, cannot. And nor can they rely on public transport because it’s mostly lousy. But if the rich pay enough they will be effectively subsidising improved public transport.

We have to decide what sort of country we want to live in over the years to come. Do we really want an American lifestyle where the car rules and no-one ever walks or cycles? Already we make 85 per cent of all our journeys by car. Or do we want something more civilised?

John Humphrys has enjoyed a wide and distinguished career as a journalist. He has been a presenter of BBC Radio 4’s Today programme since 1987 and fronts BBC1’s On the Record. He has also presented the Nine O’clock News and Panorama.

Just goes to show:

 

Georgedagnes never reads the posts:

 

That was posted yonks ago.

 

And thoroughly and comprehensively rubbished.