The chairman of the National Infrastructure Commission says motorists will “inevitably” end up paying per mile to drive on Britain’s roads as the switch towards electric cars drains away fuel taxes
The Daily Telegraph quotes Sir John Armitt as saying the Government has to consider new ways of funding Britain’s critical infrastructure, as the Treasury faces the loss of nearly £30bn in fuel duty receipts.
“Politically, it’s a very difficult issue. Many people will say road pricing is inevitable,” he’s quoted as saying. “Personally, I don’t see why it should be any different to anything else. We pay for all our other infrastructure services as we use them.
“At the extreme … you could pay a different rate, per time of day, per type of road you were driving on, anywhere in the country and you just get a bill because it would all be monitored remotely.
“At the end of the day, it’s the public who pay. We pay either through our taxation, or we pay at the point of use or our pensions are used to invest.”
Earlier in the year, former Transport Secretary Chris Grayling said on the Highways Voices podcast that pay per mile charging was the “elephant in the room”.
“I don’t think we’re going to wake up one morning and have a government white paper saying we’re going to introduce a pay per mile on every stretch of road in the UK,” he said. “What I do think is we’re going to see more… paid for miles for lorries on motorways, for example, it may mean pay per mile in and around urban areas. I think that the Treasury is going to have a deep desire to introduce road user charging in order to offset the loss of revenue from electric vehicles, but I’m not convinced it’s going to get its way anytime soon.”
(Picture – Yay Images)
