Fuelling inflation

At what point does any government decide that they're taking enough from the motorist who has to pay increasing sums to fill the fuel tank?  Judging by recent increases in both VAT and fuel duty the ConLib alliance remains blissfully unaware of the impact at the pumps.

For millions of hard-working families, recently referred to by Cleggers as "alarm clock Britain" (what a ridiculous phrase), who are now paying around £70 to fill up, the cost of getting to work is increasing at rates way above inflation.  The irony is that the cost of fuel is, er, fuelling the inflation that the Bank of England is keen to tame.  The likely outcome is that interest rates will be heading up; we can almost here Bruce Forsyth (in Play Your Cards Right mode) asking if it's going to be higher or lower than 0.5%  I think the studio audience would be screaming at the hapless contestant: "Higher, higher, higher".

When we remember that the cost of fuel is only 42p per litre we can see exactly why governments quite like having millions of cars on the road; every mile you drive and you're sending money to the government at the rate of almost £1.00 per litre.  If your vehicle does 30 miles per gallon you're dropping around 13p per miles to the government.  If you do 10,000 miles per year, yep that's right, £1,300.00 in tax that you simply cannot avoid.

So, whilst governments are keen to be seen to be caring for the environment they actually don't want to reduce the easy money that we motorists provide -- and that we provide so willingly.  If governments are so keen to be green, why are they spending soooo much money on widening our motorways that will encourage more traffic?  It also explains why they're so slow at re-opening Beeching's closed railway lines (closed by Marples, who happened to be a director of a road-building company) or why they won't electrify the whole network.  Indeed, previous governments have actually looked at the impact that new rail lines will have on the motoriing public; if too many drivers might switch to rail and, therefore, reduce tax revenue from driving, they would not open the line.

It is time for the government to stop fleecing the motorist and work towards a properly joined-up transport network.