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item0054A 840, 841 840 5 October 2003 The noise of roosting chickens
Congestion charging has always contained within it a "system flaw". By focusing penalties on specific "congested areas", it creates a million boundary-lines between chargeable and non-chargeable areas. Poor ol' Ken Livingstone is now struggling with the effects of business disruption in central London, and the threat of business flight - all of which I predicted. I have always argued for a universal charge, payable for the very privilege of using the vehicular highway itself, for any distance, during prime weekday periods. The sooner that Gordon Brown converts the "congestion charge" into an honest, universal, highway usage charge, the better. On this front, I am no Johnny-come-lately. My submissions on a Daily Usage Charge were submitted to Gordon Brown in 1997 before he became Chancellor. I am delighted that political opinion is moving - albeit at glacial speed - in this direction. If motorists could limit their costs by reference to the actual use made of the highway system, many millions would be far better off - while heavy users (particularly commercial users) would pay more. I believe that, given the necessary political balancing-skills, the changeover could generate millions upon millions of personal "winners" and a much more limited number of "losers". Vehicle Excise Duty would be abolished, and Petrol Tax reduced. And for my part, I would exempt Old Age Pensioners and the agricultural community from the payment of any highway usage charge at all.
7 October 2003 Fiscophobia a crippling disease
We are all trapped in the schoolboy politics of “tax”. The 1987 Double Whammy stalks the corridors of political power. We are in the grip of fiscophobia. Our new Labour salariat believes that their electors will sack them if they propose “higher taxes”. The Tory salariat believes, by parity of reasoning, that they will inherit Labour’s jobs if they promise the electorate “lower taxes”. The political contest is said to be as simple as that.Yet the truth is that “private goods” and “public goods” are becoming more and more closely intertwined, incapable of principled differentiation. And public goods are increasingly “monetarised”, paid for according to individual choice and usage. There are certain "zones of state action" which demand standard, universal provision, funded generically from tax-income. But beyond that, there is every reason for extending these more informal practices.
Money now enters the "public purse" by a hundred different paths, without being perceived as a “tax”. Indeed, it seems to be one of Gordon Brown’s obsessions that every new impost should be categorised as These presentational obsessions are now inhibiting political thought. In a number of sectors, the State is potentially the most appropriate provider of scarce services - transportation, and financial services (lending, pensions, savings). In these sectors, there is ample room for mobilising state-income by way of mechanisms other than "tax", and we should not be inhibited about addressing them. I do not consider that the Health Service, given the character of the fundamental promise made to our people, is amenable to "co-funding" - the state service cannot be combined convincingly with the discretionary purchase of remedies.
The probability is that in coming years the scope for "public goods" will increase, rather than decrease. Public services are likely rise, as a proportion of GDP, rather than decline. For example, the complexities of ensuring continuity of electricity supply are likely to trigger stronger public intervention, as with water supplies and overall environmental quality - these are quintessential "public goods". And they will offer opportunities for co-funding.
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