Road Tax Increases

[Tempus Fugit]

Apart from a 5% increase in the basic fees, there is an additional £5 tax to raise extra revenue to provide additional safety measures and miscellaneous other expenses which the department have no funds for.

 

THIS IS A STEALTH TAX.

 

It is despicable to raise taxes on the motoring public by this means.

 

It is money which should be raised in estimates and department budgets.

[Speckled Frost]

Sorry Tempus, that's all gone on saving the MEA

[Alias]

Good thing I don't use electricity.

[ian rush]

Apart from a 5% increase in the basic fees, there is an additional £5 tax to raise extra revenue to provide additional safety measures and miscellaneous other expenses which the department have no funds for.

 

THIS IS A STEALTH TAX.

 

It is despicable to raise taxes on the motoring public by this means.

 

It is money which should be raised in estimates and department budgets.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

 

Firstly, the % increase is below the rate of economic growth (6.4%) and broadly in line with inflation. Secondly if the £5 increase increases safety (whether it be pedestrians, motorists or otherwise) then I've got no problem with motorists paying it given that they're the main reason roads are dangerous. Thirdly, road tax is administered by the Treasury. How precisely can the DoT raise money apart from toll roads?

 

Finally how is money 'raised' by an estimate? I thought we paid taxes backed up by the sanction of law. I'd like to live in a place where money just appeared in government coffers because they gave an estimate and no need pay taxes.

[FCMR]

It could be to cover the costs of Government employees parking allowances

[ans]

THIS IS A STEALTH TAX.

 

It's not very stealthy if you're here posting on an internet forum about it.

[Jonty]

Disgraceful. It's about the cost of a gallon of petrol.

 

that's 26 miles less you will be able to drive each year.

 

 

Or 12 if you have one of those 4x4's

[=^..^=]

I know this is geting away from the original point but bear with me.

 

We've just come back from a trip away and where we were you saw the price for something on the shelf and when you paid for it the tax was added at the till. So basically you know how much something costs and you also know how much the government is charging you for buying it.

 

Imagine if we did that here with petrol. What is the current level of taxation on fuel ? About 90% ? So a litre of petrol would be advertised at say 18p but cost you 93p.

 

I think we would be whinging less about the petrol companies and more about the govt..

 

The extra fiver seems fair though - they do have a shed load of brand new yellow signs to pay for (and to put new sticky numbers on every 6 months or so)

 

And while I'm mentioning the yellow signs has any one got a picture of one ?

 

I'd quite like to photshop it to say something like "Accident black spot. 6 injuries in three years out of 3,000,000 vehicles. Go on, enjoy yourself and drive like lunatic - you have more chance of winning the lottery than being injured"

[Tempus Fugit]

A submission and vote against this order from the DOT was Mr. Speaker (Tony Brown) who raised the point that this was not the correct way to raise money whether it be for road safety improvements outside schools or any other miscellaneous projects, which should be properly budgeted for and funds allocated by the treasury in the normal procedure.

 

A second speaker against the order stated that the larger engined vehicles were only being increased by a total of 8% (5%+£5) whereas the smaller engined vehicles were being increased by 14% (again 5%+£5) which he thought was the wrong way round if the object was to get people to reduce carbon emissions and save the planet by using cleaner engines or smaller engines. I don't know how much our contribution to GW adds compared with the US population driving 4 and 7 litre monsters on fuel 'as cheap as chips' and who don't seem to worry about GW.

 

It was also stated by another speaker that in increasing the fees in accorance with the inflation rate, that this action also added to inflation.

 

 

Now to deal with the junk

 

IR ~ I will disregard all the superfluous comments about raising money by estimates, the point is that it is not the way to run government.

DoT set the fees which as you say 'are administered' by the treasury, but will be itemised as receipts attributable to DoT operations, which will

have been part of the expected income in the departmental estimates submitted to treasury when applying for their funds for the forthcoming year.

 

If you don't believe it is a stealth tax (ans) that's up to you, but when you go to renew your licence don't be surprised it's shot up another £20 or £30 from last year (or maybe you are eco-friendly and walk everywhere or use the horse trams and take the exhaust products home to feed the roses).

 

If you have any problem understanding any of this, try reading the transcript of the proceedings for yourself. I just commented on what I heard this afternoon (by accident really, I hadn't intended listening to tynwald, just stumbled onto it when looking for the S100 commentary)

 

Don't shoot the messenger, if you didn't read it on here or hear it live on the radio would you know how the clowns are running the circus

I doubt it will be reported in the paper or on mandate (unless Stu finds out when he goes to tax the Jag).

 

On the subject to the raw cost of fuel, I have never been able to understand how they can add petrol duty, then add vat on the duty, - a tax on a tax !

[ans]

If you don't believe it is a stealth tax (ans) that's up to you, but when you go to renew your licence don't be surprised it's shot up another £20 or £30 from last year

 

I wont be surprised because I already know it was being raised. The rules and effects for this increase seem pretty clear. This isn't a 'stealth tax' and perhaps you need to check up on what that actually is instead of getting your financial buzzwords from the Daily Mirror.

[Stavros]

The extra fiver seems fair though - they do have a shed load of brand new yellow signs to pay for (and to put new sticky numbers on every 6 months or so)

 

And while I'm mentioning the yellow signs has any one got a picture of one ?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

What I don't understand is that some of the new sticky numbers that have appeared on the signs go down!

 

i.e. "11 8 Casualties in the last three years"

 

Did they get the maths wrong in the first place?

 

I'll try and get a picture of one.

 

Stav.

[Lonan3]

The extra fiver seems fair though - they do have a shed load of brand new yellow signs to pay for (and to put new sticky numbers on every 6 months or so)

 

And while I'm mentioning the yellow signs has any one got a picture of one ?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

What I don't understand is that some of the new sticky numbers that have appeared on the signs go down!

 

i.e. "11 8 Casualties in the last three years"

 

Did they get the maths wrong in the first place?

 

I'll try and get a picture of one.

 

Stav.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I think they're just trying to say that the incredibly expensive signs have produced a result i.e that they have made people more aware of road safety and the number of accidents has been reduced.

[ans]

Did they get the maths wrong in the first place?

 

It's a rolling three years innit. If four people died on a road in July 2002, then at the end of this month, the figures for the last three years are changed as those four deaths are no longer in the three year period.

 

They really should have done it '11 casualties since xxxx' as this would have required less changes and possibly been more effective as the number changes would have reflected recent events rather than three year old stats.

[Stavros]

You'd have thought that they would have made the necessary changes when they had to replace the signs along the Shore Road, Gansey when the newly installed signs got blown out to sea during the storms earlier this year.

 

They could have done the same thing to some of the other signs that were blown down by the storms about a month after they were installed.

 

Stav.

[teapot]

Alternatively they could have not put the signs up and saved some money!! I wonder how many accidents there will be from people driving along and trying to read the signs!!