Fat Tax on Cars?

[Patrick]

The number of cars in Britain has grown from 21m in 1991 to 28.5m in 2011 and could be 32m by the next two decades. and there has been a significant rise in obesity rates in the same time - How about putting a "Fat Tax" on cars to lift them slightly out of the affordability scale? According to the RAC a year or so back, the cost of motoring is as cheap as it was in 1988. It's indicative of the cost of buying a car that according to another set of statistics - One third of the 20.8m homes with front gardens have now been paved over to accommodate vehicles. No one is saying take them out of the hands of people altogether, simply make it so having three is a luxury and not "The Norm"!?

How far did you used to walk as a child? If we missed the bus - even as a little'un it was nothing to us to toddle the five miles into town and I did the same myself as a teen and young adult. With children today being ferried to school ten minutes drive away - If the car wasn't there - they'd have no choice.

Naturally, the money would be ringfenced to give a proper boost to community transport services. Maybe even to the bus operators if they promised to use it to keep extra services running, which isn't always the case. So how about it? They're talking about a fat tax on food - but if people still aren't exercising - it's not going to help much is it?

[riotgrrl]

Oh Patrick, you know you'll get support from me for any anti-car rant. . . but then I can't drive and I will never be able to (my eyesight certainly doesn't IMPROVE with age, and I'd be terrified to drive a car with my weird vision.)

I can't believe how so many people have lost the ability/urge to walk even short distances. If something is only a mile up the road, why on earth wouldn't you just walk a mile there and a mile back and think nothing of it? OK, I'm a walker, and it's my default method of transport locally, so I regulary walk the 2 miles in and out of work, and the 3 miles to my daughter's house, using the bus if I'm running late or if the weather's bad.

Yet people think I'm on some kind of fitness kick for this. Really? Would most people who only lived 2 miles from their work not just walk it?

Cars are great. I wish my household had a car and driver in it as it would be so handy sometimes. But we manage fine without using public transport and, in emergencies, taxis. Sure, I've spent £60 on a taxi fare when it's been necessary, but this only happens once or twice a year at most and is still, therefore, cheaper than the cost of running a car.

[housesparrow]

I'll fess up; I probably use the car for speed and convenience at times when I could make the journey by foot or bus.

But on other boards I've come across anti-car posters who think nothing of accepting lifts from drivers, and indeed think it is the bounden duty of car owners to seek out the carless and offer to transport them here and there. Any non-driver accepting a lift has a counter duty to pay their way, if necessary leaving the cash in the car.