The most vociferous proponent for road pricing is the RAC Foundation. In its latest report, published today, the RAC Foundation again calls on the Government to stand up to nay-sayers (1.8 million motorists signed a petition against road pricing in 2007) and introduce a pay-per-mile system.

Interestingly, the Institute of Fiscal Studies, which produced the report for the RAC Foundation, said:

“Road use generates costs which are borne by wider society instead of the motorist.”

Read that again. This is the RAC Foundation and the IFS admitting that motoring generates what economists call “negative externalities”. The orgs omitted “negative”, but still, this is ground-breaking stuff. Here’s more from the report:

“These ‘externalities’ mean that in the absence of taxation or pricing, there is an inefficiently high level of road use. Taxes can help bring private demands into line with the socially desirable level. Several different externalities are associated with motoring. Some, like carbon emissions from burning petrol and diesel, are easily addressed through fuel duties as the costs depend entirely on fuel use. Others, notably congestion but also the costs of noise and accidents, vary enormously according to where and when someone drives.”

The rest of the report then goes off to lobby for road pricing. The executive summary is very careful to talk about VED, rather than “road tax.”

But let’s explore those “externalities.”

The 2009 Transport Select Committee report, Taxes and Charges on Road Users, calculated the total taxes and charges on UK road users as £48 billion per annum. The report quoted the typical annual expenditure on roads as about £8-9 billion.

In the same report, the Department for Transport estimated that the average marginal external cost of driving a car an additional kilometre is 15.5 pence allowing for the congestion (estimated at 13.1 pence per kilometre), infrastructure, accidents, local air quality, noise and greenhouse gases. This compares to 3.6 pence per kilometre paid in fuel duty and VAT.

However there are other costs to society as a result of our existing car-dependent transport patterns. In 2009 a Cabinet Office Strategy Unit report on urban transport attempted to quantify the costs of our existing urban transport patterns. Working with the Department for Transport, the Department for Communities and Local Government, the Department of Health and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), they arrived at the costs shown here:

The figures are based on the best available evidence sources, adjusted to 2009 prices. Where there is uncertainty or disagreement, they have stated the likely range as shown in lighter shading in the bars. The conclusions changed policy makers’ understanding of the situation. Previously, congestion had been thought to represent the majority of transport’s external costs to society. Now the combined costs of accidents, air quality, physical inactivity, greenhouse gas emissions and noise at £27-38 billion per annum represent 71-78 per cent of the total.

The total cost for the English urban areas is estimated at £38-49 billion. Given that the Cabinet Office’s report states that this covers 81 per cent of the population, scaling up the appropriate impacts gives an estimate of £43-£56 billion for the whole of the UK.

It is important to note that the report makes no attempt to quantify the external costs of negative social impacts, despite referring to reduced social cohesion and interaction as a result of traffic. Yet research in Norway estimated that the cost of community severance (the ‘barrier effect’ due to transport infrastructure such as busy roads) is greater than the estimated cost of noise and almost equal to the cost of air pollution.

The Cabinet Office report also excludes the impacts of noise pollution on health, productivity and the ecosystem and does not attempt to quantify ‘quality of life’ impacts of the built environment. However it acknowledges that all these areas could represent significant additional costs, mentioning for instance an additional £4-5 billion for noise impacts on health and productivity alone.

Alternatively, estimates of the marginal costs of road transport provided in a report commissioned by the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions result in a higher total cost figure of £71-95 billion (in 2006 prices). This excludes the costs of physical inactivity and other as yet un-monetised costs such as severance effects and loss of tranquillity. According to the Campaign to Protect Rural England and Natural England, the monetary values for landscape and loss of countryside have not been calculated.

The Campaign for Better Transport extrapolates from the Government research on marginal external costs to reach a total cost of externalities of £70 billion–£95 billion per annum at prices for 2006.

The Sustainable Development Commission, a non-departmental public body (2000-2011) responsible for advising the UK Governments, concluded:

“So it would appear that the overall costs imposed on society by motoring outweigh the revenues obtained from motorists, probably very substantially.”

And the externalities of driving costs don’t include noise pollution (£3.1bn); air pollution (£19.7bn – not including CO2); water pollution (between £1bn and £16bn); or obesity (£2bn).

But there are other, hidden subsidies, too. Donald Shoup, Professor of Urban Planning at UCLA in the US, estimates that providing free off-street car parking in the US cost a whopping $386bn in 2002 (in the same year, the US government spent $349bn on defence). As UK town planners operate to similar rules to their US counterparts – in that any major development has to have a set number of parking places, most of them unfilled but there ‘just in case’ – UK drivers get similar parking subsidies. No doubt it’s in the magnitude of many billions of pounds.

Fair’s fair. If cyclists were ever asked to contribute cash to get a “seat at the table”, to have a say in transport infrastructure decisions, any payment they made for the provision of excellent cycle facilities ought to be offset by the cost savings made by cyclists for the benefit of the economy. Going on just some of the externalities, we could be due for a rebate of somewhere in the region of £50bn. Such a rebate isn’t far-fetched. In Norway, the Norwegian Public Roads Administration pay for employees to cycle to work instead of driving. In Copenhagen the city calculates that for every kilometre a citizen on a bicycle rides, society earns 1.22 kroner [25 US cents]. For every kilometre a citizen drives in a car, society pays out .69 kroner 89 [13 US cents].”

In the UK, there is already a kind of excise tax on bicycles. A very small percentage of the money we spend in bike shops (except Halfords) is given to the Bike Hub fund. This part-pays for the Bike It cycling-to-school programme; Bike Week; the New Ideas Fund; and BikeHub.co.uk Disclaimer: I sit on the Bike Hub committee and I edit BikeHub.co.uk.

HYPOTHECATION & WHY THERE’S NO SUCH THING AS A TAXATION OPT-OUT
Taxes and Charges on Road Users, a 2009 report by the Transport Select Committee, said hypothecation is “the establishment of a direct link between specific taxes or charges and specific expenditure. For example, taxes levied on alcohol might be earmarked for spending on hospitals. In the UK there is no such link for taxes.”

The report said:

“the Government opposes the idea of hypothecation of tax revenues. It argues that decisions about revenue raising and spending should be kept separate for two main reasons:

• if all income were to be hypothecated, it would create severe difficulties for those services that could not readily raise revenues, such as schools, hospitals, police and defence; and
• inefficiencies would result. For example, if a large sum was raised from road users, hypothecation would dictate that it was all spent on roads (or possibly other transport modes, such as buses), even if the public priority was for more investment in, say, education.”

So, the taxes raised from motoring do not, and can not, ever go to facilities for motorists. If they did, the taxes raised by alcohol sales could be used to build bigger pubs. And married couples without children could ask for their taxes not to be spent on schools; and pacifists could ask for their taxes not to be spent on Trident nuclear submarines. Taxation doesn’t work this way.

I met John Griffin today. I gave him an ipayroadtax jersey (later in the day I also gave one to the editor of The Times). I don’t suppose Griffin will ever wear it (the editor of The Times told me he cycles so I’m hoping he wears his), but just because he won’t be squeezing into Lycra any time soon, doesn’t mean Griffin hasn’t taken on board some of the criticisms voiced by the boisterous #boycottaddisonlee campaign. 

Griffin is likely to be one of the Addison Lee folks to attend a cycle training course run by London cycle trainer David Dansky of Cycle Training UK. I’m hoping to tag along, too. And so will the Addison Lee PR executive, Alistair Laycock.

I had a one and a half hour meeting with Laycock. He revealed he’s been a weekend cyclist for about a year, does sportives, but had yet to brave the bike ride to the Addison Lee HQ at Euston from his home in Tooting. He’s going to start.

Laycock said Addison Lee execs were taken aback by the vehemence of the some of the #boycottaddisonlee tweets, Facebook postings, and name-calls at last week’s ‘die in’.

In retrospect he agrees it was a mistake for Add Lib, the Addison Lee corporate magazine, to poke the cyclists’ hornet nest when the real beef was with black cab taxi driver access into London’s bus lanes.

Stung by the criticism from cyclists, Addison Lee is willing to make amends, said Laycock. He has read the action plan posted on this site last week and said the company wants something good to come out of the conflict.

The existing driver training programme will be expanded to include more cycle awareness issues, and the company’s self-employed drivers will be incentivised to take the courses on offer from Cycle Training UK.

Getting drivers – any drivers – out from behind their windshields, crumple zones and airbags, and on to bicycles, is one of the ways to make them appreciate the cyclists’ point of view on road safety. We need space. When in the middle of the lane we’re not “blocking the way” because we “think we own the road”, we’re keeping clear of parked cars, not riding in the gutter and are being alert to possible pinch-points ahead. Drivers who spend a few hours on bikes, in real world traffic conditions, may take all this on board. Really, such cycle awareness ought to be in the driving test but that’s another battle.

Interestingly, Laycock said the company is evaluating the placement of front-facing video cameras in its fleet of 3700 vehicles. If these are fitted it will be easier for Addison Lee to check a driver’s eye view of an incident involving a cyclist who complains of being hit or threatened by an Addison Lee minicab (such cams could also prove that the driver was blameless).

What Addison Lee won’t do is sponsor a cycle team or put cash into a cycle charity, said Laycock.

“Since the war of words started we’ve been approached by lots of cycle concerns urging we support their cause as some sort of pennance. We’re not going to do that. It would be rightly seen as a knee-jerk reaction.

“The offer of putting drivers through cycle training is genuine. We contacted David Dansky last week to start the ball rolling.”

It’s very possible that Addison Lee expects – or has been told – its defence against Transport for London’s injunction will fail. [UPDATE: it did. Mostly.]. TfL was quick off the mark when John Griffin’s infamous letter to his drivers went viral over the weekend of 14-15th April: an injunction was lodged to make Griffin withdraw his letter. I spoke to TfL yesterday and a spokesman said the injunction result was expected today or tomorrow. The withdrawal of the Addison Lee press release likely means Addison Lee knows it has lost this particular battle. The war will continue. Addison Lee has its own legal case. It applied for, and got, a judicial review on TfL’s bus lane restrictions. A decision in this case is expected later in the year.

In the meantime, John Griffin has managed to do something incredible: he has made black cab taxi drivers see eye to eye with cyclists. On the day of the #boycottaddisonlee ‘die in’, cabbies were giving way to cyclists, with a cheery wave of the hand. And cyclists were doing likewise. ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend.’ Taxi drivers had been fighting alone against Addison Lee – their attempts to derail the Addison Lee smartphone were piecemeal, obvious and ineffective until cyclists joined in. Griffin knew he had no friends in the taxi driver community but it was an act of extreme folly to open up a second front by picking on cyclists.

Taxi drivers may never be happy with Addison Lee, but perhaps Addison Lee could build bridges with cyclists? How could the company do this? Here are a few ideas. I’d welcome more. Add them in a comments box here, or talk about them on the #boycottaddisonlee Facebook page.

1. TRAINING
The Addison Lee driver training programme is said to now incorporate a few minutes on looking out for cyclists. This should be beefed up, especially as cyclists have made it plain they view Addison Lee drivers as some of the most aggressive and dangerous on the road. All Addison Lee drivers – new and old – should have to ride in London traffic for at least half a day. This will give them some appreciation of why carapace-free cyclists get so defensive about their personal space. Taxi drivers have some appreciation of two-wheel concerns because their ‘knowledge’ training programme starts with navigating London on a moped.

2. ROADS ARE FOR ALL
John Griffin should withdraw his comment about cyclists having to “pay up” to “join the gang.” His statement about ‘road tax’ shows he believes motorists pay for roads and that “freeloaders” such as cyclists ought to start paying, too. Griffin needs to acknowledge that motorists have no greater right to the public highway than horse riders, pedestrians and cyclists. Roads are a shared national resource. One subset of road users don’t have any greater rights to use that shared public resource. Griffin can start his education here. The Addison Lee training programme should stress the point that roads are for all.

3. TRAINING
John Griffin’s point about compulsory training for cyclists seems perfectly reasonable to motorists who have all had to pass a compulsory driving test. But as the majority of cyclists are also driving licence holders the majority of cyclists are already trained to same level as those who choose to be propelled by the internal combustion engine. Griffin needs to acknowledge this. He may also wish to acknowledge that there is an existing training programme for cyclists, young and old. Perhaps Griffin would like to step away from his Bentley for a few hours and do a Bikeability course? Perhaps the Addison Lee driver training programme could involve some Bikeability training?

4. SPLASH CASH
If Griffin can afford to drop £250,000 into the coffers of the Tory party and yet have no expectation of getting anything in return perhaps he should divert such largesse to projects with more chance of a payback? How about becoming a corporate sponsor of the London Cycling Campaign? Or funding one of London Cycling Campaign’s training schemes for elderly cyclists? (Yes, John Griffin could actually pay to make grannies less wobbly on their bikes). [Idea inspired by @cycloxoxford]

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TRANSPORT FOR LONDON’S INJUNCTION AGAINST EVANTECH/ADDISON LEE

Here’s the full copy of High Court verdict in the battle between Transport for London and Addison Lee. TfL won most of its injunction but had to drop one part, leaving enough wriggle room for Addison Lee chairman John Griffin to – bizarrely – claim outright victory.

Mr Justice Eder said it was “necessary and just and convenient” to grant TfL a temporary injunction stopping Evantech/Addison Lee from “encouraging” its minicab drivers to enter London’s bus lanes. It’s temporary because there’s a Addison Lee requested judicial review on the way.

Monday’s ruling – revealed today – prevents Griffin’s company from “causing, encouraging or assisting” its minicab drivers from using London’s bus lanes.

Justice Eder said: “It seems to me that unless an injunction is granted, there is a substantial risk of significant problems [with 60,000 minicab drivers entering bus lanes].”

Addison Lee’s wriggle room comes after TfL had to jettison that part of its case which sought to force John Griffin to withdraw his original letter sent to its drivers telling them they could enter bus lanes, and that he’d pay their fines. In theory, Addison Lee drivers can now choose whether to break the law or not and Griffin’s letter is allowed to stand.

26th April 2012

TfL press release:

TfL’s High Court injunction prevents Addison Lee from instructing its drivers to use bus lanes

· Court ruling also labels Addison Lee ‘indemnity’ as void and unenforceable
· Court rejects Addison Lee claim that an instruction had not been issued
· TfL urges private hire drivers to note the ruling and continue to obey the law

Following a ruling from the High Court today (Thursday 26 April) Addison Lee is prevented from instructing or encouraging its drivers to drive in bus lanes and must remove the statement on its website instructing drivers to do so.

The Court also declared that the ‘indemnity’ Addison Lee issued to its drivers on 14 April offering to pay for fines and other costs when they drove in bus lanes was “void and unenforceable“, and cannot be repeated.

Leon Daniels, TfL’s Managing Director of Surface Transport, said:

“Today’s judgment prevents Addison Lee from instructing or encouraging its drivers to drive in bus lanes in London. The court felt compelled to grant an injunction because of the substantial risk of Addison Lee taking action that could result in the law being broken. We maintain that Addison Lee’s instruction to its drivers was irresponsible and at odds with its position as a private hire operator.

“Bus lanes enable buses to move around the capital efficiently carrying more than six million passengers a day. We maintain that allowing tens of thousands of Private Hire Vehicles to drive in bus lanes would impact on the reliability of our bus services, and risks inconveniencing our customers.”

The interim injunction will remain in place until judicial review proceedings, on the issues of private hire in bus lanes, conclude.

Despite the instruction from Addison Lee we are pleased to see that, last week the vast majority of private hire drivers continued to obey the law and not drive in bus lanes.

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Here’s the bluff-and-bluster press release from Addison Lee:

TfL fails to succeed in its bid to muzzle Addison Lee over bus lanes

Transport for London has been forced to abandon its application for a mandatory injunction requiring Addison Lee and its chairman John Griffin to withdraw their letter to drivers stating that they are entitled to drive in London bus lanes and to send out a further letter instructing them not to do so.

Mr Justice Eder, who handed down judgment today following a High Court hearing on Monday 23 April 2002, has instead confirmed that it is for drivers to choose whether or not they drive in bus lanes pending the resolution of Addison Lee’s legal challenge to the validity of the bus lane legislation.

The judge noted Addison Lee’s argument that the bus lane legislation as it stands constitutes “flagrant discrimination in favour of black cabs” and against private hire vehicles and that this “gave black cabs a significant unfair competitive advantage causing [private hire vehicle] drivers significant loss”. The Judge recognised the urgency of the problem by ordering that Addison Lee’s claim should be expedited so that it is determined by the High Court before the Olympic Games.

In the meantime, the Court has confirmed that it would be entirely lawful for Addison Lee to decide, after any fine has been imposed on a driver for driving in a bus lane, to reimburse that driver in respect of the fine should it wish to do so.

John Griffin, chairman of Addison Lee said: “This is a great start to our campaign to challenge the unfair bus lane legislation. We hope to fully overturn the legislation to offer faster journey times to our customers and to offer a competitive transport service during the Olympic Games.”

Despite being 75 years past its sell-by date ‘road tax’ is a term that refuses to go to where the other long-gone duties have gone (anybody out there still paying ‘window tax’)? Anyway, no big deal: ‘road’ and ‘tax’, just two little words. But, for the few minutes it’ll take to read the rest of this short article, let’s imagine ‘road tax’ did exist. If it existed, who would pay it, and who wouldn’t, and why?

1. Drivers who own the Volkswagen Golf 1.6 TDI Bluemotion 105 don’t pay ‘road tax’*:

2. Drivers who own the new Volvo V40 won’t pay ‘road tax’*:

3. More than one million disabled drivers don’t pay ‘road tax’:

4. Children don’t pay ‘road tax’ even though they sometimes have to use roads when walking or cycling to school:

5. Horses don’t pay ‘road tax’, even though they use roads and have most definite tailpipe emissions:

6. Electric vehicles don’t pay ‘road tax’:

7. Tractors don’t pay ‘road tax’:

8. Cyclists don’t pay ‘road tax’:

9. Police cars don’t pay ‘road tax’:

10. The owner of this Rolls Royce does not have to pay ‘road tax’ because it was built before 1973. Motorists with pre-1973 cars don’t pay ‘road tax’:

YOU OWN A CAR, NOT THE ROAD: Payment of ‘road tax’ does not give anyone the right to demand “their” roads are pothole-free, widened to allow greater speed or ‘improved’ in any way. Paying a few hundred quid a year – even if ‘road tax’ did exist – wouldn’t go anywhere near paying a fair proportion of the negative externalities of mass motoring.

MORE SUBSIDIES: Band A motorists, disabled drivers, police cars and tractors and so forth are supplied with tax discs showing they pay zero for their ‘road tax’. The cost of a tax disc is £1.47 for those bought at a Post Office, and 95p for those bought online.

But let’s keep it simple and say the cost to print, distribute and sell each car tax disc is a quid. There are about 2 million vehicles which don’t pay car tax. That’s two million quid of subsidy to get tax discs to those who don’t pay for them.

MOTORISTS WHO WANT CYCLISTS TO PAY ‘ROAD TAX’ WOULD PAY MORE ‘ROAD TAX’: Some motorists want cyclists to pay ‘road tax’. Do they realise that bicycles, as non-polluting vehicles, would be classified as Band A vehicles and hence would have to pay the same as cars that pay nothing for their ‘road tax’? With 25 million bicycles in ownership, that would be £25m to get each bicycle a valid tax disc. Do motorists really want to pay a lot extra for their car tax to subsidise registration and duty compliance for millions of bicycles?

‘Road tax’ is car tax, a tax on car emissions. Its full and proper name is graduated vehicle excise duty, VED for short. VED, car tax, vehicle tax, whatever you want to call it, is not a fee to use the road. Much more info on this here. If you’re now confused, thinking ‘if road tax doesn’t exist, what pays for all that tarmac I drive on?’, there’s a simple answer to this: roads are paid for out of general and local taxation. Motorists don’t pay for roads, we all pay for roads. We all have equal right to use those roads.

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* Other cars which don’t pay ‘road tax’ (apart from all cars, because ‘road tax’ doesn’t exist) include:

Kia Picanto • Fiat 500 • Peugeot 207 • Ford Fiesta 1.6 TDCi 95 Econetic • Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 CDTi ecoFLEX • Audi A1 1.6 TDI • MINI One 1.6 • Citroen DS3 1.6 e-HDi • Volkswagen Polo 1.2 TDI Bluemotion
MINI Cooper D 1.6 • Volvo C30 1.6 DRIVe • Volkswagen Golf 1.6 TDI Bluemotion 105 • Audi A3 1.6 TDI Stop/Start • Volvo V50 1.6 DRIVe

All of these cars are in Vehicle Excise Duty band A because they emit less than 100gms of CO2 per km. According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders there are currently 65,000 such band A vehicles driving on the roads of the UK. However, because the number of these low emission cars is rising, the Government is losing out on loads of logy. This can’t go on. At some point the Government will reduce the CO2 threshold. In this ‘road tax to be hiked’ story Auto Express magazine claims that senior motor industry figures predict the Government will reduce the threshold to 85g/km: “Industry insiders suggest only cars emitting 85g/km and below would be exempt in 2016 – excluding Ford’s new 87g/km Fiesta ECOnetic – and that this will be cut annually to 2020.”

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This piece was inspired by this combatitive posting. Pic of children from Heatherton.

[UPDATE: Addison Lee has updated its app and this has nudged up the star rating from one-and-a-half stars to two-and-a-half stars. The 250+ bad reviews are now shunted backwards, leaving a shiny new space for some more comments. UPDATE ON THE UPDATE: At 16.30 on Monday 23rd April, the app was back to being a one-star failure, a word-of-mouth train wreck. And by Thursday 26th April even the new app had had nearly 150 reviews, about 99 percent of which were scathing. This will hurt more than Addison Lee lets on: in an interview with the FT last year, Addison Lee boss John Griffin said: "we feel that word of mouth is the best form of advertising. By Wednesday 25th April there had been 400+ negative reviews left on the iTunes store for the Addison Lee iPhone app.”]. Last Monday’s ‘die in’ at the Addison Lee HQ lasted an hour or so, and was in response to John Griffin’s misjudged comments.

Addison Lee may have a thick corporate skin but it can’t fail to be worried by the scathing reviews of its business on places like Yelp, Google, and, most especially, the bad reviews now appearing for its smartphone app developed in Russia. (See base of article for tech info on the Addison Lee app and check out these ideas for how Addison Lee could build bridges with cyclists).

It’s nice to see that Addison Lee have taken recent events into account and updated their iPhone App. twitter.com/Pundamentalism…

— James Martin (@Pundamentalism) April 23, 2012

The Addison Lee CEO is certainly proud of his company’s app. It generated £23m in fares last year. But following this #boycottaddisonlee heads-up on BikeBiz.com, it appears that the app’s rating on both iTunes and Google Play is heading to the dreaded ‘one star mark of shame’ (there’s also a Windows 7 version: users, you know what to do). And the reviews, oh, the reviews, they’re devastating.

John Griffin: read ‘em and weep:

And, on Android…

ADDISON LEE: From Russia with not much love for cyclists

All credit to Addison Lee, the company did the right thing to bring out an update. For a few hours the app had a few of its star-ratings back. But good ol’ social media soon pegged the app back to where it belongs: at just one star, the lowest rating possible. And there have been many more bad reviews. A few 5 star ratings and positive reviews were very likely left by Addison Lee staffers, or perhaps the app dev team in Russia.

Addison Lee’s tech is done by Haulmont Technology, which outsources its coding to Samara in Russia, home of the Samara State Aerospace University.

According to a 2009 article in Computing magazine, 16,000 companies hold corporate accounts with Addison Lee including 50 percent of the FTSE 100 companies.

Over the past week Addison Lee been able to make buddies out of black cab taxi drivers and cyclists. Earlier it cheesed off UK tech firms, when IT director Peter Ingram told Computing British coders were too expensive:

“[Our Russian developers] are bloody hard working and are appreciative of the opportunities offered by working on our projects. The cost of living in Russia is lower than the UK, so they are a lot less expensive to use than British developers.”

This relative cheapness likely means there will be more updates from Addison Lee, and more faux reviews from Addison Lee staffers. Although the company’s 3500 “self-employed” drivers don’t appear to be creating 5-star reviews for their “client”. Could it be because of treatment such as this?

AddLib magazine is handed out to Addison Lee customers and is available in the 4000 vehicles used by the company for 25,000 daily journeys in London.

Griffen wrote:

Green party candidates and others are up in arms about what they see as the murder of Cyclists on London Roads.

There has, as we all know, been a tremendous upsurge in cycling and cycling shops.This summer the roads will be thick with bicycles, These cyclists are throwing themselves onto some of the most congested spaces in the world. They leap onto a vehicle which offers them no protection except a padded plastic hat.

Should a motorist fail to observe a granny wobbling to avoid a pothole or a rain drain, then he is guilty of failing to anticipate that this was somebody on her maiden voyage into the abyss. The fact is he just didn’t see her and however cautious, caring or alert he is, the influx of beginner cyclists is going to lead to an overall increase in accidents involving cyclists.

The rest of us occupying this roadspace have had to undego extensive training. We are sitting inside a protected space with impact bars and air bags and paying extortionate amounts of taxes on our vehicle purchase, parking, servicing, insurance and road tax.

It is time for us to say to cyclists ‘You want to join our gang, get trained and pay up’.

Road tax doesn’t exist. It’s car tax, a tax on cars and other vehicles, not a tax on roads or a fee to use them. Motorists do not pay directly for the roads. Roads are paid for via general and local taxation. In 1926, Winston Churchill started the process to abolish road tax. It was finally culled in 1937.

The ironically-named iPayRoadTax.com helps spread this message on cycle jerseys (wear one next time your work makes you use an Addy Lee minicab). Car tax is based on amount of CO2 emitted so, if a fee had to be paid, cyclists – who are sometimes branded as ‘tax dodgers’ – would pay the same as ‘tax-dodgers’ such as disabled drivers, police cars, the Royal family, and band A motorists, ie £0. Most cyclists are also car-owners, too, so pay VED.

Many of those who believe road tax exists – such as John Griffin – want cyclists off the roads or, at least registered, but bicycle licensing is an expensive folly.

“You behaved like a bully. You used your vehicle to intimidate and threaten. That’s like using it as a weapon.”

However, the judge’s opinion that motorists fear sentences in dangerous driving trials is wide of the mark:

“People who lose their temper and use their cars to threaten and intimidate, and where they cause fear and harm, must understand the consequences will be severe.”

Tell that to the family of Karl Austin or the families of other cyclists mown down by motorists (sometimes deliberately and not just because of SMIDSY). The consequences of killing a cyclist are rarely severe.

While the majority of motorists slow down when they see a horse (a startled horse can do a lot of damage); some motorists have entitlement issues, believing horses shouldn’t be on the public highway. To such motorists, the only modes of transport that should be allowed on roads are those equipped with motors. Cyclists, horse riders, and pedestrians have no right to be on the road, say they. The belief is that only motorists pay for roads so only motorists are entitled to use roads. This is a commonly held, but mistaken, belief. Motorists don’t pay for roads directly and, even if they did, vehicle excise duty and fuel taxes wouldn’t be enough to pay for all the externalities that mass motoring brings in its wake.

Some motorists believe that ‘road tax’ pays for roads. As cyclists and horses don’t pay ‘road tax’, they have lesser rights to use roads, or no rights at all. This is not an accusation plucked out of thin air. Motoring forums are chock full of Clarkson-clones, happy to advertise their prejudices against “freeloaders”. Similarly, on Twitter, you don’t have to search too hard to find motorists with entitlement issues.

Earlier today @Lozturnerrr wrote: “[horses] shit on roads and it makes a mess of your tyres but don’t pay road tax #holdingagrudge.”

Plus they shit on roads and it makes a mess of your tyres but don’t pay road tax #holdingagrudge

— lauren turner (@Lozturnerrr) April 14, 2012

Earlier this month I tweeted back and forth with Twitter user @BennyFreer (he thought I was an equestrian) after he had written: “Horse rider telling us to slow down…Who pays the road tax?”

His friend @JakeBilly chimed in: “Horses should be in fields not on the road! #whodotheythinktheyare.”

Horse rider telling us to slow down .. Who pays the road tax ?

— colonel gadeafi (@BennyFreer) April 6, 2012

@BennyFreer also said: “roads priority is for cars etc take the horse off the road where they belong #factnotfiction,” and “they don’t pay to use it then they shouldn’t have priority” and “people riding two abreast should be shot!”

It’s highly likely that @BennyFreer and his petrolhead mates don’t know how roads are actually funded and certainly aren’t conversant with The Highway Code:

191: Horse riders. Be particularly careful of horses and riders, especially when overtaking. Always pass wide and slow. Horse riders are often children, so take extra care and remember riders may ride in double file when escorting a young or inexperienced horse rider. Look out for horse riders’ signals and heed a request to slow down or stop. Treat all horses as a potential hazard and take great care.

(Rule no 53 contradicts part of the advice above, “never ride more than two abreast, and ride in single file on narrow or busy roads and when riding round bends.”)

It’s interesting to note that many equestrians would like to have what many cycle advocates are clamouring for, infrastructure separated from the source of danger.

The British Horse Society says:

“No proposals are put forward to connect the existing equestrian public rights of way network so that equestrians have a safe off-road network to use. This despite the fact that NHS statistics for 2010-11 show that 3,875 horse riders or occupants of horse drawn vehicles were admitted to hospital in England as a result of being injured on our busy roads. Figures such as these prove the inadequacies of the current fragmented equestrian network and demonstrate the need for a comprehensive connected network. With each accident potentially costing the nation thousands of pounds the cost of getting further equestrian routes put onto the definitive map represents good value and provides a recreational resource for walkers and cyclists as well.”

Thank you for contacting us about our story involving Karl Austin who was killed while taking part in a time trial on the A50 in Derbyshire. I was producing East Midlands Today on that day and I’d like to offer some background information which should give you a fuller picture of our decisions.

In the light of recent deaths, the sole purpose of the interview was to discuss the use of busy main roads for cycling time-trials and every question was asked in that context. Many people have judged the entire interview on one selective clip posted on several internet sites including YouTube.

In that clip our presenter puts forward a common criticism many motorists have of cyclists that since they don’t pay “Road Tax” how do they justify using the highway? “Road Tax” was a colloquial reference to Vehicle Excise Duty. With hindsight we accept the question should have been phrased more carefully. It would have been better to ask: “Many motorists will say they’re taxed to drive their car and they’re not allowed to race on the roads – why should cyclists?” [my emphasis]

The interviewee – John Stewart – was given the time to correct the misconceptions about “Road Tax”, pointing out that the tax no longer exists, that VED doesn’t pay for road maintenance and that cyclists pay all sorts of other taxes.

You may not be aware that this was the second time we’d reported on Karl’s death. On March 6, the lorry driver accused of careless driving appeared pleaded guilty when he appeared before Derby Magistrates. In that night’s programme we carried a report on the case, then followed it with a studio interview about the growing demands for greater safety measures to protect cyclists. I believe this sequence put the issue of cycling safety into context for our viewers. It also painted a picture of Karl as a talented, experienced cyclist who would be deeply missed by his family and friends.

On April 12, we featured a report about the sentence given to the lorry driver who caused Karl’s death. This was followed by an interview with Mr Stewart, who organised and took part in the time trial in which Karl was killed. The reason for looking at this subject was simple: many people are just unaware that time trials can be held on almost any public road. At a time when there are high-profile calls for greater safety for cyclists – as discussed at length in our March 6th programme – the idea of using a dual carriageway for a timed race appears to be contradictory.

I have re-examined all our coverage of this story including the interview with Mr Stewart and I don’t believe it was an aggressive line of questioning. It was certainly challenging but Mr Stewart responded calmly and robustly. I do not agree with those people who have accused us of insulting Karl’s memory. On two separate occasions, our court reporters have carefully explained that Mr Austin loved his sport, was highly-regarded as a competitor and would be missed by his family. We have remained in contact with Mr Austin’s widow and father and I will be talking to them again over the next few days to discuss any concerns they may have had over our latest coverage.

Thank you for contacting us,

Regards,

Kevin Hill
Assistant Editor

I replied.

Hi Kevin

Thanks for the reply.

Your second attempt at the question would also be wrong.

A. Motorists are taxed on the emission levels their cars emit. A car can be stood still all year round but the VED would be the same. The common mistake people make is to think that VED is some sort of fee to use roads, when it’s nothing of the kind.

B. Technically, motorists *can* race on the public highway, under certain conditions, see ‘road rally’.

Your presenter voiced a common criticism that’s factually incorrect and he didn’t state it was factually incorrect.

Yes, the guest was then able to correct the presenter but the way the question was phrased showed a lack of understanding of the basic issues of what can and cannot be legally done on roads. The question was also crass and, in the context of a road death, was unsympathetic. More research should have been carried out by the presenter beforehand.

Was the question formulated and agreed in advance or was it asked ‘on the fly’?

Here’s the beef: if this had been a news story about a person being killed when crossing the road while taking part in, say, a sponsored walk, a BBC reporter would not question whether that person had paid to use that road and as pedestrians don’t pay “road tax” they shouldn’t be on roads. The full background to this story is carried below.

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Put a lit rag on a furniture shop sofa: 11 years in jail. Change your Facebook status to “let’s start a riot”: four months in jail. Kill a cyclist with a truck, admit to speeding and dangerous driving: suspended sentence and a two year driving ban. It’s against this background that we should view last night’s ignorant and insensitive question by a BBC reporter, interviewing the organiser of the time trial event at which 47-year old Karl Austin lost his life. More on this below.

The sentence handed down to the 62-year old HGV driver was, in fact, severe compared to similar SMIDSY cases. Many drivers who kill dispute they were driving dangerously (even if they are caught speeding or texting at the wheel) and are often charged with the lesser offence of careless driving, with slap-in-the-wrist sentencing that makes a mockery of the justice system.

Karl Austin was killed in broad daylight, on a long, flat stretch of road with good visibility at the time. His death occurred on the A50 dual carriageway in June 2011. Yesterday the speeding HGV driver who killed him was sentenced at Derby Crown Court. The judge told the driver he had been guilty of “an appalling loss of concentration” but did not hand down a sentence that might send out a message to other drivers, a message that motoring requires 100 percent concentration and that if you kill a fellow human because of inattention you ought to be automatically charged with, at the very least, involuntary manslaughter.

Motor vehicles are heavy, fast and, in far too many cases, deadly. Inattention while operating a piece of machinery that can kill should carry a stiff penalty.

Yet Judge Michael Fowler told the driver:

“Passing a draconian sentence on you doesn’t in any way honour the death of Karl Austin.”

Huh? Sentences are not there to honour the dead, they are there to punish wrong doing and deter others from committing similar crimes.

According to @kayaburgess of The Times, Austin’s father Keith said: “Our hope that a stiff sentence would send out a signal…that more care was needed where cyclists are concerned has been dashed.”

Keith Austin was “quite appalled” at the sentence but had been prepared for such a “lenient” decision.

Lawyer Martin Porter, ‘The Cycling Silk’, has a thoughtful and considered article on sentencing for SMIDSY motorists on his blog.

He writes:

“Motorists must have brought home to them that the consequences of failing to drive carefully around a vulnerable road user could be very severe for them, as well as to the person they endanger.”

It’s not just cyclists who suffer from the consequences of “inattention”, it’s pedestrians and, of course, other motorists, too.

A news report on BBC East Midlands Today [BBC iPlayer link] allowed Austin’s family to make many of these points, and the outside broadcast reporter filed a relatively balanced piece. However, back in the studio, the programme’s co-host asked a guest an incredibly insensitive and ignorant question about the rights of cyclists to ride on roads.

BBC East Midlands Today’s chief reporter Quentin Rayner told John Stewart, a cycling club official: “[cyclists] don’t pay any road tax, how do you justify using the highway?”

Stewart calmly countered with facts, but why did Rayner – he’s no Paxman – ask such a question? Does Rayner genuinely believe roads are paid for by a tax abolished in 1937? And, further, does he really believe cyclists shouldn’t ride on highways if they haven’t paid this non-existent tax?

The use of the phrase “road tax” is no big deal, it’s a term in common use. The Post Office and the AA and other organisations now use the more accurate term ‘car tax’ but, still, it would be mere semantics to criticise somebody for using a colloquial term. However, it’s not semantics when the person or organisation using the term for a tax that was abolished in 1937 believes that payment of this “road tax” pays for roads and gives those who they believe pay this tax more right to be on the road than cyclists, who, it’s assumed, don’t pay this tax.

Car tax, or vehicle excise duty, is a tax on tail-pipe emissions, it’s not a fee to use the road. Many small cars emit low amounts of CO2 so don’t pay vehicle excise duty. Roads are paid for by general and local taxation, not VED. Millions of drivers don’t pay VED. Accusing cyclists of not paying “road tax” is an attempt to assert that cyclists have lesser rights to be on roads, or no rights at all. This is a point of view that endangers cyclists who are often verbally and physically abused by motorists for “not paying road tax.”

Quentin Rayner should apologise to the family of Karl Austin for asking his ignorant and insensitive question. He should also apologise for not questioning why killer drivers seem to get pitifully low sentences.

Following much twittering back and forth, Times reporter Kaya Burgess got the following article online. The screen-grab is there as proof the retraction was made, just in case the cyclesafe stuff ever goes behind a paywall.

The Times joins other organisations which have now recognised that “road tax” is 75 years beyond its sell-by date. Previously, the AA, Which?Car and the Plain English Campaign have stated their desire for accuracy when it comes to describing what is VED, vehicle excise duty or, as the Post Office calls it, ‘car tax’.

It’s good to hear that Fiat is enlisting Olympic cyclists to front a ‘share the road’ campaign, as I reported on BikeBiz.com. Members of the British Cycling team will be working with Fiat to highlight the importance of cyclists and motorists sharing a finite resource: the roads of Britain. And Fiat has confirmed it no longer refer to ‘road tax’ in adverts, joining the AA and other organisations: the correct term is ‘car tax’ or ‘vehicle tax’ or Vehicle Excise Duty. VED is a tax on vehicle emissions, not a payment for use of roads.

Fiat is the Official Vehicle Supplier for British Cycling and is to run a campaign called “Let’s clear the air” to coincide with the launch of its revised Punto.

Geraint Thomas is one of British Cycling’s star riders who will be taking part in a campaign “to improve relations between cyclists and motorists on the road.”

Thomas said this would help show that “we’re not guys in Lycra who don’t pay taxes,” a reference to the abusive term “you don’t pay road tax” some drivers shout at cyclists.

One of the reasons the myth of “road tax” lingers is that car companies use the term in their advertising. Including, er, Fiat.

But not any more.

The “Let’s clear the air” campaign will avoid “road tax” references, as you’d expect with clued-up road cyclists on the payroll. Hopefully Fiat will start a trend and other car companies will steer clear of mentioning a tax killed in 1937, a tax used to intimidate cyclists.

Tom Johnston , press relations manager, told iPayRoadTax.com:

“We will only be referencing ‘No Vehicle tax’ when referring to the TwinAir engine (95g/km CO2), and when doing so we will never refer to cyclists in a negative way. Throughout the campaign we will continue to support relations between cyclists and motorists and we are very pleased to be working alongside British Cycling to reinforce this.”

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Incidentally, in yesterday’s Metro newspaper, Thomas said: “Most cyclists own cars too, so we all need to try and get along.”

Last year, Ian Austin MP asked a parliamentary question about the numbers of cyclists who own cars. Minister for Local Transport Norman Baker revealed that, according to the National Travel Survey, 83 percent of cyclists own cars, which is a percentage point higher than the number of non-cyclists who own cars.

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Does the fact some motorists don’t know what pays for roads bother you? Wear the iPayRoadTax jersey and tell the world!