A UK government group has just released a proposal that would impose a per-mile tax on motorists to rescue the planet from an imagined catastrophe. The Committee on Climate Change (CCC), a body established by the UK Parliament to advise the government on environmental issues, has set a target of a two-percent annual reduction in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. CO2 is a naturally occurring gas that is essential to human life. The committee believes it can reach its goal by imposing massive new taxes on drivers that will reduce demand for driving which, in turn, would reduce carbon dioxide output.
“Evidence in this report suggests that road pricing would result in a significant emissions reduction (e.g. around 6 MtCO2 in 2020) if there were no offsetting reductions in other aspects of transport pricing (i.e. fuel duty, vehicle excise duty),” the report explained. “The committee recommends therefore that the government should seriously consider road pricing.”
Already, taxes account for half of the cost of gasoline in the UK. Officials have already approved an increase in the gas tax of 6p (US 10 cents) by 2013. In addition, the group proposed reducing the national 70 MPH highway speed limit to 60 MPH and using GPS-enabled devices to cut off power to engines attempting to exceed existing limits.
“Given that the 70 mph speed limit is an existing policy, the committee believes that the government should seriously consider enforcing this, either through the current enforcement mechanism, or through rolling out Intelligent Speed Adaptation technology to both new and existing cars,” the report explained.
Another 4.6 million drivers would be forced to go through “eco training.” Taxpayers would also heavily subsidize the purchase of electric vehicles and the new infrastructure that would be required to recharge them. The report explained that batteries for an electric vehicle with an 80-mile range cost $13,000, while those of a vehicle with a 200-mile range cost $42,000. As most consumers would refuse to spend such a premium, the report recommended £9.8 billion (US $15 billion) in subsidies to promote the technology.
“Implementation of the required measures to achieve budgets would in some instances save people and businesses money and in total cost less than one percent of GDP,” the report explained.
In other words, the whole suite of CCC proposals would cost the British economy a total of $26,800,000,000. Chapter six of the report is excerpted in a 4mb PDF file at the source link below.
Source: 
Meeting Carbon Budgets — Chapter Six (UK Committee on Climate Change, 10/12/2009)
[courtesy thenewspaper.com]
Any doubts the “Hope and Change” crowd won’t jump all over this?
John_K:
Any doubts the “Hope and Change” crowd won’t jump all over this?
The “Hope and Change” people probably came up with this stupid idea in the first place, and is now exporting it to other countries…
What an utterly moronic, unnecessary and redundant proposal!
After idiot Ray Lahood, who, like all other US politicians, is too much of a coward to just increase the GAS TAX instead, now the Brits, whose gas already costs well over $7 a gallon, most of which is tax, now propose this moronic per mile tax, when they can get the same revenue without any extra cost of a whole new bureaucracy, by just increasing their huge gas tax by a few pennies more.
Pathetic…
If they implement all of the above in the article, millions of discusted Brits will get rid of their cars and few will buy new ones. Cash for Clunkers all over again for the long suffering taxpayer!
What brilliant proposals!
NOT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The stupidest part of this is the fact that it removes an incentive to drive a more fuel efficient vehicles.
Also, how about gearing cars to be more efficient at 70, instead of lowering speed limits.
This is worse than a “stupid idea”. This is tyranny.
If you act on any scientific information in the next decade of your life, act on the fact that carbon dioxide is utterly benign, required for human life and essential for EVERY living plant, tree and crop to be “green”.
Efforts to control your behavior under the guise of “the environment” are the modern tactics of those who wish to end the free market and personal liberty.
ACT now to stop this.
KnowItAll :
October 12th, 2009 at 12:20 pm
carbon dioxide is utterly benign
Tell that to coal miners.
If your policy goal is to reduce the number of miles driven, a per-mile tax is certainly a good way to doing it. They can’t just raise the gas-tax because in a world of EVs and efficient hybrids, raising the gas tax does nothing to affect driving habits.
This will never happen here in the US. We’re too dependent on the road system for the voters to tolerate this kind of taxing. We can’t stomach raising our fuel taxes to a responsible level, so I don’t see this ever happening.
England’s small geographic area minimizes annual vehicle mileage, 7,100 miles on average. It’s roughly 550-miles from Land’s End to Berwick-on-Tweed, the northernmost town in England before the Scottish border.
The global warming boondoggle loses steam every day. If they can bafflegab this for a year or two it will be exposed as just another tax grab and go away.
It would be nice to sit back and say it’s the UK’s problem but unfortunately they are merely a testing ground for policy elsewhere. It’s just easier to impose on the subjects.
I see a business in defeating the electronic warfare they wage on the public. Illegal but highly lucrative.
KnowItAll: “Efforts to control your behavior under the guise of “the environment” are the modern tactics of those who wish to end the free market and personal liberty.”
Or they’re just hoping their grandchildren will find the planet happily habitable in 2100.
The Newspaper: “CO2 is a naturally occurring gas that is essential to human life.”
Actually, there are all kinds of things in the biosphere that are “essential to human life” but are best left in the proportions nature provides.
Really? A government report suggests that we are just one more tax away from solving major problems?
Any excuse for the left to collect more taxes. (lol)
The UK and US economies are in a deep recession.
Government spending is up substantially in spite of it.
We are literally relying on debt purchases from foreign countries.
Oh, and we do have this little global warming issue to contend with.
How do we solve it?
By creating a big brother program that can continually monitor and tax the populace.
These folks are beyond moronic. They’re sub-moronic. Unfortunately, Stalin died about 55 years too soon for them.
Yes, let’s use GPS because the signal is 100% reliable in all locations at all times. The Failure Modes and Effects Analysis would be rather entertaining for such a device relying on GPS and having the ability to shut off an engine.
Why can’t they just skip GPS and mandate speed governors set to 70mph? I guess that sounds a bit draconian…
It’s all very logical. They hate cars.
God Britain sounds crappier by the day….
As I look out my window, I see that it’s snowing outside and the temp is at 34 degrees. Average temp for my area on October 12th is 61…yes SIXTY ONE DEGREES. And just today, the BBC reports that the year with the highest global temperatures is, of course, 2008…No? 2007? Nope. 2006? Try again. Actually, [b]1998[/b] was the warmest year on record. Hmmm, how about that.
Global warming is a scam. Period…dot…end of sentence.
This is just a group ‘suggesting’ the idea; this isn’t anyone with any influence pushing the button on it.
My idea is to freeze the amount of UK licenses today. I appreciate this is ‘pulling the ladder’ up, youngsters will have to join a waiting list and when someone with a license dies or has it revoked the person at the top of the list gets three goes to pass the test(s) within 18 months. If they havn’t passed they get removed from the waiting list and can reapply if they want.
Keep a lid on it using this method until transport infrastructure has caught up/evolved.
If the UK still had something called an auto industry they would be singing a different tune. Sure, there are car factories all over the place but noting you could reasonably called British.
Whatever.
It’s encouraging to see the resistance traffic cameras are meeting in the US. Other methods of command and control will meet a similar fate.
Well, well, well, Mr. Jeremy Clarkson and friends, who’s laughing now?
(I may laugh, but I really do wish the Brits sane goverment policies.)
The Newspaper: “CO2 is a naturally occurring gas that is essential to human life.”
Actually, there are all kinds of things in the biosphere that are “essential to human life” but are best left in the proportions nature provides.…
Well said. Statements like “it occurs in nature” show how incorrect some can be. Try living in a 100% oxygen environment. About the only thing that is unsafe in any quantity is Glenn Beck.
And that’s why I aspire to drive a M3.
PS: The British proposal is seriously flawed.
PPS: Crown Vic: Your basis for not believing in climate change is based on the weather of one day or one season…if you really have read/heard anything on the topic from any source other than Fox News, you would realize that any given day or season in and of itself is meaningless. Even ExxonMobil’s stance on warming has softened significantly. If you care to debate the dire predictions caused by such warming, well there’s a topic that is certainly open for debate.
PPS: Crown Vic: Your basis for not believing in climate change is based on the weather of one day or one season…if you really have read/heard anything on the topic from any source other than Fox News, you would realize that any given day or season in and of itself is meaningless. Even ExxonMobil’s stance on warming has softened significantly. If you care to debate the dire predictions caused by such warming, well there’s a topic that is certainly open for debate.
My basis for not buying that load of garbage about global warming is that it’s not happening.
Many, MANY highly accredited scientists have stated that the planet is in a period of cooling…
And if my assertion that because it is 30 degrees colder than the AVERAGE is flawed…then the whole concept of “man made global warming” is flawed simply because we have not been documenting global temperatures long enough to come to any solid conclusion on the planet’s temperature.
And I am not just using today…we were below average (ie: cooler) all of spring, summer, and we will be cool this fall.
And if my assertion that because it is 30 degrees colder than the AVERAGE is flawed…then the whole concept of “man made global warming” is flawed simply because we have not been documenting global temperatures long enough to come to any solid conclusion on the planet’s temperature.…
Really? Scientists have temperature data for tens of thousands of years, not just for the years since the thermometer was invented. Otherwise how would we know that their have been past ice ages? It is generally accepted that during the last ice age, average global temperatures were, on average, 12-14 degrees cooler than today. Nobody was taking daily temperature readings. We know the temperature of the sun, who took a trip to the sun to measure it? We know the mass of an electron; nobody tossed one on a scale to weigh it. Climate data is determined by so called proxies – data stored in tree rings, glacial ice, fossils, coral skeletons and soil borings into the earth’s crust, to name a few. You seem so sure that climate change is BS. Fine. But if you want your point of view to stand up to scrutiny, you might want to bone up a bit on actual scientific methods, and not politics. So many conservatives automatically close their mind to this topic because addressing it will require changes to the ideals that conservatives hold so dear. In any event, most of us will be here to see who was correct. I hope you are, because I miss real winters and defined seasons.
The Newspaper: “CO2 is a naturally occurring gas that is essential to human life.”
Actually, there are all kinds of things in the biosphere that are “essential to human life” but are best left in the proportions nature provides.…
Well said. Statements like “it occurs in nature” show how incorrect some can be. Try living in a 100% oxygen environment. About the only thing that is unsafe in any quantity is Glenn Beck.
Agree with these reactions to the Newspaper’s inane comment. The Newspaper should stick with the stuff it knows, and stay out of global climate disruption issues. That said, th eproposal is stupid. Once again, pick on cars, when cars are a fairly small piece of carbon emissions. Here is a sensible take on mitigation strategies: http://www.ehponline.org/members/2009/117-7/EHP117pa296PDF.PDF
Really? Scientists have temperature data for tens of tho…blah blah blah…
If you do ANY sort of research, you will be presented with a BUNCH of evidence from former NASA employees, climatologists, and other highly educated people that have empirical evidence that there is no such thing as “man made global warming”…and that Al Gore is full of shit.
It is a FACT that there has been ZERO increase in global temperatures in the past 11 years.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8299079.stm
There is MORE Arctic Sea Ice around Antarctica NOW then there was in 1980.
http://nsidc.org/cgi-bin/bist/bist.pl?annot=1&legend=1&scale=100&tab_cols=2&tab_rows=2&config=seaice_index&submit=Refresh&mo0=03&hemis0=S&img0=extn&mo1=03&hemis1=S&img1=conc&year0=2009&year1=1980&.cgifields=no_panel&referal=globalwarminghoax.com
And on, and on, and on. It’s a scam to get people to drive POS rollerskates like the Ford Fiesta and have those people light their homes with toxic and dangerous curly lightbulbs.
There is MORE Arctic Sea Ice around Antarctica NOW then there was in 1980.
Wow, that is something I never knew, or even thought was possible.
I can get behind that.
Save us from this suburban hell, please.