Stop PAYG road tax in the UK

Discussion in 'Serious' started by Da_Rude_Baboon, 9 Feb 2007.

  1. cpemma

    cpemma Ecky thump

    Joined:
    27 Nov 2001
    Posts:
    12,328
    Likes Received:
    55
    Taking the tax from fuel cost is a nice simple system, more difficult to cheat than the tax disk, no complications like the particular roads and times travelled schemes. Let business claim some back.

    If anything will encourage the motorist to not waste fuel and engine makers to improve efficiency it's PAYG driving. :thumb:

    As Norman Tebbitt said, "On yer bike!"
     
  2. Nezodon

    Nezodon What's a Dremel?

    Joined:
    6 Jun 2006
    Posts:
    62
    Likes Received:
    0
    At the moment the British government seem to want to push through all their dumb ideas through with very little consultation with the people who are going to have to foot the bill, ie the tax payers.

    I think like most things this will go ahead with or without the public wanting it and they will stage manage the outcry and spin things in a good light without even contimplating the logistics and practicality of these schemes.

    It seems each and every day England seems less and less like a democracy and the government seems more and more out of touch and in its own little bubble, for this reason alone i think that what ever the people think this will happen alongside the ID card scheme and they will both be failures and tax payers again will have to foot the bill.
     
  3. KMS-oul

    KMS-oul You think you know me.

    Joined:
    1 Aug 2002
    Posts:
    1,346
    Likes Received:
    2
    Another step closer to big brother lol. Seriously though I think it will happen, maybe not now but probably within 15 years or so. They may do some sort of RFID tagging type thing first. It is very cheap and it will let the public get use to being monitored before the big stuff is used. RFID tagging will soon replace the barcode if I recall correctly.

    But as others have mentioned I think all of this is to make you not want to drive. Save oil, space, pollution.....
     
  4. Lord_A

    Lord_A Boom baby!

    Joined:
    23 Mar 2002
    Posts:
    3,539
    Likes Received:
    2
    The plan is to use Europe's GPS system, Galileo, which can track objects with greater accuracy than the current offering from USA. It will also have better coverage in cities where tall buildings usually cause a problem atm.

    AFAIK Galileo will be up & running in less than 10 years time, so this PAYG driving may not be too far off.

    Also, PAYG driving is mentioned as a possible application according to the official Galileo website.

    I do believe that this will happen, and not only in the UK either.
     
  5. specofdust

    specofdust Banned

    Joined:
    26 Feb 2005
    Posts:
    9,571
    Likes Received:
    168
    Very interesting article in the times today about this. The minister in charge of it basicly said that although he recognised that a million people had signed the petition, it wasn't going to stop him going ahead with large scale feasability tests, and that basicly anyone who'd signed the petition was misinformed and didn't have a proper understanding of what the thing actually is.

    I really hate the tories, but I have a tough time convincing myself not to vote for them at the next election when we have government ministers acknowledging 1/60 people in the country declaring their feelings on a matter but saying they're going to ignore it, and effectively calling all those 1/60 people ignorant. What an utter bast**d.
     
  6. Flibblebot

    Flibblebot Smile with me

    Joined:
    19 Apr 2005
    Posts:
    4,745
    Likes Received:
    217
    But then isn't his job to inform people what the thing actually is?
    I'd agree that government seems to have forgotten that it is supposed to be a democracy - i.e. voting by the people for them to govern in the name of the people.

    The only problem with who to vote for is that the tories aren't much better...and what are the alternatives? That's the main reason why voter numbers are dropping at a drastic rate. But that's a whole different thread...
     
  7. specofdust

    specofdust Banned

    Joined:
    26 Feb 2005
    Posts:
    9,571
    Likes Received:
    168
    I agree, the tories aren't much better. They'll screw the country in many a way themselves, but at least they'll scrap the ID card scheme, hopefully stop pissing over the school cirriculum,possibly sort out the prisons, and almost certainly stop all this pay per mile crap.

    As you say, its the ministers job to inform people what's going on, if we're ignorant it's his fault. Of course most people don't recognise this so he can get away with saying people just don't understand what's going on which is his valid-honest-to-god reason for ignoring a million people telling him to GTFO.

    It's a shame islamic fundies are trying to demolish our government for things like being infidels and non-muslims, there are so many good reasons available for doing it.
     
  8. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,559
    Likes Received:
    1,981
    :hehe: Oh, Lordy. They want to use GPS?! Have they got any idea of the technical problems with that? Oh yeah, I'm really worried now...
     
  9. Lord_A

    Lord_A Boom baby!

    Joined:
    23 Mar 2002
    Posts:
    3,539
    Likes Received:
    2
    @ Nexxo, what kind of technical problems do you know about then? Only asking because from what I've read, Galileo supposedly 'fixes' the two main problems with current GPS i.e.: accuracy + cities/tunnels/etc.
     
  10. Nezodon

    Nezodon What's a Dremel?

    Joined:
    6 Jun 2006
    Posts:
    62
    Likes Received:
    0
    I have to say i think i will more than likely go conservative next election though i will only be doing it as they are the most likely to get Labour out of office.

    Our politics really are scary in the UK at the moment and it seems we are becoming less and less like a democracy each year and the government constantly pushes universaly hated policies like the PAYG road tax and ID cards.
     
  11. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,559
    Likes Received:
    1,981
    It is not about getting a GPS signal. It is about processing it.
    OK, we had a bit of snow here in Birmingham, which gridlocked the city and caused most drivers to phone home that they were going to be a bit late. the mobile phone network fell over in minutes. Yet this system proposes that Britain's mobile phone network can absorb 30 million or so cars chattering their whereabouts to it on an ongoing basis.

    Then all that data has to be stored somewhere. A whole year's record (or more) of a car's position and speed, time stamped, identity stamped and updated every few seconds? Minutes? For thirty million cars.

    And then we have the next problem:
    No data traffic network is equipped to handle this, either. It is all well and good to do local, small-scale trials with a bunch of motivated volunteers with this, but the realities of scaling it up to a country-wide system with 30 million cars and hundreds of insurers, and a DVLA database that is only 40% accurate, and making it work reasonably flawlessly so that you don't get thousands of motorists challenging their bills every billing period, well, that is something I don't see the government pull off any time soon.
     
  12. Lord_A

    Lord_A Boom baby!

    Joined:
    23 Mar 2002
    Posts:
    3,539
    Likes Received:
    2
    I completely agree with the database management issues, but don't understand why you mentioned cellphones at all? Unless it's the current insurance PAYG trials that are based on that technology.

    Anyways, regardless of hopeless government projects, it seems clear that PAYG taxation is something they are thinking of very seriously, and as mentioned before: just because someting is a mission & will most likely fail doesn't mean that goverments won't implement it all the same.

    Or perhaps they'll just use PAYG taxation as a threat should citizens complain over congestion charges, and disproportionate fuel/road tax increases :idea:
     
  13. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,559
    Likes Received:
    1,981
     
  14. Lord_A

    Lord_A Boom baby!

    Joined:
    23 Mar 2002
    Posts:
    3,539
    Likes Received:
    2
    Fair enough, but that does say that it's for insurance, I guess the PAYG taxation will work the same though. If that's the case then they will have a hard time getting it to work because there are loads of areas in the UK where I cannot get a cellphone signal. Unless ofcourse the 'blackbox' stores the data locally & tramsmits it at scheduled times during the day or whenever there's a signal available.
     
  15. Nexxo

    Nexxo * Prefab Sprout – The King of Rock 'n' Roll

    Joined:
    23 Oct 2001
    Posts:
    34,559
    Likes Received:
    1,981
    Whether it is insurance that is charged, or taxes, the logistics remain the same. Local storage of data for transmission at a scheduled time won't help -- it will simply flood the network at peak times.
     
  16. cderalow

    cderalow bondage master!

    Joined:
    23 Jan 2002
    Posts:
    3,519
    Likes Received:
    0
    the difference being, the turnpike is called such because it's a direct tax for use of the road..

    state/fed gov here pays for road maintenance, so a percentage of our taxes goes to that all ready

    the concept of the turnpike is that you enter the road system at point a, exit at point b, and are charged a predetermined amount upon exiting at point b... the feasibility is easy... just put a pole with a RFID reader at every entrance ramp to a major road or thruway, and one at every exit point

    to make it work:

    no need to use gps, just make the reader log time on the system, and time off the system and the respective entrance and exit points
    use a simple formula to determine average speed, and then perform a simple check against posted speed
    or if you wanted to get real fancy, toss a gps transponder in for use in emergency etc
    tie every rfid#/gps transponder # to registration and you have it
    system that could bill you for use of every major road

    alternatively:

    place rfi readers in the road, and just log any vehicle that passes over it, bill according to scheme outlined above.. system that could tax you on every road, with no gps... again add gps if wanted
     
  17. quack

    quack Minimodder

    Joined:
    6 Mar 2002
    Posts:
    5,240
    Likes Received:
    9
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6356575.stm
    :lol:
     

Share This Page