Tax money from drivers not spent on roads

London: Every driver is being milked for almost £300 (Dh1,756) a year in taxes that are not invested in the UK's roads, a report shows.

Fuel duty and road tax raise £31.5 billion annually but only £13.4 billion of this is reinvested in roads or in environmental measures. That means drivers are effectively handing over £18.1 billion too much or £293 a head.

The excess taxes vary by region because of unequal spending on roads, according to the research by the TaxPayers' Alliance.

A driver in rural Essex is hit for £566 while their counterparts in the City of London "profit" to the extent of £95 because they pay out less than is invested in their network.

In Tower Hamlets, East London, motorists pay an "excess" tax of only £34, in Westminster it is £35 and £63 in Camden. The Alliance says its research reveals that drivers in urban, suburban and rural areas are taxed very differently.

"Motoring taxes at their current rates cannot be justified by the need for spending on the roads and the contribution of road transport to climate change," the Alliance report said.

"Those who live in small towns or rural areas, where a car is often the only practical way of getting to work or accessing services, are hit particularly hard by high rates of fuel duty and vehicle excise duty."

The Alliance's research paper, which relied on census data, found that the two road taxes raised £31.5 billion in 2009. By contrast, road spending in 2009-10 was just £9.9 billion. To that can be added the "social cost" of road transport carbon emissions reckoned at £3.5 billion in 2009, making a total of £13.4 billion.

The report notes: "Excess motoring taxes varied starkly between urban areas like Camden, where they were £63 per person, and rural areas like Maldon in Essex, where they were £566 per person."

Drivers in Flintshire pay the highest excess motoring taxes in Wales, at £429 a person. Those in Shetland get Scotland's worst deal, at £566 a person.

Break-up

About 60p in every £1 spent at the pumps is taken as tax. Duty is 57.95p per litre and VAT at 20 per cent has also to be added. Petrol currently sells at £134.02 a litre and diesel at £140.67, prices that will rise along with tax hikes in the pipeline.

Matthew Sinclair, director of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: "Politicians should stop ripping off British motorists with the highest taxes on petrol in the EU."

— Daily Mail