Pay-per-mile road pricing was always going to be an unpopular policy, and so it proved when it formed part of the Autumn Budget announcement. There’s still plenty of work needed to flesh out how this new revenue stream will be administered, but I think one thing that could get more people on board is if a percentage of the cash was ring-fenced to help maintain the UK’s roads.
For too long many motorists have felt like cash cows being milked to prop up the nation’s finances, but they haven’t been given much in return. When the bill passes through Parliament, I’d like to see a guaranteed percentage of the revenue set aside for road repairs and resurfacing.
Of course, things are rarely that simple, especially because different organisations look after different roads. But maybe it’s time to shake up the UK’s highways, just as is happening with rail through the founding of Great British Railways. A Great British Roadways, perhaps?
The roads are arguably a more important part of UK infrastructure than the railways, after all they carry nearly 90 per cent of the goods that are delivered across the country, so why not tie everything together into one organisation?
The starting point is National Highways, which already maintains England’s major motorways and A-roads within nine regions, then simply fold in the rest of the network, including urban streets. While you’re at it, why not absorb motorway services and other rest areas? With all road maintenance and building under one umbrella, local council taxes can be freed up to spend on essential services.
If the UK’s ban on the sale of new ICE cars still comes into force in the next decade, then we would see a steady transition towards the pay-per-mile model, and it seems only fair to me that those who use the roads the most, pay the most. How the revenue is collected is for someone else to work out, but there is likely to be a drop in revenue as the receipts from fuel duty decrease. But there could be ways around that, such as introducing a tiered pence-per-mile scale based on the fuel used. It’s not as if that hasn’t happened in the past.
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