At least the BBC news on TV pointed out that the pump price is 15p + 400% tax and duty... well, it didn't, it gave a breakdown of the various pie slices, but my broken mind figured it out, so I expect most other viewers could. I always knew the tax was something disgusting and absurd, but 400% is a whole new sickening, outrageous feeling.

Regretfully, it is probably a small enough amount that many will grumble but there won't be enough unrest to repeat the events of whenever it was last time.

Wibble.

You know what i mean, fair play on fuel etc.

However, the band D increases and precepts are going to get a lot of people hot under the collar.

Next you'll be saying the BBC license fee is a tax, rather than 'a small and necessary social investment to pay for the excellent public-service broadcasting the BBC delivers direct to your home, helping keep every one of our diverse and ethnic British communities alive'! :-)

You know how they've got all these new Asian radio services, on the BBC, and the like, all cloning successful independent efforts, d'ya think there's any chance we could get them to fund BBC Radio Libertaria? We'd certainly get a bigger audience than BBC Boondoggle, a.k.a. BBC4! :-)

(Current viewing figures, three, and a dog in Peckham)

BBC4. A place to waste other people's money...

... ambivalent terms ...

Somehow, that usage seems to be terribly understated.

Channel 5 also showed a chart giving the amounts. 5% goes to the companies as profit... around 70% of the pump price of petrol goes to the State.

Don't forget the fixed-tax costs of motoring too - £165 for a tax disc, £40-odd for an MOT, etc, regardless of how much you use the road.

For the average driver, I guess that's about 15p a litre...!!!

Then there's the other running costs that ought to be vaguely proportional to road usage, such as the proportion of 3rd-party insurance (often evaded)that isn't soaked up by insurance company expenses.

Horrible as it sounds, given that we aren't going to get a tax reduction anytime soon, it would certainly be fairer (and easier to administer) to abolish these fixed taxes and put the cost on petrol.

What then for country people who have to drive as they have no alternative? Well, why not abolish Council tax bands A-C and halve Bands D & E for remote country dwellers (yet more savings in administration) as compensation? Since relatively few people live in sufficiently remote parts of the country to qualify for this discount, it would only be a relatively small cost to cover that by a few more pence per litre.

Another 25p per litre???!!!!

But we're paying it now in fixed taxes! Old ladies who collect their shopping and only do 2000 miles a year are effectively paying over a pound extra per litre in fixed taxes!!!

So why shouldn't the heavy drivers pay a fairer proportion?

Ascend into your Horseless Carriage and take a spin down the boulevarde. Now count the taxes you're paying for the privilege.

First, obviously, road tax.

Next, fuel duty.

VAT on fuel (and on fuel duty - tax on tax. I always kinda admired that one for the pure bare-bollocked insolence that's in it.).

Insurance tax on your (mandatory) insurance. Nice little earner.

VAT on the original purchase of the new vehicle. Even if you're driving a fourth-hand scrapper, there's no VAT on used vehicles, so you can't reclaim any VAT on a purchase even if you're VAT-registered and using it for business. Result: higher O&O costs, with the difference staying with the G.

Not sure about this one, but there used to be - maybe still is - a one-off duty on new vehicles. If it's still there, it acts like the VAT on a new car by raising lifetime O&O costs.

If you're using the fighter-bomber for your business, you don't get to claim back the full cost of fuel and capital costs against your profit - you have to use standard IR rate-sheets for fuel and capital allowances. Effectively there's an income tax (and NI) premium on driving.

That's seven taxes every turn of the wheels. And, of course, you pay with mnoney that's already been income-taxed, National-Insuranced and possibly VATted before you turn the key.

Not a bit of wonder they don't allow us guns.