Refocus taxation
Surely, if we accept that we’re aiming towards a zero-carbon world, it’s crazy to create some complex new method of raising tax for a process like road travel. Every activity, be it fuel extraction, manufacturing, heating, transport etc, surely needs to be taxed simply in relation to its carbon footprint. In effect, an energy tax based on that principle. It could be applied in a similar way to VAT, with the accumulating carbon count of a product replacing ‘value added’.
Within reason, if you can travel on zero-carbon electricity, you should go tax-free, having paid the appropriate tax on the equipment used when it was purchased. You might need some form of road pricing, though.
If you want to race cars on a private track, you pay tax on the fuel used and required track maintenance, directly proportional to the resulting damage to the environment.
It’s something even more basic than the simple tax on road fuel that has long been proposed yet ignored by the decision-makers.
Fairly applied (where of course the main snags naturally arise), every country could and should apply the same system and scale of taxation levels. Maybe it’s just a pipe dream… Victor Harman
Norwich