Labour war on drivers

‘Unfair’ plan to put up fuel tax and air passenger duty provokes backlash

LABOUR was accused last night of declaring ‘war on motorists’ after revealing plans to increase fuel duty if elected.

Shadow transport secretary Andy McDonald also indicated that air passenger duty (APD) could go up under Labour.

In a speech to the Institute for Government in London, he said that under his leadership the Department for Transport would put its ‘moral responsibility to cut emissions at the department’s core’.

He argued that rising emissions had been largely caused by increased traffic, encouraged by an ‘ever-expanding programme of road building’.

Mr McDonald said fuel duty had been frozen since 2010 at a cost of more than £50billion, and APD had been ‘broadly frozen’.

At the same time, he added, rail and bus fares had risen by ‘more than a third’, warning: ‘This is not a sensible approach to transport policy.’

The comments provoked an immediate backlash last night.

Transport Secretary Chris Grayling said Labour had ‘re-announced their plan for a war on motorists with massive fuel tax rises and have announced new plans for unfair tax rises on holidaymakers and business travellers’.

He added it proved Labour was ‘ ideologically obsessed with higher and higher taxes’.

Motoring groups have complained that UK drivers pay one of the highest rates of tax on fuel in the world, with duty charged at 57.95p a litre.

Douglas Ross, a Scottish Conservative MP and chairman of the FairFuelUK all-party parliamentary group, said Mr McDonald’s announcement ‘shows a blatant disregard for road users’.

He added: ‘For many people, driving is the only method of transport available. Increasing fuel duty would be narrow minded and hit families and businesses across the country.’

AA president Edmund King said motorists ‘support reasonable measures to improve air quality’ but an increase in fuel duty would be ‘seen as an attack on the economy’.

Tory MP Robert Halfon said that, in addition to hitting ‘hard-pressed motorists’, a fuel duty rise would also affect the NHS and food prices because of the increasing costs of transportation, while small businesses would be ‘crucified’.

Any move to increase APD would be fiercely resisted by airports and airlines, which say UK holidaymakers pay the highest tax in Europe.

Labour said the party ‘is not pledging to increase fuel duty’.