National Alliance Against Tolls

National Alliance Against Tolls - Figures

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FIGURES

European directives

Fuel Prices and Fuel Tax Facts

Global Climate Change

Licensed and unlicensed vehicles in Britain

Lorries and Trailers travelling between Britain and Europe

National Travel Survey for 2004 (published July 2005)

Road Taxes

Road spending

Tidal Water crossings in Britain

Tolls - Key Figures

Traffic speeds and congestion

Transport of Goods by Road

Other statistics available from DfT:-
Main statistics page
Personal Travel (various)
"Public Transport Statistics 2005" (published September 2005)
"Regional Transport Statistics 2005" (published November 2005)
"Road Maintenance Condition Survey 2005" (published April 2006)
"Road Traffic Statistics" (published various dates - latest figures are in the Quarterly Bulletins)
"Transport Statistics 2005" (published October 2005)
"Transport Trends 2005" (published January 2006)

Useful general links:-
Department for Transport
Department for Transport - "Statutory Tolled Undertakings in the UK" produced October 2006
Highways Agency
"Highway Robbery? A financial analysis of Design Build Finance and Operate in roads in the UK" (Word doc)
UK Parliament

European directives

The European Union is controlled by bureaucrats who want more tolls. Though so far in practice national Governments seem to be able to do what they like, as long as they are not too obvious in discriminating against foreign lorries.

It is sometimes said that the EU requires all countries to introduce tolls. There is nothing as explicit as this, though it is implicit in the money that has been pumped into "PROGRESS" road pricing trials and into the Galileo satellite project. It is also implicit in some EU directives including - 2004/52. This requires that electronic road pricing should be standardised and says (paragraph 5) that this " is necessary to provide for the widespread deployment of electronic toll systems in the Member States and neighbouring countries".

It is also sometimes said that there are EU directives which limit toll prices. They do, but only for vehicles over 3.5 tons. EU summary of the directives Original directive - 99/62 Amending directive - 06/38

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Fuel Prices and Fuel Tax Facts

(Note that commentary and figures are as at April 2006. Prices quoted below are mainly average per litre for unleaded petrol. Prices at supermarkets are generally a pence or two lower than the average (which increasingly is affected by the supermarkets market share), and obviously non supermarket prices are generally higher than the average. Price of diesel in Britain is usually about threepence higher than unleaded. The diesel duty is the same as unleaded, the price difference (which is narrowing) is due to higher non duty price plus the effect of VAT on that higher price.)

With fuel in Britain at 95 pence a gallon, the tax is about 61.25 pence or 64% of the total price. This is one of the world's highest taxes on road fuel - roads users have been treated as a cash cow by all parties for the last 10 years or more.
A lot of people blame Labour for high fuel taxes, but it was the Tories who introduced the Fuel Price escalator, and Labour who scrapped it. When the Tories left power in May 1997, the tax was 77% of the pump price (the untaxed price of fuel was about 14 pence, the tax was 36.9 pence duty per litre, plus 14.9% (VAT) of the pump price). The comparison is very slightly distorted by the switch from leaded to unleaded and to fuels certified as having lower sulphur content.

Tory Chancellor, Norman Lamont's Budget in 1993, increased fuel duties by 10 per cent and introduced the "fuel duty escalator", under which fuel duty would increase annually by three per cent ABOVE INFLATION.
In November 1995, Kenneth Clarke announced that the escalator would be five per cent above inflation per year. Then in July 1997, Labour Chancellor Gordon Brown increased the escalator rate to six per cent above inflation.
The combined effect of all these increases was a substantial increase in fuel prices, making Britain one of the most expensive countries in the world.

In November 1999, Gordon Brown announced that he would scrap the escalator. He said that the duty would "be set on a Budget by Budget basis, taking account of the Government's economic and social objectives as well as the UK's environmental commitments."
Gordon Brown might have removed the escalator to have given himself flexibility in deciding what the duty increase would be, but the most likely reason was that crude oil prices had more than doubled in the previous 12 months.

In June 2000, the average price per litre for unleaded petrol reached 85 pence. By October, farmers and others were blockading oil refineries, though a lot of people disagreed with holding the country to ransom. The blockade stopped following vague assurances from the Government.
In the few months before the blockade, the average price had actually fallen to around 81 pence (49 pence duty, 12 pence VAT, without tax price 20 pence). At that time the price in France was the equivalent of about 70 pence.

In the months after the 2000 blockade, the price stayed around the 81 pence level. Then in March 2001 Budget, Gordon Brown brought in a "temporary" reduction in unleaded petrol duty of 2 pence a litre.
Partly due to the duty reduction, but mainly due to fall in crude prices, pump prices slowly fell to a low of around 70 pence at the end of 2001. Tax excluded price was now about 12.5 pence. Price in France was about 59 pence, i.e. still about 11 pence cheaper than UK.
At the start of 2002, pump prices began to go up, and by January 2005 were back at 80 pence.

With increased crude oil prices, the prices at the pump peaked in September / October 2005 at 95 pence. In the middle of September, there were threats of a blockade similar to 2000. But this proved to be a very damp squib.
At the end of 2005, the pump price had fallen to 88 pence. It crept up slightly to 90 pence in March and then in April again shot up to 95 pence (47.1 pence duty, 14.1 pence VAT, without tax price just under 34 pence)
Gordon Brown has been intending over last 2 years to increase fuel duty, but due to high crude oil prices he has postponed it several times, (though he has gained from higher VAT).
Recent figures in pence:-
2006 - Apr 95, Mar 90, Feb 90, Jan 89.
2005 - Dec 88, Nov 91, Oct 95, Sep 95, Aug 91, Jul 89, Jun 86, May 86, Apr 86, Mar 82, Feb 80, Jan 80.)

Fuel prices are higher in Britain than most countries, due to higher taxes.
Unleaded Petrol at April 2006:- Netherlands 105 pence, Belgium 99 pence, Denmark 97 pence, Britain 95 pence, Germany 93 pence, Italy 91 pence, France 90 pence, Ireland 77 pence, Estonia (lowest in Europe) 61 pence, USA 42 pence.
The gap on diesel is a lot more:- Britain 98 pence, Denmark 85 pence, Italy 83 pence, Germany 80 pence, Netherlands 79 pence, Belgium 79 pence, France 78 pence, Ireland 76 pence, Estonia (lowest in Europe) 61 pence, USA 43 pence.

Tax part of what you pay for fuel (unleaded or diesel) is 47.1 pence plus approx 14.9% of the pump price. E.g.:- Pump price = 80 pence, then tax = 59.0 pence (47.1 + (80 * 0.149) - So tax is 280% on top of the non tax price of 21.0 pence.
Pump price = 90 pence, then tax = 60.5 pence (47.1 + (90 * 0.149) - So tax is 205% on top of the non tax price of 29.5 pence.
Pump price = 100 pence, then tax = 62.0 pence (47.1 + (100 * 0.149) - So tax is 163% on top of the non tax price of 38.0 pence.

Fuel tax costs almost nothing to collect.
HM Treasury have told us that the cost of collecting Ł23,545 million duty on "Hydrocarbon oil products" in 2005/06 was Ł44.7 million. This is just under 0.2%. But in fact the cost of collecting duty on road fuels must be even smaller-
The duties are collected from the Refiner / Distributor when the fuels are removed to home use from the refinery or import warehouse. To administer this probably only needs a handful of people. The bulk of the collection cost must be on enforcement. Road fuel is taxed at penal rates, but other fuels including aviation kerosene, fuel used for agriculture or heating etc are either untaxed or only taxed at a low rate. If duty was at the same rate on all fuels, then the collection cost would be a lot lower and the base for spreading the collection cost over would be higher, so the % collection cost for fuel duty would be virtually nil.

Logical, fair, equitable.
Politicians in recent years have varied Vehicle Excise Duty (Road Tax) according to whether a car is fueled by Diesel, Petrol, or "Alternative" and its C02 rating. Someone obviously didn't like to tell them that tax on fuel is a better way of punishing drivers as it varies with actual use. The top duty rate is currently Ł215 and the bottom rate is nothing. Yes -nothing! According to the Government's Car Fuel Data (at June 2006) there is only one car in the zero band - a Mercedes Benz "S" class (V221 S65 AMG ) limo with 6 litre petrol engine. We are not sure what has caused this bizarre result - does that well known friend of the poor, Gordon Brown, drive one?

Links:-
AA is best source for information on fuel prices in Britain and other countries since 2000:- Fuel Price Reports
Institute of Fiscal Studies issued a "briefing note" on 6th June 2005:- "Fuel Taxation"
DTI - very detailed information, including historical series:- Quarterly energy prices.
Petroleum Industries Association:- Publications - including Statistical review 2005
Vehicle Certification Agency:- Official Car Fuel Data including tax bands

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Global Climate Change

Advocates of tolls often give the need to reduce fossil fuel emissions as a reason. Britain's anthropogenic emissions of CO2 is 2% of the global total, and land transport makes up about 25% of that 2%. Even if it was accepted that there was some point in aiming to reduce this tiny figure, why would anyone attempt do so by introducing road tolls rather than more directly through a carbon or fuel tax?

Tolls of course have the opposite effect to what their advocates claim, due to toll queues and traffic taking longer routes to avoid tolls. Toll advocates also suggest them as a replacement for fuel taxes! But if we accept the Green's illogical support for tolls, what is "Global Climate Change"?

Global Climate Change is the theory that carbon emissions from burning of fossil fuels will have a significant harmful "greenhouse" effect on the earth's climate. Originally the theory was called "Global Warming". Advocates were able to select from the temperature measurements that were available those that fitted their theory, they could also "estimate" figures for times and places where they had not been measured. The theory has been around for a long time (since 1896), but from 1945 up to 1975 the Earth seemed to be getting colder. Greens said that this was the effect of burning fossil fuels - i.e. dust in atmosphere was reflecting sunlight and causing "Global Cooling". From 1975 the Earth seems to be getting warmer so "Global Warming" became popular, but there are heretics who say that temperatures have not shown the predicted movement or that there are various other more likely or more significant causes than CO2 from the burning of fossil fuels. We now have "Global Climate Change" or even just "Climate Change" which may change again to "Climate Chaos". These terms cover all bets - whether it gets hotter or colder or wetter or drier or whatever including hurricanes, and even tsunamis and earthquakes.

The reality is that weather is a complex dynamic system. It varies from one place to another and changes over time. As well as seasonal effects there are various short and long term cycles. We don't know in what way the weather is changing. Even if we did know, whether any particular change is for "better" or "worse" is a subjective judgement partly depending on where you live. We don't know what contribution (in size or direction) our various actions have.

It would be folly to use resources when you don't really know what you are doing. Obviously monitoring and study of the climate must continue, but time, attention and resources would be better spent on addressing some of the world's definite problems - the biggest of which is the population explosion that has and is really happening and affects everything including the quantity of fossil fuel burnt.

Links:- Official British view Official US view National Climatic Data Center (US) Tech Station recent postings Association of British Drivers (click on "Environment" at top left).

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Licensed and unlicensed vehicles in Britain

Total vehicles (licensed and unlicensed, and including motor bikes etc) is about 34.4 million, including about 28.4 million cars.
Licensed vehicles in Britain at December 2005 was 32.9 million, including 27.5 million cars. This was a 2% increase over the previous year.
It was estimated from surveys that in 2005 there were 1.5 million unlicensed vehicles including about 0.9 million cars. This was up on the year before, but down compared with two years ago.

Links:- DfT - Vehicle Licensing Statistics DfT - Vehicles Excise Duty Evasion 2005 DVLA - Rates of Vehicle Excise Duty

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Lorries and Trailers travelling between Britain and Europe

Lorries and Trailers travelling between Britain and Europe:- "Road Goods Vehicles Travelling to Mainland Europe Q2 2006"
Figures show that the decline in Britain's share of lorries continues. Ten years ago, half of the traffic between Britain and Europe was in British trucks, it is now down to a quarter. The countries with the biggest percentage share for second quarter 2006 were:- Britain 25, France 18, Netherlands 13, Germany 8, Belgium 6, Spain 6, Italy 4. (Figures are only for lorry traffic, nearly 30% of total traffic is unaccompanied trailers.)

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National Travel Survey for 2004 (published July 2005)

National Travel Survey for 2004 was published on 28 July 2005.
Complete document (680Kb) If you only want one section OR you want the Excel tables
It shows how people travel around Britain, and is a mine of information. Here are a few nuggets:- Table 2.1. on page 6 shows that People were travelling more each year. Distance travelled has gone up 50% in 30 years, though this growth seems to have stopped about 2002. The table also shows that the number of trips has started to reduce slightly.
The amount of time spent travelling is the same as 30 years ago, at about an hour a day.
So the average speed of travel has gone up by 50% in 30 years. This doesn't necessarily mean that road speeds have gone up by 50%, but it does indicate that so far road congestion does not appear to have had a significant impact.

Table 2.2. on page 8 shows that the number of household without a car has fallen slightly to 26%. The average number of cars per household is only slightly over one. The number of people without access to a car is only 20% (Table 2.4. on page 11).

Table 2.3. on page 10 shows that 81% of men and 61% of women have a driving licence.

Table 3.1. on page 12 shows that 89% of total distance travelled is by motor vehicles on roads (82% by cars etc, and 7% by buses).
7.5% is by trains, Underground, trams, plane or ferry; and 3.5% by foot or bicycle.

Table 3.5. on page 17 shows an analysis of the AVERAGE hour a day spent travelling. It works out at about 23 minutes driving, 14 minutes as a car or van passenger, 11 minutes walking, 10 minutes on public transport, and 2 minutes is bikes, motorbikes or taxis.

Table 4.1. on page 24 shows why people travel. Commuting to work makes up less than 20% of the miles travelled. More miles are travelled in visiting friends and family than in commuting. The information in this report overlaps that in the Focus on Personal Travel report which was published in April 2005. This is older data, but has a wider set of information.

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Road Taxes
(section revised 7 June 2008)

Various figures are quoted for road taxes, but what is the correct figure? This is a bit like the question - "How long is a piece of string?" Since 2005 we have quoted Ł50 billion for road taxes, but we have reviewed this figure (June 2008)-

The total amount of road fuel sold in Britain according to industry figures - UKPIA - "Statistical Review 2007" (pdf file) is 135 million litres a day. This works out as 50 billion litres a year. According to the report, the split betweeen petrol and diesel is now 50:50.
The fuel duty for the most commonly used type of petrol is 50.35 pence a litre, and diesel is currently the same - HMRC - "BN53 - Hydrocarbon Oils Duty: Rates". Note that the duty increase that was due to come into effect from 1 April 2008 was postponed till the autumn and may be postponed again.
So fuel duty is 50 billion multiplied by 50.35 pence, which makes Ł25 billion for the Government.
Another way of arriving at this figure is to look at - table C6 of chapter C of this year's main budget report (pdf file), that gives a figure of Ł25.7 billion for fuel duties of which about Ł0.5 billion would be the effect of the duty increase scheduled in the autumn.

There is then of course VAT at the rate of 17.5% on the price before VAT. Fuel at May 2008 was averaging 118 pence (112p for petrol and 124p for diesel) a litre - AA - Fuel price report for May 2008 (pdf file), note that our figure of 118 pence is the average of the petrol and diesel prices. The VAT on this works out at just under 17.6 pence, and with 50 billion litres, this is another Ł9 billion for the Government.
So the total tax take on fuel is Ł34 billion a year. On petrol at 112 pence a litre the total tax per litre is 68 pence and on diesel at 124 pence the total tax take is 69 pence (because of the higher retail price and thus higher VAT).

The next most obvious tax is Vehicle Excise Duty. The DVLA Annual Accounts to March 2007 (pdf file), give the annual amount collected, net of refunds, as Ł4,984 million. But table C6 in chapter C of this year's main budget report (pdf file), shows that with duty increases and extra licensed vehicles, the VED in the year from April 2008 is expected to yield Ł6.1 billion.

Less obvious but equally expensive is VAT on car sales. Current annual sales are about 2.3 million new cars, 7.5 million used cars, 0.4 million new commercial vehicles and 0.9 million used commercial vehicles. Generally there is no VAT on used vehicles as it was included in the original sale price, so we will forget them. Most firms (though not all) will be able to offset the VAT on commercial vehicles so we will also ignore them. That leaves us with new cars (many of these will be company cars, but the VAT input tax on cars cannot be offset against tax on outputs). The average price of a new car is now Ł17,000! That gives sales of Ł39 billion, on which the VAT would be about Ł6 billion.

Company car tax is a bit difficult to find as it is lost in the total figures reported for Income Tax. The most recent available figures appear to be for the year ended March 2006 - HMRC - Table T4.1 - "Recipients, taxable amount and income tax and NICs liability, by each main category of benefit" (pdf file). Adding the figures for tax and national insurance on car and fuel benefits gives a tax liability of Ł2,980 million.

According to the Association of British Insurers the premiums received by their members in 2006 for motor insurance were Ł10,277 million. At a rate of 5%, that gives Ł0.5 billion for Insurance Premium Tax.

Taxes on oil companies are indirectly a tax on the products of the companies which are largely consumed in Britain. The total taxes derived from the companies for the year starting April 2008 will be Ł9.9 billion (this is on top of fuel duty) - Table 11.11 - Government revenues from UK oil and gas production (pdf file). This begs the question as to how much of the tax should be attributed to sales of fuel for road vehicles - our estimate is one third which gives a figure of Ł3.3 billion.

Lastly we have the VAT, Corporation tax and PAYE etc paid by independent filling stations, firms selling new and second hand vehicles and repairing them etc. There are about 34 million licensed vehicles and another 1.5 million not licensed. Even if this only averaged Ł100 per vehicle, this generates another Ł3.5 billion for the Government.

We said "lastly" but this of course excludes the tolls or "congestion charges" that drivers have to pay this is about another Ł600 million a year.

SUMMARY (figures are rounded)

Ł25 billion - Fuel Duty,

Ł9 billion - VAT on fuel,

Ł6 billion - Vehicle Excise Duty,

Ł6 billion - VAT on purchase of new cars,

Ł3 billion - Company car tax,

Ł0.5 billion - Insurance Premium tax,

Ł0.5 billion - Tolls and "congestion charges",

Ł50 billion - Total of direct taxes on use of vehicles,

Ł3.5 billion - proportion (one third)of other taxes on oil companies,

Ł3.5 billion - Other taxes on garages and car repairers etc.

Ł57 billion - Total of all taxes on use of vehicles.

The Road Users Association have been producing various figures on road for some years, their latest figures are here - 2007/08 Road File (pdf file). Their figure (page 6) is "only" Ł45 billion. The main difference between this and our figure is that theirs is based on a year or so earlier and they exclude the more indirect taxes.

Roads spending
(section revised 8 June 2008)

When we last revised these figures in 2006, we left them as they were in 2005 as in our opinion the more recently published figures were not reliable as some local authority spending on public transport was lumped in with roads. The last available figures from the DfT before this indicated that roads spending was Ł7.7 billion for 2004/05.
HM Treasury publish figures for all public spending. In Chapter 5 of the PESR 2008 (pdf file) it gives an analyis of spending by "subfunction". For 2007/08 it gives (line 4.5 of table 5.2) estimated spending on "national roads" of Ł3,151 million, and on "local roads" of Ł5,625 million. This gives a total of Ł9 billion on "roads"
Though there is a problem - a lot of "roads spending" is not on roads - it is on the provision, maintenance and lighting of pavements, alleys, footpaths, bridleways, cycle lanes, bus lanes and pedestrianised areas - all places where cars, vans and lorries can't go.
Also a lot of spending is designed to impede traffic - demolishing flyovers and footbridges, narrowing roads, traffic "calming", pedestrian operated lights etc.
So of the Ł9 billion that is spent on "roads", our guess is that about half is positive spending on increasing road capacity and maintenance and repairs. The other half is not on roads or is designed to slow or stop traffic.

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Traffic speeds and congestion

This may not seem to be relevant to tolls. But those who advocate tolls say that they are trying to help drivers by reducing congestion. The people who say this, are often the same ones who are trying to slow traffic down as much as possible and complain that speed limits are ignored.
One report on speeds was published in May 2005, with the emphasis on showing how slow traffic is due to congestion:- DfT - "Traffic Speeds on English Urban Areas: 2004 ".
It seems that in urban areas the difference between peak and off peak speeds was 4.3 mph, and the peak period speed fell by 0.3 mph in 5 years, (off peak speed did not change). Not bad when you consider the growth in traffic, the lack of new road space, and how much the authorities have done to stop traffic altogether. Will they try even harder?
Another report was published in April 2006. This time with the emphasis on showing that traffic is too fast and breaking the speed limits:- DfT - "Vehicle Speeds 2005".
More DfT statistics on traffic speeds and congestion here.

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Transport of Goods by Road

Transport of Goods by Road in 2004 was 152 billion kilometre tonnes. This figure has been virtually static since 1998. The distance travelled peaked in 1998, and has since declined slightly, but this has been offset by an increase in the cargo per vehicle:- DfT - Transport of Goods by Road 2004 - published 28 July 2005

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