Wait, what?

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Raymond Lin said:
And what is the cost of this licence?
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Irrelevent - you still need it in order to use a public highway. You can own a vehicle without paying VED if you wish - VED license is a requirement of using a public highway.

Therefore it's nonsense to say that VED isn't for using roads. It is.

What it isn't for is paying for road repairs etc, but thats not the same as saying VED isn't for the use of roads. It quite obviously is which is why in order for the government to legally exempt cars from VED they still needed to provide a zero cost VED License.

I thought you were a lawyer, isn't intrepreting law and guidance what you are best at :p
 
as a cyclist I don't see the point in this.

if there's a bus or lorry behind you at the traffic light do you really want a head start? or do you want to let them past at the lights?

I know what I prefer


Wouldn't it be safer to give the cars a head start? That way cars are already ahead of the cyclists, rather than doing an overtake.
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TBH it really depends on the cyclists fitness level and the speed of the road.
but I think the general idea behind this is that it's for junctions not regular traffic lights to cross the road.

a lot of nervous cyclists won't take charge of the lane so will stay next to the kerb , they start driving off and if a car is turning left it will turn into the stupid cyclist who want's to go straight on

better education on how cyclists should use the roads would be the way forward
 
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I stop reading when you said irrelevant. Lol

Because the answer is ZERO, nothing, Nada, Zilch!

In practice, you are legally to pay nothing for a band A vehicle for a VED licence. Nothing at all, yet can legally drive it on the roads.

Is that wrong?
 
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Meridian said:
No-one said that it was. What was said was that it wasn't a tax to use the road. The missing clause makes all the difference.
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It is a tax to use the road! I paid £280 last month so that I could, legally, use the public roads. Therefore, it is a tax to use the roads.

As said, the fact that some pay nothing is irrelevant. The same applies to other taxes, they are all on a sliding scale.

I'd personally simply charge cyclists a simple gesture charge like £10 a year. I'd also make them have insurance though - especially as some (not all) like to ride around like grade A *****.
 
It's not just about damage. Building the roads isn't cheap, nor is millions of cycle lanes. It'd be more of a gesture really anyway, i'd not be in favour of charging cyclists much at all, I just feel they should pay *something*.

That £2 a month insurance sounds brilliant, and should be made mandatory.
 
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Raymond Lin said:
I stop reading when you said irrelevant. Lol

Because the answer is ZERO, nothing, Nada, Zilch!

In practice, you are legally to pay nothing for a band A vehicle for a VED licence. Nothing at all, yet can legally drive it on the roads.

Is that wrong?
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It is a tax that is levied if you wish to use a motor vehicle on a public road.

It's that simple. Some vehicles attract a tax of £0, but that doesnt change the fact that VED is a tax levied if you want use of the road.

The money raised isn't directly spent on the roads, I agree, but it's still a tax levied on use of the road.
 
Tute said:
It's not just about damage. Building the roads isn't cheap, nor is millions of cycle lanes. It'd be more of a gesture really anyway, i'd not be in favour of charging cyclists much at all, I just feel they should pay *something*.

That £2 a month insurance sounds brilliant, and should be made mandatory.
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I'd gladly pay if the roads were designed for both cars and cyclists but what we often get is dangerous ill thought out cycling lanes that are full of crap.

I saw one with loads of broken tree branches scattered in it the other day and as I said next to the kerb is usually uneven and a really poor surface which causes your bike to bounce around a fair bit making it hard to control if someone overtakes uber close to you like an idiot and it also kills your backside.

you would also be surprised how much easier and faster it is on a nice smooth surface which tends to be the middle of the lane

tbh I'm sure a lot of cyclists if not most of them who do it for commuting or recreation would happily pay towards a fund if that fund only got used to help improve cycling infrastructure in this country
 
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arknor said:
I'd gladly pay if the roads were designed for both cars and cyclists but what we often get is dangerous ill thought out cycling lanes that are full of crap.

I saw one with loads of broken tree branches scattered in it the other day and as I said next to the kerb is usually uneven and a really poor surface which causes your bike to bounce around a fair bit making it hard to control if someone overtakes uber close to you like an idiot and it also kills your backside.

you would also be surprised how much easier and faster it is on a nice smooth surface which tends to be the middle of the lane
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All valid points, the roads in this country are of very poor quality in places.

[TW]Fox;24785835 said:
The money raised isn't directly spent on the roads, I agree, but it's still a tax levied on use of the road.
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Can I just add that I don't agree with this either. Money generated through road tax and fuel duty should be recycled back into maintaining the streets.

Maybe then the standard would improve.
 
Ok yes it is a "road tax" of such, this so called "road tax" is an emissions based tax. There are cars that pay nothing due to the amount of emissions they emit. Bicycles emit no emission and therefore are equally allowed on the road just as much as the car that has no emissions. The whole cyclists pay no "road tax" is irrelevant.
 
They should contribute.

1. It's fair.
2. It would shut those up who claim "you don't pay any tax so shouldn't be here".

It's also only an emissions tax to drive morons into eco crapboxes and so prop up a lagging car industry. As soon as it becomes economically unviable to keep the system as it is, it will be changed and "emissions" will be forgotten overnight. I'm personally in favour of a very small charge levied to all road users of say, £10-£15 and then the rest is rolled into fuel duty *cough* tax.
 
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Any suggestion a cyclist should pay tax is just ridiculous. It would cost more than it would generate to administrate and enforce it.
 
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Tute said:
They should contribute.

1. It's fair.
2. It would shut those up who claim "you don't pay any tax so shouldn't be here".

It's also only an emissions tax to drive morons into eco crapboxes and so prop up a lagging car industry. As soon as it becomes economically unviable to keep the system as it is, it will be changed and "emissions" will be forgotten overnight. I'm personally in favour of a very small charge levied to all road users of say, £10-£15 and then the rest is rolled into fuel duty *cough* tax.
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The tax doesn't contribute to roads and isn't ring fenced so how is it 'fair' that they pay? Surely as long as you are paying your share of tax, be it income tax, VAT, fuel duty, council tax, CGT, IHT, etc then what difference to VED make. Why is VED special? If you say that I as a cyclist should pay VED to sue the road then surely I can say that I should have priority over you in my county because I pay council tax there (and council tax is ring fenced for roads).

I'd suggest that people not being idiots and actually understanding what VED was would shut those up who claim "you don't pay any tax so shouldn't be here".
 
It is a road tax to use the roads. Cyclists use the roads. Therefore they should pay a tax for the priviledge.
 
Tute said:
It is a road tax to use the roads. Cyclists use the roads. Therefore they should pay a tax for the priviledge.
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It's a tax to use motor vehicles on the roads and it's based on axle weight and emissions. As soon as I put a motor on my bike I'll pay it for my bike.
 
I'm aware of what the law is. My original point is that VED can be perfectly validly called road tax because that's what it is.

I then went on to add that cyclists (and by extension, ALL road users) should contribute to the roads they use, and should have insurance whilst they do so.

Again, cyclists use the roads so they should pay road tax to do so.
 
I do contribute to the roads; I pay council tax, income tax, stamp duty, VAT, CGT, etc.

As it happens I also pay over £800 a year in VED but let's ignore that for the moment.
 
[TW]Fox;24785148 said:
It is a tax to use the road - you don't need to pay it if you don't wish to use the vehicle on the road.
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So it's a tax to use the car on the road, not to use the road. As others have said, I don't have to pay it if I have no emissions, therefore, it's an emissions tax or license, which, if I used on private land, wouldn't affect anyone in the public domain......
 
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[TW]Fox;24786599 said:
So do pedestrians, people who ride horses, people on mobility scooters...
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Pedestrians should not be wandering in the road.
Horses should pay too, same as bicycles.
Mobility scooters should be on the pavement where they belong.

[DOD]Asprilla;24786602 said:
I do contribute to the roads; I pay council tax, income tax, stamp duty, VAT, CGT, etc.

As it happens I also pay over £800 a year in VED but let's ignore that for the moment.
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As do I. But I still pay my road tax as it gives me a right to use the country's roads, and without paying it I can't.

I don't see how you don't think that everyone who uses something shouldn't pay for it's upkeep?
 
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