This petrol thing...
Created | Updated Jan 28, 2002
IMHO it seems to me that for any country looking in from the outside, Britain would be easy pickings for a prospective takeover, all they would need to do would be to get a few people to stand outside the oil refineries and ask the tanker drivers not to leave their depots, and when asked why, they could say that it's because it's too expensive or they would just rather they didn't for any reason. Within twenty four hours Britain is on it's knees with most of the population unavailable to defend their country because they are a bit tied up in a queue at the filling station, including the army, who were also resricted to emergency rations. mmm what happened to Great Britain.
But to take it more seriously, we have known for a long time that fossil fuels are on their way out, so the era of cheap fuel is over ($35.00 per barrel) but we still need it more than ever, so the sensible thing for Labour to do is tax it as much as possible, to the point where ordinary mortals can simply not afford it and force the people to go out and use our wonderful and efficient public transport system.... hmm.. perhaps thats not the sensible thing to do, perhaps to have forseen the trouble in this country after seeing the blow-up in France over their high but lower than our fuel prices. It might have been a wise move to have given an immediate tax cut on fuel, on the understanding that it will incur a small increase on income tax, which is fairer, on the ability to pay basis.
Or alternatively, tell the people what all this extra tax will be spent on, how much is being spent on research to find an alternative fuel, tell us why we can't have decent rail network, or at least a bus service which arrives on time and isn't more expensive than driving a car. Probably the reason is, is that it's easier to confuse people when they're at their lowest and poorest ebb and spreadsheets can be difficult to understand!
Thanks for reading.
W.Hague
pp. Ziko
By the way Douglas, did you ever do anything with those Hitch hiker books?
But to take it more seriously, we have known for a long time that fossil fuels are on their way out, so the era of cheap fuel is over ($35.00 per barrel) but we still need it more than ever, so the sensible thing for Labour to do is tax it as much as possible, to the point where ordinary mortals can simply not afford it and force the people to go out and use our wonderful and efficient public transport system.... hmm.. perhaps thats not the sensible thing to do, perhaps to have forseen the trouble in this country after seeing the blow-up in France over their high but lower than our fuel prices. It might have been a wise move to have given an immediate tax cut on fuel, on the understanding that it will incur a small increase on income tax, which is fairer, on the ability to pay basis.
Or alternatively, tell the people what all this extra tax will be spent on, how much is being spent on research to find an alternative fuel, tell us why we can't have decent rail network, or at least a bus service which arrives on time and isn't more expensive than driving a car. Probably the reason is, is that it's easier to confuse people when they're at their lowest and poorest ebb and spreadsheets can be difficult to understand!
Thanks for reading.
W.Hague
pp. Ziko
By the way Douglas, did you ever do anything with those Hitch hiker books?
