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UK councils considering school-run charge

 
17 1,451 views April 22, 2008

UK councils considering school-run charge

UK councils considering school-run charge

Just when you thought there couldn’t be any other deterrents to vehicle ownership in the UK, what with all the congestion charges, speed cameras, parking tickets and registration taxes, local authorities are now considering implementing a scheme to charge parents that drive their children to school. Richmond Borough Council in South London is proposing to charge parents up to £75 ($150) a year for a parking permit to allow them to use special bays outside schools.

The move is part of the council’s greater plan to cut congestion, reduce emissions and encourage students to be more active and walk to school. Under the scheme, owners of vehicles such as SUVs and people-movers will have to pay the full charge while owners of smaller vehicles will receive a lesser charge, reports the BBC.

According to the council, schools are already issuing permits to parents themselves in an effort to ease congestion during the peak hours. However, parent groups say the new charge would be unfair given the high number of other charges motorists in the UK are already faced with.

Councilors will vote on the scheme by September and if given the green light other councils are expected to follow with similar schemes.



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Comments (17)

  1. By Gus Posted: 4/22/2008 11:05am PDT

    I guess the only way to get those lawbreaking, environmentally unconscious, degenerate British criminals to comply with everything their government demands that they do is to tax, fine, charge and fee them within an inch of their pensions...

    Next up, a pee tax, more for large people, less for small people, no tax for hybrid bodily expulsions...

    Insane.
     
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  2. By chris Posted: 4/22/2008 11:26am PDT

    well... the article makes a good point. kids do have legs. if they dont want to take the school bus like every other kid... then they can walk their butts to school.

    some parents may see this as a god send cause now when their snotty nosed brat says "oh why mummy won't YOU drive me to school today",.. well mummy can put down her cup of earl grey and say "I'm sorry love, but we can't afford such luxuries. NOW WALK YOUR BOTTOM TO GRAMMAR SCHOOL BEFORE I REMOVE YOUR RIGHTS TO PLAY TIDDLY WINKS!!!"

    I'm sorry, my attempt at a hilarious portrayal of backwoods england has failed. but you get the point. there are school buses for a reason... so that 2,000 range rovers are heading to the same place in town twice a day. I guess the funny part of all of this is that aparently gasoline prices arent high enough in britain to deter parents from babying their kids to the biggest degree.

    "oh i just can't sit around and watch my children have to take that cursed school bus any more. I think i'll drive them myself"......... yeah cause taking a school bus is the worst kind of torture known to man.
     
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  3. By chris Posted: 4/22/2008 11:27am PDT

    ....but yeah, seems kinda excessive to charge 150$ to parents to allow them to drive their own kids to school.
     
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  4. By ally Posted: 4/22/2008 11:37am PDT

    i think this environment stuff is becoming kind of anoying...i mean if you want to stop pollution come up with fuel which is cheap and widely available all over the world...but i hav to agree with chris here why dont kids ride the school bus or walk to school...there is absolutely nothin wrong with riding the bus or walking....it is kinda expensive though
     
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  5. By MyWheelsOnWalls.com Posted: 4/22/2008 12:37pm PDT

    Unbelievable!!! Are they going to tax fat people more as their gravitational pull is greater? This would make sense as gravity is a natural resource and the heavier you are the more of it you use.

    As for taking the bus, England does not have a school bus system anything like the one in the USA. In fact the UK town I went to school in did not have a bus system until you got to high school and even then it was for the kids who came in from towns that did not have a high school.
     
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  6. By steve Posted: 4/22/2008 1:47pm PDT

    ...this is ridiculous! why dont they just make it illegal to own/operate a car...
     
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  7. By chris Posted: 4/22/2008 2:06pm PDT

    MWOW: still, if the school is a 10 minute walk, then walk it. its its a 10 minute bike ride, then bike it. if your kid is fat and has asthma, even more reason to get his butt on a bike.

    if that sounds insensitive, i was a fat kid with asthma. if it wasn't for biking my butt to school every day, I'd probably be a lazy slob today. only reason why I drive to work is because I have a 40 minute drive to work.
     
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  8. By Roy Posted: 4/22/2008 2:36pm PDT

    Actually, the biggest factor here is safety. Thirty years ago, 90% of British schoolchildren walked to school and there were no problems. A decade ago, 90% of British schoolchildren were getting lifts to school. This dramatic change has more to do with increasingly poor behaviour of children/adults on their way to school than anything else. However, it has taken most schools by surprise. Unlike the US, there are no dedicated school buses in most places. The "drop-off" zones that now exist were usually hastily retrofitted and this school run is one of the biggest causes of congestion.
    I don't know what the solution is, but something's got to give. As the situation is right now, Brits are taxed on their car purchases (17.5%) and then further taxed to get a license (one-off) AND to use the roads (yearly). Then the gasoline is taxed (a US-size 3.8 litre gallon costs upwards of 12 US dollars), which is further taxed at 17.5% VAT so that people can drive anywhere. If they drive into London they will pay their 50 dollar tax (if the car is large) so they can drop their kids off in the drop-off zone that they will now be taxed to use!
    Don't forget, though, that there are more roads per square mile in the UK than in the US and very few toll roads.
     
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  9. By Gus Posted: 4/22/2008 2:57pm PDT

    Have some kids and then you'll understand.
    No kid of mine is sitting on a bus with no seat belt driven around by some minimum wage grandma.
    And school is too far to walk or bike, and there's no bike paths that don't cross major roads.
    And in England it rains a lot.

    So back to the moral of the story: If you're wealthy, in Britain, you have all the luxuries you desire, and the government will clear the road for you by taxing the **** out of the people who can least afford it.
     
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  10. By MyWheelsOnWalls.com Posted: 4/22/2008 5:29pm PDT

    Chris- If I want to drive my kid to school I should be able to without having to pay a tax. Once again government needs to stay out of the invdividuals homes, hence I live where I do.

    As Gus said at least the very wealthy in England are moving to a nirvana of one day having clear roads to drive there Chelsea Tractors on.
     
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  11. By Alex Posted: 4/22/2008 5:48pm PDT

    chris you have to look at the wider picture.. we live in a free society. if i want to take my kids to school i'll do it when i please and with my own car!!
     
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  12. By HECTOR Posted: 4/22/2008 6:41pm PDT

    Chris:

    How did I know that you would be OK with this latest iteration of the old highway robbery scheme? DUDE! I don't mean to be insulting, least of all to a fellow reader, but do you even have the ability to think for yourself or do you do everything the government tells you and think that all their ideas to part you with your money are great?

    It's not for you or the government to tell me how to live my life! If I want to drive my kid half a block to school on my Range Rover that's my business. If I want to tell my kid to walk 10 miles to school that's my business! The government has no business getting involved in these things!

    But, hey, it's a good thing you live in a place(Canada, right?) in which the government has a lot of say in how you live your life. Me? Call me crazy, I like my freedom and think we already give too much of it away to the government.
     
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  13. By MyWheelsOnWalls.com Posted: 4/22/2008 7:10pm PDT

    OH Hector your so full of common sense!! Careful now as Chris will struggle with such forward thinking.....
     
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  14. By Gus Posted: 4/22/2008 7:34pm PDT

    Chris is a very forward thinker, and I think he gets the idea that this is doen to encourage things, or discourage others. But he is very young, and as one gets older, one wants the government in one's business less and less.
    This is why most liberals are young, and most conservatives are older. There's pluses and minuses, young people have vision and drive, old people have wisdom, but they are also stiff in thier views and inflexible at times (I know I can be, at the ripe old age of 38).
    So yes, in a perfect world, we would all drive Smarts running on hummingbird farts, but in the real world, the one where China puts out more pullution per capita than even the worst English speaking offender, and where huge solutions to CO2 are being thought of monthly (see Planktos, for example), the idea that levying more and more fines on a relatively small populace for the sake of presenting a green image seems absurd.
     
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  15. By autoque Posted: 4/23/2008 1:55am PDT

    Not every country has a dedicated school bus system like the U.S. Chris thinks every English speaking country has it.

    Ride bike to school? Sure in spring and fall, but why don't you ask a Canadian what riding a bike in winter means? You wouldn't say such thing.

    Not everyone lives in the same environment as you do.
     
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  16. By Alan Posted: 4/23/2008 7:53am PDT

    This is just ridiculous, everything is taxed, everything is policed by government in the UK nowadays. Really won't be long before UK becomes just like in 1984 and V for Vendetta.

    I totally agree with comment from Gus, all these tax means the majority of the society can't afford to drive anywhere, and the rich will have a clear road to roam about in. But i guess the people who came up with such schemes are probably rich themselves.

    I have to say though, all this green movement against cars is really annoying the s**t out of me, if they want to save the planet by not driving, then dont' drive! It's a free country, i should be able to drive as i want. Sure, it doesn't mean i should drive SUV and pollute excessively, but i should be allowed the freedom to drive around in a sensible small car as i like. I've always wondered, do those greenies protesting about cars go about in a push bike? or do they still drive around like the rest of us. Not to mention cars aren't the major source of carbon emission around the globe, coal/oil based electricity production is probably the biggest source, and countries like China are building many more coal powered station every year, undoing all the reduction made by western developed countries. Perhaps it's like we tackle global warming on a large internation scale to really have an impact on reducing carbon emission.
     
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  17. By RB Posted: 4/23/2008 8:44pm PDT

    Don’t forget chaps that there is not a given right to drive a car in the first place! -You pay to learn and pay to own.

    In term time the peak traffic is significantly higher and most schools simply do not have the parking space for all these drop offs and hence traffic jams are caused. There ought to be schemes where schools organise official 'walk to school' clubs or something for the little ones.

    From my experience Most Primary schools in the UK are easily within about a max of 20 mins walking time of 90% of its students. High schools (age 11- 14ish) tend to have a larger catchment area (but still doable within a 20 min bike ride), and many colleges (14-16ish) already have bus services.

    By cutting back on the school run you would significantly reduce traffic therefore making it safer for walkers and bikers!

    Ok so you should be able to do what you want in this word but why should you want to drive little Johnny round the block to drop him off at school? What’s the matter with walking him to school yourself (if it rains take a brolly!) Simply driving round the block to drop the little ones off is not really healthy for them let alone the problems caused to the environment/traffic flow etc. I have also witnessed many parents unable to park between two vehicles simply abandon their vehicle in the middle of the road causing extremely unsafe conditions.

    So taxing drivers may be a good way of reducing journeys - but anyone who can afford to run a car in the UK will not miss another 75 quid a year, so I doubt if it will have much effect other to increase the councils coppers!
     
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