Clause 10
Finance Bill
2:30 pm
Adam Afriyie (Windsor, Conservative)
I have just a few observations. The Financial Secretary said that the objectives of these duties are for environmental reasons, to raise revenue for public services and to create certainty by laying out the future progression of these duties. They are all fairly admirable goals and I have no complaint with them. There is a danger that the green taxes are an excuse for revenue raising or that they obfuscate the drive to raise revenues by hiding it behind environmental issues. It strikes me that when we come to vehicles and the duties on vehicles, consumers quite possibly already pay many times more than it costs to tidy up the carbon they may be emitting from their exhaust pipes.
We are coming on now to vehicle excise duty with many different gradings. That is arguably a green tax. We have these fuel duties now escalating with the various differentials. Residents parking permits in some areas will be cost more for gas-guzzling or large vehicles, the cost of parking at railway stations is always increasing and then there is congestion charge in central London which is arguably an environmental or a green tax to a certain degree. Now we have talk of road pricing.
It strikes me that at approximately £30 per tonne to clear up CO2, there is no doubt that, if we are considering this as a green issue, the motorist is already well over-taxed in that area. That is why, to an extent, I am pleased with the Conservative party’s position, which is that if we raise green taxes, we will offset them against taxes in other areas of the economy. Can the Financial Secretary confirm—or advise otherwise—that there is an intention in here somewhere to offset the increases in what are called “green taxes” against those in other areas? To echo my hon. Friends on the Opposition Front Bench, how much of the additional money raised from these duties will go directly to road improvements and carbon removal? The technologies are available, so is anything ring-fenced to be passed, for example, directly to carbon sequestration or other means of removing carbon from the atmosphere? It is not that I would argue for any form of hypothecation; I should just like to give the Financial Secretary a platform from which to tell us what measures are being undertaken and how much they have been increased, given that there is increased revenue from fuel duty.
Finally, on a point that applies to most broadly based taxes, does the Financial Secretary recognise that the increases in these duties will, by virtue of the kind of tax that they are, disproportionately affect the least well off?