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There's one niggling little detail of the punitive parking charges story I have a problem with. Green taxes- love them. You want big useless things- you pay for the privilege, no problem with that. There are ways of doing it though. Tiered road fund license- good idea so long as its not too disproportionate. Fuel duty, good idea also, can we get other countries not to set theirs so irresponsibly low though.

It's right that people are penalized for driving needlessly large vehicles. My problem is the notion that the council are charging for residents to use something that's already theirs. Bear with me I'll explain. The council do not (usually) own the street outside your house. They are just managing it for you, and the management charge is part of your council tax. It's perfectly fair that the additional administrative cost of a scheme to protect parking places for residents is passed on. But does it really cost more than a tenner to log a registration in a computer and issue a paper disk?