North East Hauliers Hit Hard As Government Loses Taxpayer £1billion of Foreign Lorry Income

10.15.31am UTC (GMT +0000) Fri 2nd Dec 2005

North East Members of Parliament, Malcolm Bruce and Sir Robert Smith, have today slammed the Government for its decision to scrap the introduction of a national lorry road charging scheme after new Liberal Democrat research revealed it will cost the taxpayer over £1 billion pounds in lost revenue.

The Liberal Democrat MP's also criticised the UK Transport Minister, Alistair Darling, for failing to protect the UK road haulage industry from unfair foreign competition.

Foreign registered vehicles travel over 900 million kilometres a year on UK roads and the scrapping of the Lorry Road User Charging Initiative now means that foreign hauliers will not contribute anything until the national road user pricing scheme is operational, which according to Alistair Darling may not be for another fifteen years.

Gordon MP, Malcolm Bruce, commented:

"The Lorry Road User Charging initiative was intended to address inequalities for British hauliers following the fuel protests in 2000. The scheme would have brought in additional tax revenue which was to be used to give rebates to British hauliers and address the unfair competition the industry currently faces from their foreign counterparts who fill their tanks abroad.

"The scrapping of the scheme means that it is the tax payer and hauliers who foot the bill for unfair foreign competition to the tune of £1 billion pounds."

"This money could, and should, have been used to make a real difference to the haulage industry. The news will be particularly hard to swallow for North East hauliers who already feel the bite from foreign competition more than most."

Sir Robert Smith, MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, said:

"Given the distance we are from many of our markets road haulage is vital to the economy of the North East. Our lorries already face serious extra costs from the price of fuel and extra regulations on working time. This billion pounds could have helped reduce the burden of those extra costs and deal with unfair competition from foreign lorry owners."