Why even Pretend

I recently wrote an article about Road Pricing, which was prompted by the petition raised on the Governments website for those opposed to this scheme.

Well that petition is closed now, and something like 2.5 million people signed it. I say “something like” because I can’t be bothered to confirm that, because even though the number of people who signed was vastly in excess of the supposed number required for the scheme to be dropped, the government have basically given them the finger. Apparently the 2.5 million people who signed the petition signed it for the wrong reasons, and therefore it doesn’t count, and they’re going to go ahead with the scheme anyway.

Am I wrong to suggest that it’s a little presumptuous to assume to know the rationale millions of individual people had for their actions? And if making unilateral decisions like that is to be accepted, I’d like to counter that by saying the governments reasons for wanting road pricing are also wrong, and therefore they don’t count either.

But aside from that, even if people did sign for the wrong reasons, and even if the government could possibly know that, it’s irrelevant. The petition didn’t say that it had to be signed for certain reasons, it just had to be signed. If a vote can be discounted because the reason for it being cast was potentially errant, then surely Tony Blair shouldn’t have won the election, as it’s common knowledge that a large percentage of old people voted for him on the grounds that they liked his smile.

Bush was elected on the grounds he is a redneck simpleton and therefore appeals to the morons who inhabit 40 of the 50 states in America. It doesn’t matter that he can’t count to 10 and signs his name with crayons, the people voted for him, so he won. Big Brother is on TV every year because millions of people continue to watch it. It doesn’t matter that it’s shit and that the people who are watching it have no more intellect than a blade of grass, they want to watch it, there are loads of them, so every year it is back on TV. The point of democracy is that people have their say, and no matter how stupid their say is, the majority rules.

Now, I don’t like this system, I genuinely believe that everyone should be IQ tested every 4 years, and only the people in top 1% should be allowed a vote. I will elaborate on the reasons for this in a later article, but for the moment the system we use means that everyone, rich and poor, young and old, thin and fat, clever and stupid, black and white, tall and short, gay straight bi and clergy all get a say, and their say counts equally. And while this is our system, we have to stick to it. So if you put a petition up on a website and say that if 200,000 people sign it you will ditch road pricing, when two fucking million people sign it, you have to ditch road pricing. End of the matter.

But that wont happen, and congestion will continue to dominate the media for years to come. And I will get increasingly frustrated because of the following fact.

I pay a huge amount of income tax, and VAT, and road tax, and travel tax when I go on holiday, and stamp duty when I buy a house. I pay inheritance tax if I inherit money, and huge amounts of tax on the fuel I use. I am basically a machine for paying tax, every day it’s all I do. The Government must get at least a £1500 from me every single month. And that’s assuming I don’t go on holiday, buy a house, or kill a relative. If I do any of those things, it’ll be much more than that.

And where does this money all go. Hospitals? No, they’re badly funded disease pits that didn’t bother to fix my collar bone properly. Police? Not allowed to arrest criminals anymore, and even if they did there are no prisons to put them in. Education? If I want my kids to be stabbed, I’ll do it myself. Roads? The roads around my area are now so bad I piss blood after every spine breaking journey.

So where does it go? It’s billions and billions of pounds every single year, it must go somewhere. And it does, it goes on studies and focus groups and meetings and conferences all on one of two subjects: Road congestion, and the environment. And that’s it. Billions and billions of pounds spent on idiots talking about topics they don’t understand.

What the fuck is wrong with us all for taking this shit. Every time anyone hears a politician mention either road congestion or the environment, they should punch them in the cock and tell them to do some proper work. I’m sick of it.

Here’s the thing with road congestion. Every single year, there are more cars on the roads. So we need more space for them. On the motorways, this is simple, build more lanes. But then people moan and say this doesn’t solve the problem. A man called Richard Moe once said “building more roads to ease traffic is kind of like trying to cure obesity by loosening the belt”. This is a nice comment, but it’s also stupid, because when dealing with congestion, we shouldn’t trying to force people not to drive, we should be trying to make it possible for them to do so, so in fact loosening the belt is a valid response.

People always say “new roads just get filled up, they attract more cars”. This is as stupid as saying “If I buy a bigger house, I’ll end up with more furniture, so I’m not getting a bigger house”. When you build new roads, and they end up filled up again, it’s because people are always buying more cars. It’s not because the prospect of new and exciting roads has created a mad dash for them. When was the last time you heard someone say “Have you seen the M40!!! They’ve widened it, it’s got another lane now, quick, get everyone you know and I’ll meet you there!!!!”.

An important thing to appreciate when thinking about roads is this. They’re dull. People aren’t attracted to roads. People use a road to get where they want to go. People don’t drive hundreds of miles to Alton Towers because the roads through Alton are pleasant to drive on. The roads get filled up because the number of cars goes up all the time, new roads or not. If the road was one lane narrower, the same amount of cars would still try to be on it, and the congestion would be worse.

To make it really simple, what do you think would happen if they closed half of the lanes on the M25 tomorrow? Would half the people decide to stay home because there was less road to attract them out?

Or put another way. Imagine you live with your partner, in a one bedroom apartment, and decide to have a Baby. You do not have a spare room, so you now get a two bedroom apartment. When you have the baby, you again don’t have a spare room, just like you didn’t when it was just you and your partner. Does this mean that getting the extra room didn’t help at all? Was the correct solution to your problem actually to drown your child in the bath and stay in the one bedroom place? That’s essentially what you’re talking about when you suggest forcing cars off the road rather than trying to make enough room for them.

Congestion charging, vehicle tracking, increased road tax, all these things are a load of shit. Solving congestion is easy, build more roads so there’s room for more cars, and make public transport meet at least two of following criteria

1) It doesn’t smell like a rock star recently died on it
2) You can use it without getting stabbed or raped, or both.
3) It occasionally turns up on time
4) It services more than 3% of the country
5) It’s frequent enough that it’s actually viable

See that’s not even unreasonable, I only want two of those criteria, and if you go to a real country, like Japan, you get all of those. Public transport in England is so far behind pretty much every other civilised country that it’s laughable that people still pretend it’s a valid option. In London it’s OK, the underground seems to work most of the time, it’s a bit crowded but that’s unavoidable, and although it’s not pleasant, it gets the job done. But I don’t live in London anymore, and anyone without a car where I live runs a genuine risk of starving to death. There is no public transport. I know someone who doesn’t have a car and it takes him 2 hours to get to work every day. He lives 7 miles from his office.

So then people say “why not ride a bike?”

Where do people get this from, it’s hilarious. Here is a fact that does to the “ride a bike” argument what Eastern Express did to Christopher Reeve. Are you ready?

Often, in England, it rains.

And that’s it. If you have a job where you have to look presentable, for example any office based job, you have to know that the method of transportation you are going to use will guarantee that you can get to work without looking like you’ve just been gang raped by natural disasters. England’s weather is unpredictable, and riding a bike to work isn’t valid. Employers don’t have a sense of humour about you turning up to work looking like shit. If you ride a bike to work, pretty soon you’ll be riding that same bike to the job centre.

And so back to my point, why the fuck am I paying all this tax when I’m living in a country that can’t arrange for it to be possible for me to use my car?