Cost of UK Motoring
Is being a UK motorist today all that it first seems? After my last few months on the road, I would have to say no.
Insurance is expensive, and seems to get more expensive every year, despite the fact that it is supposed to become cheaper the longer you go without having an accident.
Road tax. This is apparently charged for road maintenance amongst other things, but how often do we actually see the areas of our roads that really do need attention being repaired or resurfaced? Near where I work, I have seen the same section of road resurfaced at least four times in the last year, but it puzzles me because there was nothing wrong with it in the first place! I suppose though, that it's nice to be able to see where our money is being wasted every year and how this can be used as a reason to increase the amount of road tax we pay again and again.
Petrol and diesel. Coincidentally, since the ban on smoking in public places was brought in, the people who complained about smokers in pubs and clubs got their way, but they themselves are now paying, because as I predicted, (at least for the area I live in) people have either cut back on smoking or quit altogether. This I suspect, will cause the government a great loss on the tax/duty of cigarettes over time. Spookily, the slump in cigarette sales was surely enough followed by the beginning of a steady rise in fuel costs, a coincidence I also spoke about before the smoking ban became enforced.
I wonder how many people realize the catch-22 effect this has? Where something everybody uses or needs becomes more inaccessible by means of expense, meaning everyone wants more money or better pay from their jobs, meaning companies have to pay their employees more, meaning that in turn the companies have to raise their prices to continue to make as much as they were before, which means just generally the cost of living goes up, causing people to want more money again from their jobs or wherever they get it... and so on and so on.
There's more! Did you ever notice that pay and display car-parks really are just a complete rip-off? The machines take certain amounts of money for certain amounts of parking time, but say you had to break a note just so you can put coins in the machine which does not take notes, this means you do not have exact change for the dodgy pricing system meaning you have to put in more money than the machine requires for the length of time you wish to park. The machine does not give you change, so instantly you are out of pocket having paid money for something you do not get, then you get held up and return just a few minutes after your ticket expires, only to find those slimy little parking attendants have been hanging around anyway just waiting for people's tickets to run out, then slapping penalty charge notices under their wipers! But what's worse is that there isn't actually a way you can claim back all your money from them, for all the times you have paid too much at a pay and display machine, because it doesn't give change due to the greed of the government and it's subsidies.
It doesn't make me proud to be able to honestly say that my home country makes me sick.
