Date published: 2008/02/19
The BBC says:
Luxury carmaker Porsche is to challenge plans to increase London's congestion charge to £25-a-day for some vehicles.
The firm said it intended to ask for a judicial review into the price changes, which come into force in October.
Porsche says the new rules, which affect the highest polluting vehicles, are "disproportionate" and will not decrease emissions in central London.
Transport for London (TfL) predicts up to 22,000 cars will no longer come into the zone when the new fee comes in.
Under the plans, which will be introduced on 27 October, cars with the lowest carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions will get a 100% discount on the charge.
Most drivers will still pay the £8 road toll for entering the zone which covers parts of central and west London.
Porsche will write to the mayor's office informing him of their intention to seek a judicial review.
If it does not receive a satisfactory response, it will apply to the courts for an order to quash the new charge.
The mayor's advisor on climate change Mark Watts said "No-one needs to drive these really big polluting cars in central London.
"It's the 'polluter pays' principle - you will be allowed to carry on driving a big polluting car in central London, but what the new charge will mean is you have to pay for the cost of the pollution that you inflict upon everyone else."
Porsche are clearly correct. The new £25 band is indeed "disproportionate". It is just a vindictive tax put in place by the academic middle class because they hate cars (especially big ones). And the mayor's stooge, Mark Watts, is just taking the piss: "No-one needs to drive these really big polluting cars in central London." Well, no-one really needs to do anything in life (except die). That is not the question at hand. Indeed, one can imagine the Mark Watts of the world also just saying: "No-one really needs to drive in central London." And effectively, that is what the so-called congestion charge is all about. The academic middle class hate people being independently mobile. (Well, for some reason they excuse rich people who go around in taxis, because evidently rich people need to be able to do that.) Needless to say, just because Porsche are correct does not mean they will win their case. The judiciary is very academic middle class. But at least Porsche may force these dreadful bureaucrats to justify their decision with something more than the silly and patronising comments we get from Watts.
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