Roads: Charging

Lord Campbell-Savours Excerpts
Thursday 18th November 2010

(14 years, 1 month ago)

Lords Chamber
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Earl Attlee Portrait Earl Attlee
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My Lords, on the noble Lord's substantive point, we are anxious to avoid making the mistakes of the previous Government, who spent £60 million of public money on a satellite lorry road-user charging scheme that achieved absolutely nothing.

Lord Campbell-Savours Portrait Lord Campbell-Savours
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Why is the tachography option more expensive—which is what the noble Earl said—when all it would require would be an entry reading and an exit reading to provide a calculation based on a multiplication of the cost per mile?

Earl Attlee Portrait Earl Attlee
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The noble Lord is quite right: it is an option that we are looking at very carefully. However, he will also be aware that it is quite easy to interfere with the operation of the tachograph—for instance, by placing a large magnet on the transducer or an illegal switch in the electrical circuitry.