'Greening' – good idea or just another excuse to tax road transport?

The British Association of Removers

Friday, 15, Aug 2008 12:00

The British Association of Removers (BAR) is concerned at the ever-increasing burdens being placed upon the road transport industry.

Such concern is highlighted even further following the recent "Greening of Transport" package of proposals published in July by the European Commission.

The British Association of Removers, together with many other responsible transport industry representatives, recognises that transport demand will continue to grow in the coming decades. Sustainable development is taken very seriously and the industry has been continuously involved with the development of individual and joint programs to tackle this challenge.

However, this challenge is a shared responsibility and requires both the European Commission and other industries to join the sustainability challenge on equal terms.

The policy tools such as the instrument to internalise external costs through road pricing, as proposed by the European Commission, will not be a sufficient guarantee to achieve sustainability and will thus not reach the aim of reducing the external effects of transport.

Environmental benefits from introducing higher charges will be minimal as freight will need to be moved regardless of additional charges! BAR is of the opinion that the policy as it stands will simply make road transport and thus the goods transported more expensive with a marginal environmental impact.

Road transport is the only practical and viable mode of transporting goods to their end destination. This is certainly true for the movement of household effects and/or office effects between residences or commercial premises. In the majority of cases, reliable and realistic alternatives do not exist.

Experience suggests that when road freight costs go up, other modes will follow suit, thus neutralising any potential cost ‘advantage’ that may otherwise have been gained and fuelling inflation at a time when we are already experiencing increased costs and declining markets. It is no secret that members of the British Association of Removers and others carrying out removals and storage activities are suffering hugely as a result of inflation, the credit squeeze, the decline in the house moving market and other related factors.

For a number of years the European Commission has pursued a policy of modal shift, by proposing pricing instruments or capping strategies to curb the growth of transport. The 2006 mid-term review of this policy gave birth to the co-modality concept, which considers all modes operating together to provide sustainable transport solutions, whereas the European Commission’s July 08 ‘Greening Package’ proposal once again drives a wedge between the modes.

BAR is of the opinion that the latest initiative by the European Commission will not help the current drive towards cleaner engines, lower emissions and more efficient freight transport in any way. There is a common concern that the principle of strict ‘earmarking’ may not be finally adopted, thus failing to achieve the goal of addressing externalities altogether.

The main issue is that the European Commission wishes to address congestion in order to tackle local pollution (air and noise) and also emissions of Green House Gases such as CO2 - and yet their hands are being tied by Members States - such that they can only suggest rather than mandate that the internalising of such costs should be extended to the private vehicle sector - the very part of road transport that contributes the lion share of CO2, congestion and noise impacts on society! How ironic is that?

We recognise that transport like any human activity causes externalities, which we all have a shared responsibility to mitigate now and in the future. But - as a matter of fact, it needs to be recognised that the road transport industry has already taken effective “at source” technical measures and adopted operational practices that have, for instance, reduced the fuel consumption of commercial vehicles by more than a third since 1970 and toxic emissions by some 97 per cent!

The European Commission’s proposals require considerable caution: they stem from observations carried out in a different economic climate. Today, with higher transport costs, the risk of stagflation and economic decline, the last thing we need is ‘another nail in the coffin’ when essential industries are already fighting for survival.

Forced modal shifts are not sustainable or even practical force niche industries such as Removals. For general transport, in the medium to long term, rail freight figures will increase – but so will road freight figures! There will be no sudden or substantial shift towards rail.

The majority of logistics operators will stay focussed on road transport, which despite the acknowledged restraints, continues to be more efficient and reliable. Governments therefore need to find ways to encourage the use of more environmentally friendly trucks, minimising empty miles, getting the best use of trucks through well planned and executed supply chains and improving the road transport infrastructure rather than ‘taxing’ road transport even further with diversification of such important funds to other modes and other uses.

BAR questions the methodology and therefore the reliability of the Commission's proposals to add 'External Costs' under the guise of 'efficient and fair pricing of transport'. There are numerous flaws in the Commission's assumptions. Furthermore, such unjustified extra charges, directed only at road transport and not other modes of transport and only to vehicles above 3.5 tonnes, imply a different political agenda.

BAR therefore calls upon the UK government to vote against the present proposals

Until there is equal and neutral treatment in all modes, with equivalent measures (in proportion to the externalities of each mode), BAR sees no justification for the urgency to place additional charges on road freight with a rushed revision of the Eurovignette directive.