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8th December 2009

The Department for Transport had announced that national road pricing was off the agenda for the foreseeable future, however they have spent £7.2 million on "demonstration" projects, to test the technology. This is in addition to £23.6 million the DfT used to persuade larger urban areas to bring in some form of charging scheme by pouring money into the local economy.

Greater Manchester is the only area outside the capital to consider the option, however the plans were scrapped after being rejected in a referendum. This was only after the Government spent £16.1 million in an attempt to get the scheme moving. Cambridgeshire, Leeds, the Thames Valley and Bristol are reported to be considering some form of pricing.

Although national charging has been ditched the Cabinet Office produced a report last month in which it still nurtured hopes that some form of road pricing should be considered as a way of tackling congestion.

In May last year, the DfT produced a study on the "Public acceptability of road pricing", which followed the February 2007 report on "Designing efficient local road pricing schemes".

That followed the comprehensive Eddington Transport Study, which was published in December 2006. That report, prepared for the Treasury and DfT by Sir Rod Eddington, the former chief executive of British Airways, cost taxpayers £1.3 million.

When the Government floated the idea of national road pricing, it triggered protests with 1.8 million people signing a petition on the Downing Street website calling on the scheme to be scrapped.

Peter Roberts, the petition's author, accused the Government of wasting public money. Why then do we need to continue spending on researching and preparing for road pricing when the debate is over and the public have comprehensively rejected it? he said.

Theresa Villiers, the Tory transport spokesman, also rounded on the Government.

It is shows a real lack of competence that Labour have wasted so much money on these unpopular schemes which have come to nothing. Taxpayers will deeply resent their hard-earned money being frittered away like this, she said.

A spokesman for the Department for Transport comented Congestion is putting the economic future of many of our major towns and cities at risk. If left unchecked it is predicted to cost the economy an extra £22 billion every year by 2025.