EQUITY IN TAXATION.
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ASSUMING from Sir Erie Geddes's recent remarks on road maintenance that taxation of some sort or another is unavoidable and even justifiable in. the case of commercial motor vehicles, it is obviously the duty of those concerned to see that the basis of such taxation is as equitable as possible. The petrol tax was presumably' selected in the first instance, as against other possible forms of taxation, on the supposition that it would be at least as equitable as any other method. From this point of view it has the apparent advantage of taking into account the mileage covered hi. the course of the year, and also, indirectly, the power, speed and load-carrying capacity of the vehicle. , It is obvious that an increase in any one of these three factors must involve some increase in the amount of fuel used. The weakest spot in the petrol tax as an equitable impost is that petrol and kindred fuels are not our sole source of power. Obviously, the burden of any taxation imposed with a view to road maintenance or improvement should be fairly borne by all classes of traffic. The petrol tax does not touch the horse-drawn vehicle, the steamer, or the electric van. It has been assumed all along that any tax on the horse-drawn vehicle would be deeply resented and very unpopular, and it has been argued that the pro ceeds of the petrol tax go to road improvement as distinct from road maintenance, and that, cn far as homed vehicles are concerned, road maintenance is all that is necessary. There is, of course, something in this theory that the people who want a change shoukl be the ones to pay-for it, but we must remember that, whether the owners of horsed vehicles want road improvement or not, they certainly benefit if such improvement is carried out, and, therefore, there is no reason why they should not pay something in return for that benefit. In fact, . any scheme of taxation that omits the horsed vehicle is based upon vote catching and not upon equity. A heavy horsed lorry can do considerable damage to the roads, and the ill-effect upon the reads of the free use of skids is notorious. The narrow steel-tyred wheels of even comparatively light horsed vehicles cannot possibly be absolved of all responsibility for road wear. Moreover, road .improvement giving hard smocith surfaces enables such wheels to travel with less effort. • There is no reason to suppose that the owners of steam-propelled lorries -or tractors, or of electric vehicles, would resent a proposal that they should bear their fair share towards any general payment that may be necessary and justifiable. Thus, we see that the petrol tax as it now stands falls far short of -complete equity. Leaving the horsedrawn vehicle out of consideration far the moment, we might, of course, lax all motor vehicles on the basis of horse-power assessed by formula, or on the basis of some other formula directly or indirectly taking speed and weight into account. The weak spot about any such scheme would be that it does not at all reflect the mileage covered ; that is to say, the actual use made of the roads.
At the same time, it is questionable whether it is in the public interest that the system should be such as to make 'payments exactly proportionate to mileage, other things being equal. It would help to create a desirable tendency if the taxation per mile were greater in cases where the mileage is small.
The point is that it is in the national interest that transport should be economically conducted, i.e., that all vehicles that are used at alt should be used to their full capacity in respect both of the load carried and of the mileage covered. Therefore, it would be well to encourage a truly economic use of vehicles by making taxation bear more heavily per mile on those the mileage of which is small. On general principles, this argument is sound. Its only weak spot is that it might tend to make taxation very heavy upon vehicles used for short local deliveries, where much time is necessarily wasted and the mileagecovered is necessarily trifling. These are just the conditions in which it'is hardest for motor transpart to displace horsed transport ; therefore, it is undesirable that any artificial interference in natural competition in these classes of traffic should be permitted.
This brings us back to the basic fact that no scheme can be really equitable which does not include the horsed vehicle.
Now, the only things common to all vehicles, motor or horse, •are wheels and weight. If every vehicle were registered to carry-up to acertain weight, a tax could be imposed on a scale of so much per cwt. or per ton of registered weight.
This tax might be regarded as a payment for the right to use the roads. It might be supplemented by a reduced fuel tax upon liquid fuels in the case of all vehicles so drawn. It would be practically impossible to extend thaaystein of fuel taxation to steamers _ and electric vehicles, or to horsed traffic. The nearest approach to equity could probably be got by estimating the average mileage which these various vehicles might be expected to cover in the year, faking proper account of the character of the work uaually done by them, and charging a second tax on registered weight, bringing the total up to something very nearly approaching an equiValent of the proceeds of the two taxes in the case of corresponding petrbl vehicles.
The result of scheming taxation somewhat on the bases proposed would be that all would bear their fair share in the cost of the roads, and some slight preferential treatment would in effect be given to those vehicles which, being kept fully employed, are really thoroughly conducive to economy of transport.