Another story of people losing their jobs in the Third Sector as donations start to dry up and there are insufficient funds to employ the people. A store in Sheffield closes and 30 jobs are lost because people don't go there anymore as they would have to pay a clean air tax type scheme. You know where you cross an imaginary line and the air is suddenly cleaner because the polluting cars pay to go into the zone?
The problems arising are a bit like my experience. I live in rural countryside, few buses and it's 45 to 60 minutes for me to walk to either of my stations. It takes around 15 minutes to walk to the nearest bus stop and a bus goes past I understand hourly but not after 6 pm! So I pretty much need a car. The powers that be all appear to be from cities as they think everyone uses or should use public transport when, in reality only around 10% of the population actually does - they, like me, could look up this sort of statistic, but why let the facts get in the way of taxing the daylights out of the population?
In my view killing off my spending power by taking away my winter fuel allowance and with rising energy costs - the Chancellor once again thinks that we all only run on electricity! means I have to make choices. By making me pay £12.50 each time in make an incursion into the invisible ULEZ zone, it means I don't go to things I used to thereby saving the money I'd spend there and the imposed tax to do so. So far not doing so has saved me around £500 and quite a bit as I no longer eat and drink in the establishments I used to go to.
The impact on my social life and on my disposable income is such that I have consciously, in the past month since this silliness arrived, with a further month until the next government budget and with measures already in place, have decided that only essentials will be bought, the remaining money is now going to be used for to clothe, heat and feed ourselves. I have plans to use my log burner a lot more this year to keep ourselves warm and I no longer plan to go the local town as they've put the car park prices up and you have to pay whenever you go there.
Shops are already closing and saying footfall is down. It's not fair on them or us but they, at least have some leverage over petty council diktats and surely councils will see that they are destroying they very people they need to encourage for employment and prosperity and to increase rates etc.
But they'll never see it as they aren't business men and women and they don't see that their actions have a reaction (equal and opposite) despite this being well known and understood. A place I went to this year had a great idea and didn't charge for parking except between 8:00 and 8:30 when it was a large sum of money, rest of the time, it was free to park which was great, you could spend all day there, see the historic monuments, shop in the town's shops and so on. They made the rule so as to dissuade those using the station to get to work to not park there but in the allocated station car parks. That left these car parks for tourists and residents to use. The result was a vibrant shopping area (thinking back I don't think I saw too many empty or boarded up shops).
Punitive tax regimes often have the effect of not doing what they set out to. I just wished more people were as bloody stubborn as I am about it. In my view, there ought to be a Gandhi style non violent resistance where for example acts like not buying petrol from a specific brand for a day or week happens. Where no one buys from a certain supermarket for a week or similar. The message about who holds the power would come through but people aren't inclined to put themselves out these days.
If you remember, I've never gone to MacDonalds again since the incident where they tried to "fine" me for parking over 1 hour at one of their establishments. My crime was I'd gone and got a second coffee. It was ridiculous and the "fine" was dropped but the time and cost involved in me to fight it made me take the decision that I'd never spend my money in one again. So what you might say, you're just one person and that, dear reader, is the wholoe point. If everyone did it, they'd reverse their policy but the Muppets pay these "fines" and they are around £70 or more and so all the time you don't fight it, you invite it. A general level of ignorance as to what these "fines" are would help but no, people pay and don't fight them.
So with all the talked about impositions on people coming down the track in the October budget I think it might start to wake a few people up. I hope so. The levels of taxation in this country are abhorrent. I'm dipping into my savings, the ones I've put in all my life, saved for times like this where money is being taken away from me as a pensioner and blow me down but they're taxing that money too! Shocking behaviour.
I really hope that the people will get angry and organised to actually do something about it. The societal damage successive governments do is unacceptable and so let's hope everyone realises who actually holds the power here. However, most people think that these MPs are something special - they aren't, they are our servants, they should do what we say, we put them there, they want the job (we don't) and that's what it boils down to. The cronyism and greed, squirrelling away of our hard earned money into vanity projects doing the opposite of what they are intended make us all poorer. We might as well go back and live in caves if this carries on.
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