LETTER : Taxes well spent on roads

Sir: The AA has not proposed privatisation of roads or increasing the tax burden on the average car-owning family ("Ministers axe plan to cut pollution", 2 April). What the AA wants is reform of our archaic system of transport finance and motoring taxation.

Elsewhere in Europe, decisions on transport are bound together with the funds to deliver them. In the UK the curse of our annual public expenditure round allows capital spending to be raided to balance short-term needs. This leads to a massive waste of money, with delayed preventative maintenance, and the preparing of endless projects that never arrive. The result is a low-grade infrastructure from which all travellers suffer.

What the AA is calling for is reform of the system so that the average family enjoys a better return for what it pays.

John Dawson,

Director of Policy

Automobile Association

Basingstoke, Hampshire