THE PETROL TAX

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 126, 25 February 1928, Page 10

THE PETROL TAX

IS IT EQUITABLE? “I am inclined more to a tire tax than the petrol tax?” said a gentleman who is very much interested in the motor business to a Dominion reporter yeste.rday, “as I believe that the tire is the surest guide as to what use is made of the roads.” “But isn’t the petrol used just as good a guide?” he was asked. “Yes, if it were not open to so many abuses,” was the reply. “The Government would have been better advised if, instead of putting 4d. a gallon on to the petrol consumed by road users, it made the tax 2d. per gallon, with no exemptions. The exemptions are the weakness of the present system, and if the Government knew what I knew they would realise that.” Do you refer to the petrol used by the farmers? “No, I don’t refer so much to that, though I expect there are plenty of abuses in that quarter; but in town there are plenty of instances of machinery being driven by internal combustion engines, which do not consume nearly all tile ‘juice’ they are supposed to do. Then the owners of power boats are exempt, as power boats do not use l' le roads, and who is to say what proportion of the petrol purchased for such boats is used by them? Fourpence a gallon is a lot of money to pay extra for petrol, and these exemptions open the way to abuses of the law that cannot very well be prevented. That is why I think it would be better for the Government and fairer for all users if the Government were to reduce the tax to 2d. per gallon, and allow no exemptions whatsoever.”