From the Rolls-Royce experimental archive: a quarter of a million communications from Rolls-Royce, 1906 to 1960's. Documents from the Sir Henry Royce Memorial Foundation (SHRMF).
Page from a motoring magazine featuring readers' letters discussing topics such as vehicle taxation, the national budget, and the driving test.
| Identifier | ExFiles\Box 160\4\ scan0077 | |
| Date | 9th May 1939 | |
| May 9, 1939. 567 The Motor We Lose a Reader I HAVE been a regular reader of The Motor for more than 11 years and I have never read anything printed in it that gave me such a shock as your comments on the Budget in the Editorial last week. I fully appreciate that the additional expenditure on armaments has to be met, and it is only right that the classes with most money should make the biggest contributions. But why should a tax be imposed which will cripple so many people to whom a car is an essential part of their business? And why should a tax be imposed that will cripple what is probably one of the largest industries in the country? A paltry excuse was put forward that the roads were getting too congested, and that somehow this condition must be avoided, so we must stop the manufacture and sale of so many new vehicles. This, after the motoring public has already subscribed enough in taxes to give us the finest roads in Europe. On top of all this I read in your closing paragraph on the Budget, entitled "The Brighter Side," that you consider it is not so bad after all! I now take pleasure in informing you that if this is your method of supporting fair play for motorists, I consider it "yellow," and I am cancelling my order for The Motor as from to-day. J. {Mr Johnson W.M.} M. {Mr Moon / Mr Moore} KING. Hove, Sussex. [This is gratitude, if you like, for the ceaseless war waged on the bureaucrats by The Motor. We said that the tax increase was less than 5 per cent. of the running costs of the average motorist. We see no reason for panic, but it should not be inferred that we are taking the increase complacently. Far from it.—ED. {J. L. Edwards} ] Revenue May Drop by £5,000,000 HAVING partially recovered from the stunning blow administered to the motorist, and to the motor trade in particular, by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, I have worked out a few representative figures, multiplied them to represent the whole country, and have come to the conclusion that, far from obtaining £12,000,000 extra from motor taxation, the Chancellor will obtain, in a full fiscal year, from £5,000,000 to £7,000,000 less. My own combined petrol and horse-power tax works out at £38, next year it will be £22 10s. I have worked out with five of my customers their present and future costs, and I find that next year, in every case, the Chancellor will lose figures varying from £8 to £17. An aspect that I have not yet seen mentioned is that of loss of income tax from the motor trade. I am a comparatively small trader, who has been selling big-horse-powered cars for 17 years, and this week I felt compelled to write my stock down by at least £500. Other traders in this city tell me that their losses vary from £400 to between £2,000 and £3,000. Multiplying these losses throughout the country produces a staggering figure of at least four to five million pounds, which will come out in the retail motor trade balance sheets. The Chancellor will lose 5s. 6d. in the £1 on this—nearly a million and a half pounds. P. G. {Mr Griffiths - Chief Accountant / Mr Gnapp} EMERY. Bristol. A Pay-as-you-go Tax FOR 20 years I have tried to advocate—like many other people—a petrol tax to replace the horse-power tax, but I have always been told that such a scheme might only result in drawing the attention of the Chancellor to the motorist. To me, it is childish to imagine that the Inland Revenue Department are not alive to all these possibilities, and now we see the result in a tax which must do immense harm to the whole of the British industry. A " horse-power " tax is out of date, pays no attention to modern development, and presumably continues to exist as a result of mental inertia in high quarters. Its effects are almost Gilbertian—for a man who buys an old large car for £10 may pay £37 per annum, while the purchaser of an expensive sports car only contributes, say, £16 per annum to the revenue. Our foreign and colonial markets will be especially hit, for it is well known that large engines are usually preferred in those places. A petrol tax would be easy to collect and would allow the harassed motorist to "pay as he goes"—or, at least, to feel that the amount of use to which he puts the roads bore some faint proportion to the amount of money which he is compelled to find. There is the further point that artificial restriction upon design has not and will not prove particularly helpful to the British designer. A. {Mr Adams} M. {Mr Moon / Mr Moore} LOW. London, W.4. An Answer to the Budget in Advance KNOWING the lack of organization, the apathy and the long-suffering willingness of motorists as a body to accept taxation without effective protest, I decided in January last to take my own steps. It seemed to me more than likely that the h.p. tax would go back to £1—I did not expect 25s. Hitherto I had run a 1932 13.9 h.p. Riley, which cost £10 10s. in h.p. tax and, for 20,000 miles annually, £37 10s. in petrol tax—a total of £48. Under the existing Budget proposals this would be raised to £55. I looked around and picked the car which would accommodate my height (6 ft. 4 ins.) and have a low horse-power and the best possible petrol consumption. I selected an eight horse-power D.K.W.—a German car! I average 47 m.p.g., but will take 45 m.p.g. for working out figures on 20,000 miles. I shall now pay £10 horse-power tax and between £16 and £17 in petrol tax, a total of £27. The net loss to the Exchequer is £28. Not only that, but having been forced to buy the best advantage, the greater portion of the purchase price of this car has left the country. Whether patriotic or not, my action is based on the necessity for my balancing my own budget, and unlike the Chancellor, I cannot just go out and borrow what I lack. A tax of 5s. a year on cyclists is overdue. JAMES EASTWOOD. London, N.21. The Driving Test Farce SURELY the driving test tends to become farcical when an examiner has to criticize an examinee's driving on the grounds that he "drove too close to stationary vehicles" in a main street, with a continuous line of parked cars on each side, leaving just enough space in the centre for the necessary two moving streams of traffic? Another point of criticism was that the examinee waited too long to draw out at main cross-roads, whereas the examinee thought, in blissful ignorance, that in waiting for the traffic to clear he was simply carrying out the admonition of the Highway Code to take special care at cross-roads. PROTEST. London, S.W.6. [Image of a man standing next to a sign that says 'END OF PROHIBITION'] Nothing to do with drink—but the end of a ¼-mile section of the Great North Road, 3½ miles beyond Stamford, where overtaking is prohibited. c21 | ||