The Future’s Blue!
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 17 Dec 2019
- Messages
- 13,615
- Team supported
- City
Again, it’s a local tax imposed by those who’ve imposed the biggest tax hikes in my lifetime, probably my grandads as well.
ULEZ Letter
- Thread starter Blue Maverick
- Start date
I
I
inbetween
Guest
Something that isn't mentioned is the impact of COVID.
COVID cost the taxpayer around £300-400bn, IE two years worth of NHS budget or 1/6th of total UK borrowing.
Something somewhere has to pay for that, it has set us back decades and Brexit is almost irrelevant compared to this.
bluethrunthru
Well-Known Member
The Future’s Blue!
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 17 Dec 2019
- Messages
- 13,615
- Team supported
- City
It was a huge cost and should never be forgotten. The human suffering will be remembered for generations.
Rascal
El Presidente
Here is an idea, I never got drove to school, I walked to football practice, i walked to the cubs, i didnt need an SUV dropping me off, i was a kid full of energy. I walked to cricket matches, i walked to the youth club.
When I played for the school football team, my mam would turn up on her shopper bike to watch with drinks and oranges for the lads at half time, she didnt need an SUV.
What makes you think you are that special you need to do all that you do for your kids? Or you just a petrolhead who loves to be in charge of something powerful.
Rascal
El Presidente
I see you live in Cheadle Hulme, you have a train station, you have many local schools, good transport links and shops in walking distance
You shouldn't as you are a tradesman, as i said earlier as long as you use your van just for trade it should be exempt.
Do not be so gaslit by the lunatic right who see any curtailment of the right to drive as a basic assault on human rights, think about the human rights of those who do not drive.
Bluesince1979
Well-Known Member
I would love a world where i dont use vehicles to get about. My issue isnt in any way climate change denial.
My issue is with 2 kids who do a milion and one kids clubs and sports teams etc it would be a literal impossibility to do it using public transport.
Even if the services improved 10 fold.
Im sorry, im not being awkward but it just cannot happen
Bluesince1979
Well-Known Member
Right you are so off the mark its untrue . I hate driving. I have a van for work and the mrs has a 5 year old micra for the family car.
If i could get away with driving any where i would. So wind it in
Let me give you an example
of my week and see if you still think its possible to do on bikes and public transport.
Bare in mind mrs leaves at 7am and is home at 5.30pm so a lot of this down to me.
We live in poynton
Ill pick the 2 busiest days so as not to bore you with my full weeks diary ;)
Monday.
Collect kids from school at 3.20
Sons football training at 4.15 but need to get home, let son have snack and get him to training which is 5 miles away with no direct transport link.
Straight home after for tea.
Daughters footy at 6-7 approx 4 miles away. No direct transport link.
I take her direct from football to her guides group for 7.15 , 3 miles , again no direct link.
That finishes at 8.45 and i will often walk the dogs down to collect her.
Saturdays.
Sons football can be at either fallowfield, woodley or brinninton and kick offs can be 8/9/10am. No direct links to any.
Daughters football is at 11am at hazel grove. No direct links.
Other days they have swimming, cubs, snd other bits n bobs. Im not ashamed that i keep my kids active
Always an additional activity saturday pm. Add in us going to City too ….
Do u have kids? I know we all were one but things were a lot more localised 30 years ago.
I lived in cheadle hulme and could do all my football etc on my bike.
Not so now.
So ill bow out now because im
trying to get you to understand that im no special petrol head, i dont think im better than anyone else, im just a working man, who needs a vehicle to earn a living and to get my kids to there activities to keep them fit and off play stations.
In your head you think it can all be done on push bikes and buses. The reality is somewhat different
Blue Maverick
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 6 Aug 2010
- Messages
- 25,325
Yep got to agree with all this, back in the 80s local football leagues had 13 divisions! Now I don’t think there are 13 leagues. My daughter does cheerleading twice a week, no bus goes that way direct it would take a good hour each way so in a Wednesday night she would be getting home about 930pm and that’s if we can get a bus and it’s nit cancelled and the times are right. We live on the road for her school so walk but these days lots have to drop before work (although why they need a fucking massive Land drover is behind me) back in the day my mum like many women didn’t work so took us to school, these days most work.
All these get the bus, tram even bike are living in cloud cuckoo land, the public transport system just doesn’t work, I will be using the bus for City this year more due to parking restrictions coming in, but when it’s freezing in winter and pissing down I’ll stay at home and stick it on ticket exchange because I’m not getting pissed wet through waiting for a bus at 10pm that might not turn up.
Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 12 Apr 2019
- Messages
- 20,407
- Team supported
- FC Zurich (and city of course)
I resisted responding to that one. I'm wondering if the bad weather we're getting while the EU is scorchio is also down to our national act of self harm?
Has to be, it’s the only logical conclusion.
We have completely fucking blown it!
Blue Maverick
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 6 Aug 2010
- Messages
- 25,325
Why not just put up road tax on higher polluting vehicles, oh wait they already did that!
Bluesince1979
Well-Known Member
Yep when i were a lad int 80s my footy team trained a 5 min bike ride away, our home pitch the same.
For away games we’d all pile in dads cars.
My cubs was a 5 minute bike ride and swimming for fun was a 10 min bike ride but lessons were in wythenshawe so a 10 min drive.
Its just not like that now.
I was accused of being a petrol head. Nothing could be further than the truth and these dick heads driving a 4x4 round the suburbs shouldnt be allowed. No need.
But to be told twice, despite me telling him our schedule, to use a bus, well its difficult to have a mature discussion
Blue Maverick
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 6 Aug 2010
- Messages
- 25,325
It’s like we are encouraged to buy cars, buy diesel ones as well, helps the economy etc then when they need money tax those same people knowing full well they can’t do without them. I’d ride a bike more especially with electrics ones now, helps with the hills, but it’s literally taking your life into your own hands on the roads, ye there are dickhead bike riders but jumping a red light on a bike your more likely to get yourself killed, car driving these days I’d say 8 out of 10 are fucking dickheads, the standards are appalling they jump a red light and they will more than likely hurt not onky themselves but someone else as well.
meltonblue
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 14 May 2013
- Messages
- 8,722
I’d just put up tax on higher earning people full stop and collapse things like road tax and the licence fee too into overarching taxes rather than them being individual. I see them both as public services that aren’t just for the benefit of the individual.
west didsblue
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- 2 Oct 2011
- Messages
- 34,063
That’s not really how it works. The economy isn’t like your bank account. Debt needs to be managed not repaid. Every country in the world had Covid but the thing that makes our situation unique is the drag on the economy we inflicted on ourselves thanks to Brexit which means our interest rates are higher than others and makes managing our debt more difficult.
Rascal
El Presidente
I congratulate you on being a good parent, you certainly do provide for your kids in spades and i admire that. I also took your location as being Cheadle Hulme which does have very good transport links.
I agree on the 4x4 front, a woman at the top of our street drives her two kids to school in a 4x4, her back garden backs on to the school fields, its a 5 minute walk to the front gate of the school.
I did also say much earlier in the thread that i would invest enormously in public transport infrastructure and make all public transport free at the point of use for everyone and that work vans would be exempt. The public transport system is piss poor, but that is because of the fragmentation caused by privatisation, where only profitable routes were retained and fuck everyone else.
Something radical has to change, i am pretty sure everyone wants their kids growing up in a clean air environment, you obviously want your kids to be healthy as shown by the activities they do. I suspect most on here want that too.
Scottyboi
Well-Known Member
I watch a woman drive her kids to school everyday whilst living 50 metres away from it, baffles me. And the amount of people who park up and leave their shitty diesel engines running whilst we all choke on the fumes outside the gates is obscene. Selfish bastards the lot of them.
Rascal
El Presidente
I was never driven to school, i was never driven to an activity, my dad would have said get fucked you lazy ****. I walked to school and back, it was about 3 miles round trip. I would walk to school on saturdays to play football and cricket for the school teams, my dad would be working but my mum would get on her bike to come and watch.
Like I have said, i have a car, I rarely use it and it will be the last car i ever own. I simply do not need one, I use public transport.
Maybe if some of us make the same decision and say this car is my last, we might get clean air for our kids to breathe,