C-charge ‘will destroy jobs’

Business leaders have launched a fierce attack on the idea of congestion charging, warning it could have a devastating effect on the West Midlands and destroy thousands of jobs.

Birmingham Chamber of Commerce says up to a third of firms would move out of the Black Country, Birmingham, Solihull and Coventry to avoid the £1.30-per-mile tax.

It also attacks the idea of using the West Midlands as a national test-bed for a congestion charge, saying it would undermine the region’s ability to compete with the rest of the country.

The Government has asked councils in the Black Country, Birmingham and Coventry to come up with a pilot congestion charging scheme because the West Midlands suffers some of Britain’s worst traffic jams - said to cost the regional economy £2.2 billion a year.

Last month a high-powered report to the Government from former British Airways chief Sir Rod Eddington said motorists should pay up to £1.30 a mile to use the busiest routes, raising £28 billion a year which could be used to improve public transport, cut greenhouse gases and reduce congestion.

But the new report from Birmingham Chamber warns that as many as 10,150 of the region’s 40,757 businesses could move out of the area as a result.

It adds the figure could even reach 23,550 businesses “if an unfavourable scheme were introduced”.

“This would inflict serious damage to the economy of not only the metropolitan area, but to the region as a whole,” the report says.

The Chamber report does support a pay-as-you-drive spy-in-the-car satellite tracking system.

However it insists it would have to be put into operation across the country in one go.

The report claims the cost of charge would have to be passed on to customers, causing local price inflation. If companies could not pass the cost on, “they may cease to become viable businesses, thus removing both wealth and jobs from the region.”

The report, by the chamber’s policy adviser James Cooper, insists any new charge should be imposed nationwide to avoid any competitive advantage.

By Simon Penfold

Your comments: “Why do the council have to charge for the use of the road? We already pay road tax for using the road and what do the council do with the money? Waste it on stupid things like statues and giving it to asylum seekers so they can get free housing. Why not make the people on the dole pay for some things like rent and council tax so that others who pay full rent and council tax would be lower and others would not have to struggle to pay.” Mrs T Trow, Wolverhampton”