en-us https://www.intensedebate.com/users/25024514 Comments by unprecedented https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/02/john-macdonald-are-the-tories-becoming-the-party-of-high-taxes-and-picking-industrial-winners.html#IDComment1097453627 "The Government should be doing everything it can to make the UK a more welcoming place for innovation and entrepreneurship" The Govt is doing everything it can to be the antithesis of this. Prior to the pandemic we were close to selling our successful business and managing a retirement exit, with CGT of 10%. With Govt only listening to high tax lobbyists, this looks increasingly impossible and in order to have a comfortable retirement after 9 very hard years of work building up a business and employing 12 staff, we are exploring how we move abroad to minimise this confiscatory policy. Entrepreneurs relief was cut 90% last year. What message does that send. Its OK, I got the message. Good luck in Dublin coldhouse Wed, 10 Feb 2021 14:11:30 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/02/john-macdonald-are-the-tories-becoming-the-party-of-high-taxes-and-picking-industrial-winners.html#IDComment1097453627 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2021/02/emily-carver-an-online-sales-tax-would-be-a-clear-cut-case-of-levelling-down.html#IDComment1097453450 This is a very interesting discussion, but so little comment on the demand side. Until the Conservative Govt, and Grant Shapps in particular stop colluding with anti-car mainly Labour, but some Tory, councils then the demand side for High Streets retail, cinema, arts, cafes will be limited to non-drivers. That is a small segment of the market. The parking charges, ULEZ charges and draconian enforcement and entrapment have painted all authority as anti-car. Many people will not return to high streets and restaurants only to be fleeced, fined and harrassed. I don't shop at Amazon, and nor do I shop in either of my local cities which are profoundly anti-car and don't care cos a thriving economy is not in their financial interest. Wed, 10 Feb 2021 14:01:35 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2021/02/emily-carver-an-online-sales-tax-would-be-a-clear-cut-case-of-levelling-down.html#IDComment1097453450 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2021/02/andy-street-my-transport-plan-will-get-the-west-midlands-moving-as-never-before.html#IDComment1097436126 If Andy Street is talking to Grant Shapps it won’t be long before the conversation turns to ‘ways to make life harder, more expensive & more miserable for motorists.’ Shapps has this as top of his to-do list every day & Andy seems fully signed up to the congestion charging scheme that will suck economic activity out of the centre. But hey, our buses have a USB port for every empty seat. Conservative mayors and conservative transport ministers would not be working with anti-motorist Labour councils. Enough Wed, 10 Feb 2021 00:19:50 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2021/02/andy-street-my-transport-plan-will-get-the-west-midlands-moving-as-never-before.html#IDComment1097436126 https://www.conservativehome.com/thinktankcentral/2021/02/patrick-hall-a-demand-led-on-street-chargepoint-scheme-will-be-essential-to-the-electric-vehicle-revolution.html#IDComment1097277816 Its not that EVs Heat Pumps are coming and being introduced. They are being FORCED on people when there are myriad problems, and the challenges with many groups of car users are being ignored. If BEVs were so great, you wouldnt have to subsidise them. There would be demand. BIK is 0% this year. But are we really saying that people in flats, terraced houses, on street parking cannot have a car. For many it will be very difficult. And why hasnt Govt said that cars must have a single type of connector. And what about the electricity price. While Govt is pushing people into new vehicles they are not regulating the fuel price. Petrol is +/- 8p per litre. But some suppliers for PowerPoints are 2-3 times the cost of domestic. Finally, the Govt should say what the long term playing field will be. Road pricing, electricity price stabilisation, BIK ambition. How can people make decisions. How can people vote against a policy/party when the facts are hidden. All the same arguments apply to heat pumps. Unsuitable for many, unaffordable for a great many. But don't worry, Boris and Sunak plan to increase gas 'green crap' costs so that the gas is priced out. Trouble ahead. Thu, 4 Feb 2021 17:39:42 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thinktankcentral/2021/02/patrick-hall-a-demand-led-on-street-chargepoint-scheme-will-be-essential-to-the-electric-vehicle-revolution.html#IDComment1097277816 https://www.conservativehome.com/thinktankcentral/2021/02/patrick-hall-a-demand-led-on-street-chargepoint-scheme-will-be-essential-to-the-electric-vehicle-revolution.html#IDComment1097272763 Making people's lives more difficult, more expensive and colder. That seems to be the plan that Boris and this unquestioning cabinet is setting out on. Every single policy kite being flown is going to affect people in a negative way unless you already have a house that is highly modern, very well insulated and has a private driveway. For everyone else, the Govt is going to kick you, but not tell you how hard, where on the body, and when. I hope the 1922 have their gaze on some ministers who are briefing some very unpopular policies yet convinced millions of people bills, inconvenience and personal comfort is worth the sacrifice. Thu, 4 Feb 2021 14:04:00 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thinktankcentral/2021/02/patrick-hall-a-demand-led-on-street-chargepoint-scheme-will-be-essential-to-the-electric-vehicle-revolution.html#IDComment1097272763 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2021/02/our-cabinet-league-table-truss-is-still-top-johnson-is-up-again-and-kwarteng-comes-straight-in-at-fourth.html#IDComment1097268468 Some very unpopular policies will come from Sunak and Johnson soon. Carbon pricing and moves to load extra costs onto gas heating systems now that electricity prices are very high. This will be a highly visible and significant and unavoidable cost/tax for tens of millions. Electorally this is going to be very unpopular as the costs are going to be high and a clear shove in the direction of heating systems that are not suitable for many many properties. The 'polling' showing road pricing was popular was incredible to almost any driver. If Boris thinks that pricing peoples journeys is going to go down well outside London where the public transport:private transport journey ratio is entirely swapped around, he will need a hard briefing by the team of MPs who sit for seats where the car is dominant and central to life, not peripheral or non-existent. One can only assume he knows what he is doing but I doubt it. Thu, 4 Feb 2021 11:03:24 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2021/02/our-cabinet-league-table-truss-is-still-top-johnson-is-up-again-and-kwarteng-comes-straight-in-at-fourth.html#IDComment1097268468 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2021/02/our-cabinet-league-table-truss-is-still-top-johnson-is-up-again-and-kwarteng-comes-straight-in-at-fourth.html#IDComment1097268194 Grant Shapps: in collusion with anti-motorist councils, clearly using the SMART motorway as cover for hated Road Pricing planning, low traffic neighbourhoods causing highly disruptive journeys, and declaring that cars must be used differently. Actually making life harder for drivers in a pandemic and making life more expensive post-pandemic. Please let Shapps slide to the bottom of the table and then off the list. Thu, 4 Feb 2021 10:49:57 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2021/02/our-cabinet-league-table-truss-is-still-top-johnson-is-up-again-and-kwarteng-comes-straight-in-at-fourth.html#IDComment1097268194 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2020/12/andy-street-15-years-on-we-can-finally-heal-the-scars-of-mg-rovers-collapse.html#IDComment1096639797 Andy Street wants the Gigafactory in the West Midlands but Birmingham and other local authorities are rolling out plans in accord with anti-Transport Minister Grant Shapps to stop people using cars. Congestion charges, road closures, and imposed charges. Anyone would think the Govt is against cars. Or do we just want the jobs and the ££ and not the products. Tue, 12 Jan 2021 14:09:26 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2020/12/andy-street-15-years-on-we-can-finally-heal-the-scars-of-mg-rovers-collapse.html#IDComment1096639797 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2020/12/andy-street-15-years-on-we-can-finally-heal-the-scars-of-mg-rovers-collapse.html#IDComment1096639698 Please don’t forget the anti-car anti-motorist ‘conservative’ transport minister. He too has more than a walk-on part in the destruction of the motor industry and the travel in our lives. Please give him full credit in the end title sequence for this administration. Grant Shapps. Tue, 12 Jan 2021 14:02:18 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thecolumnists/2020/12/andy-street-15-years-on-we-can-finally-heal-the-scars-of-mg-rovers-collapse.html#IDComment1096639698 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/01/jerome-mayhew-the-carbon-proposal-that-the-government-should-put-at-the-heart-of-its-plan-for-cop26.html#IDComment1096639293 So now Mr Mayhew goes into bat for the Govt on NetZero, reducing emissions, COP26 with a particular flavour of increasing taxes, and a specific tax in this case. We have had a succession of MPs and think tank gurus all from the POV that we must make the most enormous changes to lifestyle, business and economy and he presumably thinks the Red Wall are just salivating at the thought of being forced off the road, and having their very warm and efficient boiler ripped out and swapped for something that in most houses does not work well enough. And there will be a tax to pay after these huge personal costs. I didn’t vote for this. I support fully moving to reduced C solutions. We have a new, hyper efficient gas boiler and a family diesel that does 55mpg. But having got a taste of control of the populace via pandemic, the Govt is testing the limit of ‘force’. The policies of Mr Mayhew and all the other green-captured so-called Tories will impoverish millions. Slaves to a higher fuel,bill and road pricing, unable to travel and challenged to have warm homes. Johnson out, Shapps out. Let’s see where the new energy secretary sits, but if Mayhew is his outrider, the whole lot should put the real plans to the public in an election. There is no political upside for this disastrous policy. Tue, 12 Jan 2021 13:32:49 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/01/jerome-mayhew-the-carbon-proposal-that-the-government-should-put-at-the-heart-of-its-plan-for-cop26.html#IDComment1096639293 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2021/01/the-short-sharp-shuffle-sharma-takes-on-cop26-full-time-kwarteng-to-business.html#IDComment1096550644 No further reshuffle this side of the Autumn so we have to endure at least 6 more months of Grant Shapps anti-conservative, anti-motorist policies. Johnson seriously over estimates the impact of COP26 on the ordinary people of the UK unless he plans to force us all to have expensive poorly-functioning boilers and electric cars that many millions cannot charge and use by deploying draconian fines and heavy handed pricing like those in play in Derbyshire today. I hope 1922 are only keeping their ammo dry. Unravelling by Autumn once these ambitions become policy. Sat, 9 Jan 2021 01:08:34 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2021/01/the-short-sharp-shuffle-sharma-takes-on-cop26-full-time-kwarteng-to-business.html#IDComment1096550644 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/01/ted-christie-miller-everything-must-change-if-britain-is-to-hit-its-net-zero-target-how-are-we-going-to-manage-it.html#IDComment1096443623 Ted’s post highlights public chargers. And Laura Sandys was on Radio4 a few nights ago talking about the ‘low’ running costs of EVs. This is currently true, if you charge at home. But there is plethora of charging networks with different apps, terms and conditions and costs. For those without home charging or who need to charge away from home, the costs increase 2-3x and the running costs start to look uneconomic. We must remember that 65-70% of running costs of a. ICE is duty + vat. My Euro6 diesel does 55mpg so c. 10p per mile. Sources in the Treasury are floating Road Pricing. EVs will not be economic. The people can not afford this change and need to have guarantees that running costs will be low (capital cost is high) and predictable. I went to a town of about 20k people on Sunday. There are no public chargers, and the streets are all rows of miners cottages with a car outside almost all. How are they going to move to a net-zero EV with little £ and no infrastructure, Who has their consent? Tue, 5 Jan 2021 09:37:09 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/01/ted-christie-miller-everything-must-change-if-britain-is-to-hit-its-net-zero-target-how-are-we-going-to-manage-it.html#IDComment1096443623 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/01/ted-christie-miller-everything-must-change-if-britain-is-to-hit-its-net-zero-target-how-are-we-going-to-manage-it.html#IDComment1096443141 Whether there are 63 chargers per hundred thousand or or we need 3x the plumbers is irrelevant to me. The Govt and Onward and the Citizens Assemblies all assumes we will meekly comply and put up with whatever cost, whatever disruption because Govt have deemed it so. How much will electricity be? How much will it cost to have a boiler-free home? What compensation if any are you going to give to motorists who cannot drive their cars? If the technology, specifically heat pumps, is the wrong technology for an older house in A colder part of the UK, then will you be forced to have one. Are you going to force All homes to be EPC C and if so, who pays. These are big Qs and much bigger than 63 chargers. These need to be put to the country in a referendum. Soon. Mrs May brought in a price cap for electricity. Because it was too much. But CCC is predicting rises of up to 75% above inflation from the current price. And Germany it is c. 50% more than UK already . I think we should be encouraged to make green choices where sensible, rational and economic. Not forced whatever the cost. Tue, 5 Jan 2021 09:17:29 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/platform/2021/01/ted-christie-miller-everything-must-change-if-britain-is-to-hit-its-net-zero-target-how-are-we-going-to-manage-it.html#IDComment1096443141 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2020/12/our-cabinet-league-table-feels-the-brexit-trade-deal-bounce.html#IDComment1096265849 Absolutely incredible that Grant Shapps could be a + anything. He is pursuing an unwanted anti-car agenda and colluding with councils to allow them unfettered power to restrict motorists. Do none of the panel drive? Does no one read the press? We have an 80 seat majority & a supposedly Conservative transport minister doubles down on the war on the motorist. The party is in real trouble if that is +42 performer. Out of touch Tue, 29 Dec 2020 17:11:21 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2020/12/our-cabinet-league-table-feels-the-brexit-trade-deal-bounce.html#IDComment1096265849 https://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2020/12/judy-terry-the-demands-to-make-car-travel-more-expensive-ignore-the-political-and-economic-realities.html#IDComment1096089290 Judging by the articles over the last few weeks, Judy is a single voice telling truth to conservatives but the MPs and ministers all have Stockholm syndrome & are blindly going to support the net zero policy despite what it will do to hard-won constituencies & constituents bank accounts. Modern cars are excellent. Cleaner & efficient & bought. The path to forced BEV will turn these family assets to zero much much quicker & the just about managing will be ‘just about managing without a car’ And how do we charge in urban / towns. One side of my street has driveways. The other dosent. I could charge at 3-5p per mile I hear. The other side commercial rates. What’s that levelling up? Heat pumps are for a certain, specific well insulated house. I bet they are brilliant in that circumstance. But this will make poorer & colder citizens of vast swathes of the North & East. That 80 seat majority must look wobbly when this all starts to be implemented & unravel. Peoples saving will evaporate for no benefit & bills will rise. As for pay per mile taxes, who trusts Govt.. there will 30million losers & a massive contract for cronies. It comes in, it’s over. Tue, 22 Dec 2020 11:35:57 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2020/12/judy-terry-the-demands-to-make-car-travel-more-expensive-ignore-the-political-and-economic-realities.html#IDComment1096089290 https://www.conservativehome.com/video/2020/12/watch-johnson-when-the-science-changes-we-must-change-our-response-its-a-new-lockdown-for-much-of-the-south-east.html#IDComment1096032209 So many of the cabinet need to be ousted. They have been duped as Boris has, though some especially Shapps, have used the pandemic to pursue anti-conservative dogma. Johnson & Shapps need to go now & several others in the weeks that follow. Less than 0.1% of the population have died WITH cv-19, not from it, & we have made millions measurably poorer & more insecure. The scientists have given advice but the response is political. Go. Go now. Sun, 20 Dec 2020 00:53:48 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/video/2020/12/watch-johnson-when-the-science-changes-we-must-change-our-response-its-a-new-lockdown-for-much-of-the-south-east.html#IDComment1096032209 https://www.conservativehome.com/video/2020/12/watch-johnson-when-the-science-changes-we-must-change-our-response-its-a-new-lockdown-for-much-of-the-south-east.html#IDComment1096032174 So many of the cabinet need to be ousted. They have been duped as Boris has, though some especially Shapps, have used the pandemic to pursue anti-conservative dogma. Johnson & Shapps need to go now & several others in the weeks that follow. Less than 0.1% of the population have dies WITH cv-19, not from it, & we have made millions measurably poorer & more insecure. The scientists have given advice but the response is political. Go. Go now. Sun, 20 Dec 2020 00:52:13 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/video/2020/12/watch-johnson-when-the-science-changes-we-must-change-our-response-its-a-new-lockdown-for-much-of-the-south-east.html#IDComment1096032174 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2020/12/year-one-of-johnsons-government-is-the-conservative-parliamentary-party-ready-to-back-unpopular-measures-in-year-two-and-afterwards.html#IDComment1095853298 Any Govt with Boris & Shapps will not have to look far for unpopular policies. The anti-car agenda has seen me give up on this Govt. I hoped an 80 seat majority would build policies that are popular and right for a non-metropolitan majority. But no. Anti-car & ramping up the Net Zero ambition & rhetoric. We didn’t vote for this. It’s a disaster that will unfold as people are pushed to change behaviour and increase the costs of bills & transport. Sat, 12 Dec 2020 16:38:46 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/thetorydiary/2020/12/year-one-of-johnsons-government-is-the-conservative-parliamentary-party-ready-to-back-unpopular-measures-in-year-two-and-afterwards.html#IDComment1095853298 https://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2020/12/tony-devenish-conservatives-can-be-pro-cyclist-and-pro-motorist.html#IDComment1095763189 A Transport Minister from the ‘BlueWall’ might get some common sense to the Cabinet Table. Cars are essential to many outside the metropolis & decision makers should be regularly reminded of this. Tue, 8 Dec 2020 10:45:23 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2020/12/tony-devenish-conservatives-can-be-pro-cyclist-and-pro-motorist.html#IDComment1095763189 https://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2020/12/tony-devenish-conservatives-can-be-pro-cyclist-and-pro-motorist.html#IDComment1095763144 The Conservative Govt have certainly extended & intensified the idea that ‘motorist is public enemy number one’. Grant Shapps has pronounced on & introduced many anti-car measures, pushed the LTN agenda and colluded with councils for making life harder for motorists under the guise of the pandemic. What can be done? Shapps must go, & a balanced policy that does not demonise motorists who in normal times deliver huge economic benefits to commuting, cinemas, theatres, restaurants etc. Without motorists, outside London at least, many leisure activities are unviable. I hope Tony is pressing for the replacement of the Conservatives most anti-car transport minister. Tue, 8 Dec 2020 10:41:43 +0000 https://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2020/12/tony-devenish-conservatives-can-be-pro-cyclist-and-pro-motorist.html#IDComment1095763144