Re: Domestic wind turbine

["Mal Lansell" <mal@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

--- In ukha_d@xxxxxxx, "Mark Harrison (Groups)" <mph@a...>
wrote:

> As you're probably aware, I'm relatively libertarian - I don't have
> faith in Governments to sort the mess out, but I do have faith in the
> mass of individuals making their own decisions about what car to buy
> once petrol is triple the price it is today, and how well to insulate
> their houses, and whether aeroplanes are actually a good way to
> transport people around.
>
> Mark
>

In that case you'd probably approve of my favourite plan for getting
people on public transport - rationing - although it wouldn't be
called that of course ;-)

I envisage a system where everyone (including kids) gets a travel
allowance, provided in monthly installments with a one year validity -
say 10,000 car and 5,000 air miles per year.  The crucial difference
from wartime style rationing is that these allowances would be
transferrable.  If you don't need to travel so much, you can sell some
or all of your allowance for cold hard cash.  If you need more, you
can buy the right from someone else (or from the brokers that will
spring up).  It's like carbon trading except on a personal level.

The benefits of this scheme would be that there it provides a carrot
rather than stick approach to getting people to carpool or to use the
bus/train instead (i.e. they can sell their unused allowance), which
would be far more effective at changing people's behaviour than just
higher taxes (people don't really notice taxes being taken - but they
sit up and pay attention when you wave a cheque under their noses!).

The money stays in the pockets of private individuals, who will spend
it far more efficiently than taxes collected by a wasteful central
government.  That should help to negate the economic impact.

It also means that the total amount of travel and therefore emissions
will be known (and can be controlled) in advance.

It doesn't penalise the poor (a common argument against higher taxes
and congestion charging) - they get the same allowance as everyone
else.  In fact, it could be seen as a giant redistibutive scheme that
even Red Ken would be proud of.  And this is from me - the one known
as "Tory Boy" at work!

Mal