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Why does Alistair Darling hate me so much? What have I ever done to him? Those thoughts occur this weekend as I ponder the effect of his first Budget on me. His assault on what are vulgarly termed " four by four gas guzzlers" is a particular disappointment given that I am the proud owner - or will be when I've paid it off - of a four-year-old Land Rover Discovery. And now that he's raised the vehicle excise duty - road tax to you and me - to prohibitive levels, how does he expect me to get to my second home? It's an outrage, I tell you. The truth is that for most of the winter months I simply can't get to it without the good old Disco. Does Chancellor Darling care about this? Apparently not. But if I can't get to it, is there any point in keeping it? And if I give it up, there'll be nobody to pay the council tax, especially as the house lay empty for two years before I moved in. But then council tax isn't Mr Darling's problem. That's the responsibility of Angus council which until last May was SNP-controlled, and it was the Nats who effectively doubled my council tax bills when they were in power. They did it in the full knowledge that we don't use their schools or social services, we have no street lighting and get our dustbins emptied once a fortnight. Surely Mr Darling can sympathise with those of us who try to keep weekend and holiday retreats. After all, by my reckoning he has three, or maybe four, homes. There's his main Edinburgh home, as well as a London flat and Mr Darling has for years kept a Hebridean hideaway. Now that he's Chancellor he also has 11 Downing Street at his beck and call, although it is not known if he's taken up residence there. He might like to consider that if all of those like me, who use "four by four gas guzzlers" to reach dachas in the wilds of the Scottish countryside are forced to give them up because of the ludicrous levels of road tax that are soon to be charged, will councils find that their revenues start plummeting? And if they're short of cash as a result, will councils have to start cutting vital public services? Who will get the blame if that happens? Step forward Chancellor Darling. But it's the car thing that most perturbs me. The huge increases in fuel prices are bad, too, but given my low mileage - much less than 10,000 per year - I'm not worried about that aspect of the tax on motorists. And contrary to popular opinion, the Discovery is not an especially thirsty guzzler, about the same as a Mondeo of the same engine capacity. No, what's especially galling in all of this is that I'm doing all the other things I'm supposed to save the planet. I've given up, or at least tried to, using plastic bags and have attracted all sorts of strange looks from the neighbours by carrying my little Hessian sack to the paper shop of a morning. All that Mr Darling has done with his draconian measure is provide ammunition to all of those who have wanted me to give my Land Rover and drive what they call a "normal" car. In this respect I'm thinking especially of my wife who has never really understood the need for a four-by-four, hates driving it and seldom manages to return it without some dent or scratched bit of paintwork having been inflicted upon it. Although there wasn't much else in his Budget that she approved of, she appears to be applauding the Chancellor's moves on road tax and is already insisting that this increase is the final straw for the Disco. Meanwhile, on another front the SNP announced that they actually intended to keep a manifesto promise - this time over their pledge to hold a judicial review of the circumstances surrounding the Shirley McKie case. She was the police officer charged and convicted of perjury after experts said her fingerprint had been found at a crime scene. She was subsequently cleared and received 750,000 in compensation. Imagine, the embarrassment of Kenny MacAskill, the Justice Minister, then, when Miss McKie said that she wanted nothing to do with his inquiry and just wanted to get on with the rest of her life. Oops! Before people had 'Discos' and their ilk, and justified them in all sorts of ways by linking them to their lifestyle, the truth is they did their journeys in a more conventional car - or even a cheap and cheerful old landrover - if their access roads were really as bad as they claimed. My next door neighbour who runs an adventure travel company has a fleet of vehicles, most of which go "off road". One is a Discovery and I have lost count how many times the RAC has been out to get this vehicle back into operation. If this vehicle is typical of the breed, then Alistair Darling's pogrom on owners of such vehicles may be doing you a favour by forcing you to get a proper car. How anyone would wish to go beyond the easy access of a recovery company in a Disco is beyond me as the rigors of life as a shopping vehicle in the stockbroker belt appear to be too much for this "ready made pile of manufactured grief." RE-CYCLING PAPER BAGS IS HARDLY WORTH IT,AaLAN, WHEN YOU USE UP A SMALL BRAZiLIAN RAIN FOREST EACH YEAR WITH THE DRIVEL YOU PUBLISH EVERY WEEKIN THE TELEGRAPH. NOT WORTH READING, AND CERTAINLY NOT WORTH THE PAPER IT'S WRITTEN ON! For goodness' sake stop whingeing, man ! Those nasty SNP people have now frozen the hated, unfair council tax, and are planning to replace it (not - some commentators please note - add to it) by a local income tax that will take into account people's ability to pay and relieve many less-well-off people of local tax altogether. Well, Alan, what do you expect if you keep writing all those nasty things about the SNP? The worst thing about it is that it's a retrospective tax. I am looking to buy something I can stick my dogs and family in and was thinking of a (second hand) Subaru Forester 2.0. But that produces 220 g/km of CO2. Darling said in the budget, that overall the road tax will be revenue neutral. Most commentators are calling him a bare faced liar. As on of the last surviving british car manufacturers in the country, isn't it nice to see them targeted in the budget? Funny how the government can prop up a failing bank (Northern Rock) with copious ammounts of our money being wasted there, and do nothing to save any of our car industry. But alas this will soon be owned by foreign investors too. How long before Solihull and Castle Bromwich (Land Rover and Jaguar) end up flattened like Longbridge? Could'nt resist your usual snipe at the SNP could you? Where is the spiteful attack against the wicked socialist Labour Party who just stole our money to pay for 10 years of tax'n'spend? Just count your blessings you don't live in the congestion zone like I do. Ministers should pay out of their salaries the road tax of their official cars. Remember two JAGS Prescott. When MPs drive to work in electric cars, I'll go out Alan...You forget...Darling owns your income so what he allows you to keep should make you grateful. 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# posted by henry62119 @ 7:57 AM 0 comments