West End Letters: illogical | Jean-Baptiste Bacquart | compulsory tax | object | proposals

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West End Extra - LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Published: 27 March 2009

It’s illogical

• AS a resident of Westminster and on a very low wage, I already struggle with the cost of living in the borough.
The additional cost of £200 per year is most unfair and extreme.
As a resident of Westminster, I have to move around to work, do the shopping and get on with daily activities. I chose to buy a scooter in order to get things more efficiently, to lower my impact on the traffic (instead of getting a car).
The attitude of Westminster City Council in imposing a compulsory tax, is illogical.
In one way they pretend they want to promote better traffic, while they tax motorcycles which have the ability to do exactly that.
This is just illogical.
Even Chelsea and Kensington council has a different policy of only having a few parking spaces needing permits, the rest being as they were, free for all motorcycles.
This is why, as a resident of Westminster, I strongly object to this proposal and demands its complete withdrawal.
Jean-Baptiste Bacquart
Gloucester Place, W1

Scrap it

• AS a motorcyclist myself, I am absolutely shocked and furious to have been treated as a rogue by a Westminster councillor when all I have done is protest peacefully to an experimental policy I do not agree with.
Councillor Danny Chalkley has asked the committee in charge of the “No to Bike Parking Fees” campaign to call off the massive demonstration scheduled for this coming Tuesday March 31, claiming that it “will inevitably delay Londoners seeking to go about their business”.
He also goes on ask protesters “to desist from actions which damage the West End economy”.
But what Cllr Chalkley seems to forget is that, by stealth-taxing motorcyclists to park their bike, the money which would otherwise be spent for the benefit of Westminster retailers is in fact going into the council’s pocket!
Cllr Chalkley is therefore entirely responsible for damaging the West End economy in the first place by taxing motorcyclists.
The March 31 demonstration outside Westminster City Hall is going ahead and further demonstrations will be scheduled until the tax is fully scrapped.
Mark Jones
Edith Grove, SW10

Send your letters to: The Letters Editor, West End Extra, 40 Camden Road, London, NW1 9DR or email to letters@westendextra.co.uk. The deadline for letters is midday Wednesday. The editor regrets that anonymous letters cannot be published, although names and addresses can be withheld.
Please include a full name, postal address and telephone number.
Letters may be edited for reasons of space.

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