Judging by some of the emails after my last posting on London’s ‘congestion charge’ (basically a surcharge on motorists driving into Central London) there are still a few otherwise sensible readers who remain loyal to this malevolent piece of leftist social engineering. Their argument? That the congestion charge is, somehow, a ‘market-based’ solution. It’s nothing of the sort, of course. The transport market is already so distorted by subsidy, planning regulation and excessive fuel taxes, that a levy imposed by government on yet another group of travelers will do nothing to make this market anything like, well, a market. The charge should be seen for what it – yet another example of destructive environmentalist politics.

What’s more, it’s a real mess.