• IN her letter suggesting that bicycles should be subject to tax, Geralda Dennison asks: “Why not think of something along these lines?”, (We can keep tabs on cyclists with this easy system, June 7).

Well, currently, tax is applied to motor vehicles. Enclosed motor vehicles cause considerable amount of wear on the roads, whereas that from cycles (and skateboards, scooters, etc) is negligible.

Motor vehicles also emit pollutants and consume vast amounts of fossil fuels – and in the main for journeys for which using a car is really not necessary.

There are short and long-term costs associated with cleaning up or mitigating pollution, so it is right a tax be applied. But bikes are zero-emission vehicles, that also benefit the health of the user, thereby lessening the burden on a strained health service.

And, as has been reported time and again in these pages, when we get behind the wheel, we become killing machines.

The opportunity of cycling gets people out of cars and consequently dramatically reduces the possibility of fatality or serious injury. In other words, in the majority of cases, private motorised transport is completely unfit for purpose in the modern urban environment.

Cycling is an incredibly efficient solution to urban transport issues and it is important that it is encouraged as much as possible. Placing a tax on cycles would only serve to discourage, not encourage, sustainable transport.

DR GREG CARSON
NW5