The government needs to raise money, and fuel duty is a good way to do it.

Fuel is an easy way to do it, but not a good one. Government needs to realise it is from profit that people pay tax and Govt swells its coffers, so taxing people off the road, out of jobs and - in the case of manufacturing industry - out of the continent of Europe is not a good idea.

Fortunately petrol engines are becoming more efficient.

That just means they'll raise taxes even more. The less fuel we buy, the higher the tax will go. The Treasury is chasing revenue downwards now and eventually there'll just be one motorist left, driving round a desolate economic wasteland paying £25,000 a litre.

But a problem is that many people buy big heavy cars when they do not need them. Many Land Rovers are style/fashion statements.

I thought we lived in the free market West where people were allowed to buy things they want, but not especially need. It's not up to you, me or the Government to tell people what they do or do not need. Anyway, people who buy a £60k SUV are not affected by a 3p petrol duty rise. It's the people in 10 year old Mondeos doing low paid work who I'm concerned about.

I admire your deep concern for other people, and your willingness to scarifice yourself for the common good. :)

I think we could sacrifice Newham for the common good.

It was only when America started to accept global warming that American companies started to take seriously the generation of energy from alternative sources.

And since Jesus Obama came to office, gas prices in the US have doubled. Of course American companies started to take it seriously. You'll find when you subsidise something then a company will suddenly take it very seriously indeed.

What shoul d they tax instead?

They shouldn't. They should cut spending. You can't just decide how much you want to spend and then chase everyone else to pay for your fantasy. We managed to get through the entire 1980s repairing much of our economic damage and increasing treasury revenues without the existance of a fuel duty escalator. Even in 1991 our petrol was some of Europes cheapest. This idea that petrol needs to be unobtainable to pay for things has been proven incorrect. After all if its too expensive for people to buy, then they can't sell any.

Then you are mistaken, we live in a country where even the act of dying incurs a payment to the exchequer, unless you are poor.

Or very rich. Inheritance Tax is another tasteless measure which needs scrapping. The very rich don't pay it anyway. They've never paid it. It's the moderately wealthy in the middle who are hit the most for having the audicity to die.

The low paid person can drive a more frugal car.

Well they can't because they can't afford to buy the car in the first place. Eco cars are stupidly expensive and rich peoples playthings. People are driving frugal cars and they're still going bankrupt so the fuel is still too expensive and needs to be cheaper.

Fuel is getting expensive due to increased demand and reduced supply.

Well that's simply not true. That's not why prices in the US have doubled in just four years, but I'm more interested in what's happening back in Blighty. The only solution is to either cut tax dramatically or make fuel VAT exempt. This economy will go nowhere if people can't afford to go anywhere, how much will the treasury be raising then? Nothing.

Yes we were told in the 1970s that the oil would run out before 2000. They were wrong. Look, the price of petrol is still around 55p a litre even with China and India sucking the land dry. There's also much more supply than they like to let on, after all if you're an oil producer and you want your product to increase in value then you tell the world you've got no oil. Huzzah! More valuable! There's well documented examples of big producers purposely slowing down production to force the price up.

The problem isn't supply or demand, it's tax. Government gerrymandering, meddling, emission legislations and tax. That's the problem. I don't buy the theory that the 'answer' is to buy a more economical car. People have been doing that for the last decade and they still can't afford the fuel. People driving 50mpg depressing ecoboxes can't afford to both fill it and eat food everyday, so that 'solution' isn't good enough.

The solution is to slash taxes. Cut back the state, scrap many environmental regulations and let the market do what it does. When the oil is really running out they'll find something else to sell us instead, don't you worry.

Yeah, let the poor starve, let corporations dominate, a free for all, with some of the disgusting poverty we see in America, and sadly here is not so good.

A free for all would be better than what we currently have which is a free for the state and any suggestion that we're keeping some sort of lid on corperate dominance is frankly laughable. If anything current policy plays into it by subsidising big business and strangling small ones with endless red tape.

The poor are starving now, go and have a wander round Greece and Spain to see that for yourself. An economic model based on millions of workers rights without any jobs is hardly condusive to ending poverty.

Right now we (Europe) have the most expensive energy in the World because of ridiculous taxes and legislation. 10% of your electric bill goes to subsidise megacorps' wind turbines and mega wealthy landowners for allowing said turbines to be sited on their land. A classic example of state sponsored poverty. That's money being paid by the poorest and transferred to the richest with a Government rubber stamp. I'm suggesting we stop that to help the poorest and lowest paid.

We have food prices hitting all time highs partly because of bonkers EU environmental targets which result in us turning farmland over to growing motor fuel. I believe on a starving planet, with fuel at the bottom of the sea, we should help the poorest by growing food, not petrol.

We have 2.5million people officially unemployed in this country and we can't even keep them warm and fed with an extensive benefits system because we can't afford said benefits system. Increasing debt leaves the Govt needing more money which is then money none of us can access, which helps nobody. I'm suggesting we cut back employment regulations to create more movement in the jobs market to give those people a chance.

Free for all indeed.

There are no Communist countries.

China?

Hardly. The Communists came to power under Mao as a result of financial and military support from Stalin, and they were little more than thugs. It was a brutal dictatorship that starved to death many millions, and installed a hierarchy based on corruption and fear. What we see today is very different, somewhat corrupt, but run by a committee of old men, but with a largely scientific background, and modernising the country without having to worry about public opinion e.g. build a road, build a damn, just do it.

Yes and no. For consumer goods such as phones, the free market is far superior. For services such as rail, or medicine, I am not convinced. The train companies pay a lot to rent rolling stock because they only have short term contracts.

I can sort of agree on rail because the railway privatisation was a horrible, rushed botch job when John Major was trying to look radical. Medicine is a fascinating beast and it's perfectly arguable that certain drugs would've never been discovered if left to the free market. Investors like a powerpoint presentation showing what's going to happen and what the returns are, but most medicine discoveries happened by accident with no objective in mind from the start.

However once stuff is discovered then free enterprise tends to develop it very well. It's easy to say an aspirin is 2p a pill but that's the second pill - the first pill cost many billions. I find it amusing Americans can buy anything they want from their Canadian neighbours - except medicines in order to protect US drug companies from the more socialised Canadian system. Quite telling.

Sensible comments. :) No doubt the private sector can play a role in medicine, but it is complex.

Russia was a brutal dictatorship, corrupt, and run by a psychopath in the Stalin era. He murdered left right and centre. He was little better than Hitler,

Actually most deaths under Stalin were from famine - like in most dictatorships - where as Hitler was more of a systematic murderer.

Yes, he tried to destroy the peasants, the small holders, by forcing them to sell grain at below cost, causing masive starvation. That to my mind is murder. Just as Mao tried to force through his green revolution and starved millions to death. Maybe not technically murder in the latter case, but in practice the same outcome. And both had opponents shot, or sent to slave labour camps, in huge numbers. I agree that few were quite so systematic as Hitler.

But my point is the concept of communism was based on making the world fair and equal but that idealogy is so open to abuse and only small steps away from brutal dictatorship at the hand of a madman - as has been proven.

And my point is that there have been no Communist states. But I agree with the above.

My point is communism isn't that, but it leads to it.

Communism is something thought up by a dreamy intellectual with the aim of fairness and equality, but it does not lead to that because it does not include mechanisms to ensure fairness and equality. Oddly enough capitalism comes closest, because it empowers more people, and allows for a form of representation for all of us, albeit not ideal. Quite why so many people have been seduced by the writings of Marx is beyond me. Maybe because it sounds clever?

Describe China however you like and you may even be able to claim they practice state capitalism rather than communism, but the fact remains it's a single party state.

Indeed.

Marx mostly wrote about capitalism and his analysis on it's inherent faults have been proven accurate - quite remarkable, considering he died 130 years ago.

Can you give some examples? I've always thought of Marx as a seducer of impressionable minds through the creation of clever ideas not based on reality, rather like Sigmund Freud.

Marx often issued rallying cries and predicted a revolution (Revolutions are the locomotives of history) but he never clearly laid out what that would be. Sort of like a book with the last third missing. Marx felt capitalism divides people into 'bosses vs workers' and it's the bosses constant need for profit which not only damages the workers but brings down the boss eventually as well.

Rather naive and simplistic.

He lived in Industrial Revolution times when workers spent 23 hours a day down pits for less than pittance pay. The fact the boss had to pay them less and less to drive profit - or else a different boss would - meant eventually nobody had money to buy with, so it brought the boss down too because there was nobody to sell to. He felt capitalism is forever doomed to that cycle.

For sure capitalism at that time was often brutal, and the vote was not extended to all men until after his death, and to women even later. However, it was in that era that many benevolent capitalists helped the poor e.g. Cadburys, Bournville etc.

'History repeats itself first as tragedy, second as farce'

He didn't think these capitalists were stupid though, he felt they'd always come up with something to keep their system going, an example he gave was how machinery was invented.

Machines were, it may be said, the weapon employed by the capitalist to quell the revolt of specialized labor.

Marx theorised the proletariat (lower class) would eventually be so worn down by the Bourgeoisie (capitalist class) that it brings about a revolution because the two are always in conflict. Whether that ever happened or not is up to you but I'd argue his analysis on the flaws of the system are pretty accurate.

I would say that what you ascribe to him is not exactly hard to figure out (whether it was generally believed, I know not). It seems to me he ignored the benefits. Capitalism gave rise to an affluent and educated middle class, and more and more people had opportunities never seen before. Many failings in capitalism were overcome by widespread free schooling, the universal vote, the NHS and unemployment benefit and so on.My own experience is that so-called evil capitalists often risk their own homes, and savings, to create companies that employ people, and generate wealth. It is usually done out of self interest of course, but I would argue that self interest drives most if not all people. For academics it is often ego.

From what I know of pre-revolution Russia, it was brutal, and the ruling classes would maim or kill the peasants for their pleasure/amusement, and that is why 'Communism' had such appeal in Russia. Britain has not seen such excesses, well not since the Conquest, and subsequent centuries.

Marxism seems to be built on a black and white view of the world, capitalist = pig dog, worker = saint.

Rather naive and simplistic.

Maybe by todays standards but as you allude to, in his time it was very brutal and what he articulated probably was the status quo of the day.

I still don't accept it was anything but simplistic, imposing his own values on reality.

It seems to me he ignored the benefits. Capitalism gave rise to an affluent and educated middle class, and more and more people had opportunities never seen before.

Back then the benefits were enjoyed only by the Bourgeoisie as it was a ruling class which controlled who got into it and how much the Proloteriat were allowed to have. His basic belief was everything the capitalists had was created by the labour of the lower class. Capitalists live off the backs of the lower class who do all the work for them - as they have little choice but to. He felt eventually the lower class would overthrow the higher class and seize the product of their labour for themselves.

Who do you think the Bourgeoisie were? Where did they come from? The truth is that they were a class created by the end of feudalism, and the beginnings of the industrial revolution. I have researched my family history to 1800 and beyond. Most ancestors were agricultural labourers, with a few minor trades. One chap in the early 1800s became an apprentice, and eventually a master engineer. His son owned a machine shop. HIs daughter went to private school, as did her daughter who was my mother. The industrial revolution created opportunities, allowing society to change more than it ever had in preceding centuries, where a ruling class attained status by patronage of a fickle KIng.

Many failings in capitalism were overcome by widespread free schooling, the universal vote, the NHS and unemployment benefit and so on.

That's 20th century stuff and some might say the product of democratic socialism, an example of how a bit of socialism can redress the balance. The bosses vs workers age would've never tolerated the lower class having the same vote as the ruling masters.

You are imposing an interpretation. Actually many capitalists were altruistic.

.My own experience is that so-called evil capitalists often risk their own homes, and savings, to create companies that employ people, and generate wealth.

That may be the case today, though I do question whether they generate wealth for many people other than themselves.

A small company employs a secretary or PA, an accountant, a marketing manager, perhaps an IT manager, perhaps sales reps, perhaps service engineers, perhaps engineers, a tea boy, an office dog, and so on. Each one pays income tax, which goes to the Treasury. The company income attracts corporation tax. And if the owners sell the company, the sale attracts capital gains tax. So overall the small company creates wealth, which benefits everyone. Yes the owners do earn a lot, if they succeed. But many do take risks by remortgaging their own homes. I have worked for such people. The wife of one owner had a nervous breakdown due to the stress of running a company which could have bankrupted them. In the end they made a few million pounds, which I think they deserved. Many are less fortunate. I get sick of some on the left wanting what the successful have, but not wanting to take the risk, or show initiative.

When we're in economic crisis and executive pay rises 180% while the bottom half are still earning what they did a decade ago it is hard to defend the 'generating wealth' argument.

No it isn't, unless you miss the wood for the trees. Some of the higher salaries may be indefensible, but I baulk at the government interfering. When governments interfere, they tend to screw up as they tend to act according to political expediency e.g. something has been in the newspapers. Taxes used to be much higher during the pre-Thatcher era, and yet tax takings are currently much higher. It sounds nice to prevent these top earners from earning by tax for example, but it often backfires, as they leave the country, or pay an accountant to find loopholes. So it sounds good at the party conference, but in practice less so.

Marxism seems to be built on a black and white view of the world, capitalist = pig dog, worker = saint.

It's a black and white view from a black and white world. He died in 1883 so didn't know what you know.

No, I've read other works from that time which were not black and white. I think Marx imposed his own value system on economics.

For me Marxism falls down with the assumption that the Proleteriat would behave honourably and share everything equally amongst each other if freed from the capitalist master. I believe that same wicked human nature which drives the capitalist greed would drive the worker as well, should be they in that position.

I certainly agree with that.

There's no doubt we live in different times, I'm just saying his analysis of why capitalism is fundamentally flawed is spot on.

As I've said, I've seen nothing of any profundity from Marx.

For me the problem with Marxism is that it is very seductive, it imposes a value system on economics, and an interpretation that is crudely but not inaccurately summarised as capitalists bad, workers good. It is like a religion. It appeals to class warriors, and those who have envy of the more fortunate. It encourages people to think that you can get something for nothing, by overthrowing an evil over-class. It avoids personal responsibility, the idea that one can better oneself through hard work, and education. That was true when Marx was writing, as my own family history shows.

Another issue I have with Marxism is that it is based on assumptions, with no proof, no real substance. It is a house of playing cards. I have heard so many people on R4 spouting Marx as the foundation of their own beliefs. I think it is destructive. And from what I have read, Marx was a scrounger, which may well explain his views. To me it is no better than astrology, or any other pseudo science, except that astrology is relatively harmless. Marxism has been used to justify mass murder, and mass starvation through economic incompetence. It is ironic that a system that is supposed to free the people from the oppression of the capitalists has led to so many deaths.

Whilst capitalism is far from perfect, it is at present the best we have. I tend to think that society evolves through the establishment of institutions, and as our insiitutions evolve, so our society improves, well, hopefully. Unless the EU takes over. ;)

I'm talking about top employees, CEOs and other faceless suits who have actually risked nothing of their own at all. They're just very well paid employees who if they make a catastrophic error will lose nothing at all as they leave with plenty of money and a lovely pension - while everyone who used to work for them joins the Job Centre queue.

Yeah, I have sympathy for that argument. The high paid BBC executive who earns more than the PM, and so on. Some do earn the money, some don't. And some who screw up get paid huge golden parachutes.

The mere mechanics of capitalism means we can't all be millionaires so there's always going to be the non-millionaire majority who dispise the millionaire. The alternative is for the millionaires to give up all of their money but I think they'd rather have their cars scratched, houses egged and be generally hated by the hoi-polloi than do that.

I am not rich, far from it, but I do not hate millionaires. Why should I? You need incentives to encourage risk takers. Of course some excesses are questionable.

I really hate the idea that someone wouild scratch a rich person's car just because they are rich. It is horrible, a form of bigotry, class warfare and all that BS.

Looking at my family I feel my parents haven't got what they deserved out of life considering what they've put in so I do struggle to like incompetant people who've only risen to a high position because of who their parents are and who they went to school with.

Most of us have to get used to not doing as well as we might have done had we had more advantages, that's life. We have to make the best of our lot.

But I think you are confusing stereotypes with reality, the upper class twit who is the son of the boss's friend, who is promoted to a senior role, or whatever. In practice that isn't what happens today, it is more complex.

For example, in some jobs you need to work as an unpaid intern, and people from poor backgrounds cannot do that. It can be true in law and politics, and it should be banned. And when you go for a job interview, how you present yourself matters. Public school types are self confident, they present well. They also have the confidence to take risks, to cram a subject before interview, and so on. They are also taught the value of hard work, as the schools have discipline, unlike some state schools. I feel that on the whole we should not attack the public school system, but the state system should learn from it. We need to create people who are confident enough to learn what they need when they need it, and to push themselves. I've known so many pubic school types, and seen them succeed where a state school type might not, and it really is self confidence and hard work, or sometimes charm.

Karl Marx also said the only thing he was certain of was that he's not a Marxist. Look, much done in his name was done after he died.

Clearly this is a debating point.

I'm of the view that New Labour made social mobility worse in this country by charging for tuition and devaluing education.

They did indeed reduce social mobility. However, we could not afford to pay for everyone to go to university. Why should a street sweeper pay tax for others to go to university, and earn more than him/her? That said, the child of the street sweeper might never go to university because of fear of debt. It is a problem.

It's those 7% of children in the private school system who dominate higher University applications, high career positions, executive positions and the entirity of Whitehall. As someone who hardly attended school, never went to University and has only got where I have through blind luck, sheer effort and maybe some natural cannyness, I do dispise the chummy old boys club.

They do dominate. I don't think the old boys club exists any more, or at least it is rare, and maybe only in certain jobs such as law, not that I know about law. As I said earlier, it is all about aspirations and self confidence. Many state schools encourage poverty of aspiration. I was talked down to by snotty condescending teachers, who thought I was nothing, then when I won an entrance scholarship to a London college, it was a metaphorical V sign to them. They hated me, but I did better than the well spoken teachers' pets. Posh kids come from posh families, with parents who achieve, and they are taught to think they can succeed. We need to encourage others. And to get discipline into schools. I know people who were teachers, and left, as they could not control the kids.

By the way, C4 had a programme on disability allowance, it was troubling. I think the government have screwed up, and it is unjust. Regular reassessment of people with neurological disorders that can never improve is dumb, and expensive. I think you have to err on the side of caution, give them the benefit of the doubt.

The Prime Ministers salary being used as some kind of benchmark does wind me up. His £147,000 is pocket money, not a salary. He doesn't have to pay a mortgage because we also pay for his residence - though he does own a house in his constituency. He doesn't pay for transport because we pay to have him driven around in a convoy of Jaguars and we pay for all of his staff. I haven't even mentioned his incredibly sophisticated security operation. The likelyhood of him costing us anything below a seven-figure-number is very unlikely.

True, but we have to protect him. I really don't mind some people getting high salaries, as long as they work hard, and they are good. Maybe on second thought Cameron could take a pay cut ...

There was a news feature recently about the personal statement segment of University application forms and how the small group of kids from private schools can obviously put much better things on it. Such a child can put 'went skiing with Ben Fogle as part of geography field trip' where as the state school kid kicks a football against a wall.

That's quite funny. Sad too because it is true.

The general culture just didn't fit with the idea that you'd be supported by your parents and not get a job until your early 20s, only Charles Fotheringhamshires family did that. By ladening people with debt we've sort of re-engineered that 'oh I can't go' feel amongst the street sweepers kids.

Yes, people have to be encouraged, easy to say, but no-one is doing it, although Robert Peston is doing his bit, getting successful people to visit state schools. Places like Eton get Stephen Fry, or William Hague visiting, and giving talks, state schools get, err, they don't. I know what you mean about the "get a job and don't waste time at school" attitude.

Looking at my family I feel my parents haven't got what they deserved out of life considering what they've put in so I do struggle to like incompetant people who've only risen to a high position because of who their parents are and who they went to school with.

My father came from a very poor background, wooden clogs, council house, and so on. He had no qualifications. My late mother came from a posh background. They got no money from her parents, or help, but she pushed him to go to night school, and he worked his way up to a middle management job as she knew it was all about how hard you push yourself and believe in yourself, rather than crying because Rupert Ponsonby Smyth got the job you wanted. I think she thought she was better than other people, and that he was too. Self delusion helps. :)

That's a nice story, Leif. She believed in him and he came to believe in himself. He was probably a very good middle manager who encouraged his staff to believe in themselves. If you get the best out of yourself you get the best out of others.

He probably was a decent manager, but it didn't stop them getting divorced. ;)