Bristol City Council Motoring Fines

Bristol City Council calls for a 'sliding scale' of fines proposed for older, more polluting vehicles.

21:53 26 July 2019

Bristol City Council is considering two options for cleaning up the air in the city’s most polluted areas. It is in the middle of a six-week consultation that aims to get public feedback on banning diesel cars from the city centre between 7am and 3pm and charging zone for older, more polluting vehicles.

 

 

 

Under the proposals, the charging zone would cost taxis and trucks £9 a day while lorries, coaches and buses will be fined £100 a day. The fine would apply to Euro 5 or older diesel vehicles and Euro 3 or older petrol vehicles.

 

 

 

On Wednesday, two councillors said that the blanket approach is “very inequitable”.

 

 

 

Liberal Democrat group leader Gary Hopkins said: “We have people who have vehicles which are just beyond the level, and we have others that are massively non-compliant.

 

 

 

“We’re going to be charging them exactly the same amount of money and that to my mind does not seem logical.

 

 

 

“Surely we need to make the really bad polluter pay, but there’s nothing in these proposals that aims to do that.”

 

 

 

Chair of the scrutiny board, Conservative councillor Geoff Gollop, agreed, saying: “Someone who’s possibly spent a lot of money on buying the cleanest and least polluting diesel car available is being penalised as much as someone who has something that has been around for many years,” Cllr Gollop said.

 

 

 

“And that seems to me to be wrong, I feel uncomfortable with that.”