UKIP Manifesto Transport
Britain is a nation of commuters, for work and for pleasure. Whether our journeys take us on the daily commute to work, on a cross country commercial delivery haul, or the school run, everyone needs a comprehensive and reliable transport network.
• UKIP will scrap HS2. At an estimated cost of £100bn this vanity project is not affordable (5). HS2 will destroy people’s lives and will have a huge environmental impact. UKIP will invest in the existing railways to improve capacity and journey times.
• The problem of failing rail operators could be solved by taking control by means of a new government owned company to run the franchises. All options would be considered.
• UKIP opposed the expansion of Heathrow Airport. UKIP will encourage investment in regional airports. The current Heathrow plan will destroy many villages and listed buildings as well as add to pollution in the locality.
• UKIP will scrap all road tolls. Tolling increases costs to business and the public. Road users are already overtaxed and should not be paying twice to use our roads. We will also block any introduction of payas-you-go road pricing.
• UKIP will abandon the current rollout of smart motorways and instead divert the funding to road maintenance with a priority for fixing potholes. Smart motorways are perceived by the public as being money-making scams, and removing the hard shoulder is dangerous.
• UKIP will stop diesel drivers from being penalised through discriminatory parking fees or zone charging. Modern diesels are far cleaner today and many people bought their vehicles in good faith on Government advice.
• UKIP supports the transition to electric vehicles, but the electric charging infrastructure is not keeping pace. We will support the installation of charging stations by diverting funds from the electric car subsidy. We will also encourage off-street parking and charging provision in all new housing and industrial developments through the local planning process.
• UKIP supports the development of driverless car technology.
• UKIP will scrap the EU derived law for the Certificate of Professional Competence (CPC) which has been severely damaging to the UK haulage industry. This unnecessary qualification has led to a shortage of HGV drivers in the UK.
5 Estimated by the Institute of Economic Affairs.
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