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Birmingham considering workplace parking tax

Transport watchdog committee currently just gathering evidence

Birmingham transport officers are reportedly investigating the potential impact of a workplace parking tax. According to the Birmingham Mail, the council’s transport watchdog committee is considering charging hundreds of pounds a year to park cars at city centre offices.

Similar to a congestion charge, the measure would be intended as a means of reducing traffic. A similar scheme is already in operation in Nottingham where businesses with more than ten parking spaces are charged £375 a year per car.

Committee chairman Councillor Victoria Quinn said that Nottingham’s workplace parking levy – which raised around £9m last year – was paying for a city council run bus network. However, opposition transport spokesman Councillor Timothy Huxtable said that such a proposal would be opposed by Conservatives.

Council transport official Phillip Edwards was keen to emphasise that there were no firm plans at this point. “However it is one of the initiatives we are going to be looking at. We will be talking to Nottingham.”

Speaking about the possible impact of such schemes in 2010, Hilary Holden, a transport analyst at the consultancy Arup, said that whether companies passed the cost on to staff would vary, adding: “This may not change behaviour but could raise money for public transport."

The committee is also examining investment in public transport and cycling as it seeks to reduce car use in the city.

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17 comments

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1961BikiE | 8 years ago
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I'm not a car owner but I do have strong reservations about these schemes. As always the well off will feel virtually no impact in their pocket (but will probably be one of the biggest groups to bitch about it) and so it will be the poorer end of the economic spectrum who will be hit hardest. And at the same time what infrastructure will be put in to place to cater for those who choose/are forced to use public transport/cycle or walk to work? I am massively for the reduction of motorised road traffic but a whole raft of physical and social changes need to be made your cities and society.

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EK Spinner | 8 years ago
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Surely a commercial property with car parking has a higher rateable value than a similar one without. Hence they should already be paying more business rates.

Administering a new tax comes with the needs for a new set of rules and an admin to run it. I think they should use the existing system properly and don't create a new expense.

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RedfishUK | 8 years ago
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Would make more sense to tax out of town business parks rather than city centre ones.

Landlords build cheap out of town offices where there is often no option other than driving (or cycling ;))

Where as City Centre offices are more expensive but much easier to reach by public transport.

In Leeds I have worked in offices 5 mins walk from the railway station where aroung 75% of people arrived by public transport. I'm currently in an office less than two miles away but almost unreachable by public transport and despite a company shuttle bus to the station well ove 90% of staff arrive by car.

 

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bikebot | 8 years ago
1 like

Caroline Pidgeon talks about it quite prominently, as a way of reducing traffic in London. It's a shame no one else is.

Yep, it's absolutely an employee perk, and I say that as someone who has had a work parking space in London. Parking is a major cost of car travel, I don't see why that's an untaxed perk when I can't claim for train travel to and from a regular workplace.

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awjr | 8 years ago
5 likes

The Workplace Parking Levy has had a huge impact on cycling infrastructure and public transport in Nottingham. I expect other cities to consider doing this. The long-term benefits to a city are huge.

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ribena | 8 years ago
4 likes

If a company provides you with "free" lunch it's treated as a taxable benefit. Same with any other benefits. You pay income tax on the equivalent value. Stops people avoiding income tax.

Car parking is currently excluded from this. If you work in a city, parking can be as much as 25 quid a day. It's a significant way of avoiding tax.

Really, there are just closing the loophole.

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themartincox | 8 years ago
2 likes

I live in Nottingham and was serving on the board of a pretty major firm when then came into effect and the bigger businesses were NOT happy about this at all. There were advisors talking about changing one bay into a flower planter to avoid the levy etc

It's hard to see the difference it has made in everyday terms, but we are getting there slowly as far as joined up travel thinking is concerned, the tramways are developing, the bus network is pretty sweet, and cycling is more catered for.

Expect the firms in Brum to kick up a stink! Very short-sighted views, but maybe cycling has developed enough in past 6 years that people can see alternatives.

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Winders | 8 years ago
1 like

Double post, please ignore!

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Winders | 8 years ago
2 likes

Nottingham City owns the local bus company and tram network with plenty of park and ride facilities on the outskirts. It's also busy building a network of London-style cycle superhighways and introducing its own version of an Oyster Card. All these are partially funded through the Workplace Parking Levy. Also, employers are starting to ask their employees who insist on driving to work to pay the levy out of their own pockets.

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brooksby replied to Winders | 8 years ago
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Winders wrote:

Nottingham City owns the local bus company and tram network with plenty of park and ride facilities on the outskirts. It's also busy building a network of London-style cycle superhighways and introducing its own version of an Oyster Card. All these are partially funded through the Workplace Parking Levy. Also, employers are starting to ask their employees who insist on driving to work to pay the levy out of their own pockets.

I suppose that's the difference: schemes like this could work in cities which still have council-owned/managed public transport systems. But those are few and far between: London, Nottingham, err...

Most cities and regions just have the usual suspects: either Stagecoach or First (and the council just gets to subsidise routes which are needed by the public but which are not profitable enough.

I agree with other posters, that the charge for business parking needs to be higher if it is really to discourage people driving into work.

And finally, if a bit OT, what about addressing those 'free' parking spaces at out of town supermarkets and shopping centres which are only free because everyone is paying through the price of the goods they buy... So if I ride there, I'm subsidising someone who has chosen to drive there in their Canyonero.

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wycombewheeler replied to brooksby | 8 years ago
1 like
brooksby wrote:

.......... Canyonero.

 4
I think they call them Q7s here.

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captain_slog | 8 years ago
6 likes

My company buys business parking permits from the council and gives them to employees who drive. This is essentially a perk denied to those who choose or are forced to commute by other means.

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HarrogateSpa | 8 years ago
14 likes

It's encouraging that Birmingham realises that we can't go on this way, with our towns and cities being dominated by motor vehicles, and ever more congestion.

I don't agree that it is money-grabbing and will have no effect. Behaviour can be influenced. People will make decisions on how to travel based on a number of factors, including convenience and cost. This proposal would add to the cost of driving into the city centre.

I understand why there is cynicism about politics, and in some cases it's justified. But if we respond to all ideas by assuming the worst motives, and instantly dismiss them as ineffective, how are we ever going to improve our society?

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wycombewheeler replied to HarrogateSpa | 8 years ago
1 like

HarrogateSpa wrote:

I don't agree that it is money-grabbing and will have no effect. Behaviour can be influenced. People will make decisions on how to travel based on a number of factors, including convenience and cost. This proposal would add to the cost of driving into the city centre.

I understand why there is cynicism about politics, and in some cases it's justified. But if we respond to all ideas by assuming the worst motives, and instantly dismiss them as ineffective, how are we ever going to improve our society?

If you want to have an impact you have to charge the people using the space, and charge at a rate at least equivalent to using public transport. Can anyone travel to work by public transport for £7.50 a week?  It costs my daughter more than that to get to school on the bus, a journey of 2 miles, few people live within 2 miles of their workplace.

Charging the companies for the spaces they have whether they are used or not, and charging a mere 19p/hr will not do anything.

this is akin to adding £10 onto the cost of a flight to reduce carbon emissions, a number too small to have an impact.

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djfleming22 | 8 years ago
1 like

This has noting to do with helping the city centre, just money grabing councils trying to squeeze every last penny out of tax paying people to pay for the miss management of council funds, councils have been getting away with it for years its a disgrace.

 

 

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wycombewheeler replied to djfleming22 | 8 years ago
4 likes
djfleming22 wrote:

This has noting to do with helping the city centre, just money grabing councils trying to squeeze every last penny out of tax paying people to pay for the miss management of council funds, councils have been getting away with it for years its a disgrace.

 

 

I think disgrace is a bit strong after all we are talking about taxing large businesses here. And at least the likes of amazon and starbucks can't claim all their parking spaces are in Ireland, the Netherlands or yhe Bahamas, unlike their profits.

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wycombewheeler | 8 years ago
1 like

No impact just money grabbing.

£375 is equivalent to 19p per hour on top of the rate of employing people. +The spaces won't dissappear whatever people do.

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