Welcome to the "Its YOUR Duty!" motorists protest website.

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Welcome to my home page on bogush's "It's YOUR Duty!" fuel tax protest web site, set up to give an airing to what I believe to be the common sense, practical views and opinions of, literally, the man in the street, and on the Clapham Omnibus.

Many years ago, (ok, three decades ago, so I'm hopefully even wiser, as well as a lot older!), as a schoolboy, I witnessed the total chaos caused to motorists and public transport users alike, when my home town pioneered bus lanes.

The best improvements in bus times were on cross town routes, where journey times were cut by up to 5 minutes (with half the journey going in the opposite direction to the rush hour traffic).

Car journeys were delayed by an average 20 minutes.

And so bus journeys on non bus lane, and probably also on bus lane, routes were delayed by a similar amount by the general congestion.

I'd assumed that this would have been "bleedin' obvious" - you cut the road in half - you double congestion.

It's interesting that three decades later (2001) a report has been published by the government's Transport Research Lab (but not publicised by the government) showing that bus lanes produce a negligible improvement in bus lane journey times, but have a devastating effect on other traffic including non bus lane buses.

(Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

When I was at school and university I used to think that house prices would go down as well as up. Small wonder that some people complain that I am always right ;-)

The council also introduced pedestrian areas, some of which were excellent.

Unfortunately they also introduced bus only "pedestrian" roads. So instead of dodging between cars doing 0 to 20 mph in the rush hour, you were run down by a bus doing 40 mph.

After school, I studied law for a while, which gave me some idea of the knots politicians can tie themselves, and so us, into when they try to legislate for reasons of ideology, rather than neccessity and practicality.

However, I switched to civil engineering, and so, although never having specialised in highway or traffic engineering, I do have some understanding of what they should (and should not) involve.

I was brought up in a poor part of town, and didn't go to a posh grammar school. Most of the people on the university courses I studied on were practical, down to earth people, regardless of their background.

However, out of class I came across small groups of a different type of "student", a type of person I had not come across before.

One who believed that in a democracy small sections of society have a right, not only to force their views on others, but to try to force others to live by their rules, without their consent.

There was another type also, who because they were so nice and naive, would not only believe everything the first group told them, but would actively support them, in the belief that it was for the greater good.

These have now, no doubt, "grown up" into the PC Mafia, Animal Liberationists, Eco Warriors and others defenders of the oppressed people, animals, plants, and even rocks, of the planet. Strangely they are quite prepared to destroy people, animals, plants, and even the planet to further their own personal agendas.

Not long after graduating, I went to work in Guernsey. It was there that I first realised how much tax and duty was being levied on motorists on the mainland.

I also gained experience of official speed limits down to 5 mph. Try it for a sustained distance (if your speedo reads so low) or even 10mph - while paying due care and attention to the road.

And I received my first and last speeding ticket. For doing 30mph in a 35mph zone (sic). The mainland traffic cop thought that we were driving (safely) in a 25mph zone. Just shows how difficult it is to stay within the law. These days two or three mistakes can lose you your licence, and your livelihood!

Since then I have driven up to 50,000 miles a year in private and company cars. But I have also used, trains, tubes, buses (including in Clapham - up to 4 hours to get to work by bus!;-) and my own two feet (yes - I've even worked as a streetwalker) to get to and from work. And I have seen people unable to get to work, because they could not afford to buy petrol.

I have been a taxpayer, and a self employed taxpayer. I have children at school, and am a long term user of the NHS. And for most of my life I would probably have been a lot worse off financially if motoring taxes were cut.

But I have disagreed with the extortionate levels of motoring taxes ever since I worked in the Channel Islands, and with a number of related motoring policies (speed cameras, traffic "calming", environMentalism) imposed for what I believe to be revenue and/or ideological reasons.

Last year (2000), the high levels of motorists taxation become more widely known, but a number of people, for their own reasons, have sought to excuse them on various grounds which I think are less than sound.

As a result I became involved in a number of discussions on various fuel tax protest related forums.

Forums on sites such as Boycott the Pumps, Dump the Pump, Peoples Fuel Lobby, Peoples Fuel Campaign, Less Tax on Fuel, Lower Fuel Tax and the Road Users Forum.

However, due to space restrictions or spamming problems, a number of my contributions on some forums never appeared, or were wiped with the rest of the board they were posted to, when the boards were cleaned up.

When a couple of responses to "Stanley" (see link buttons) weren't published, I decided to set up a web page, bogushs lair to post them on.

One thing led to another, and I decided to use up the "spare" pages to store all the fuel protest and "ecology" web sites I had listed in my favourites folder.

Then at the begining of 2001 the Peoples Fuel Lobby site (also known as Less Tax on Fuel), one of the main web sites I used to visit, closed down. It has since reopened as the Peoples Fuel Campaign. Another site I visited - Boycott the Pumps (also known as Dump the Pump) - had a very slow forum.

After I had mentioned I had set up bogushs lair a few of the contributors visited, and some suggested that I tidied it up for public consumption. Because of the problems with the other forums some asked me to add a forum.

So I thought I'd give it a try - and here is the result: Its Your Duty! Hope you like it, or at least find it stimulating and/or usefull.

Bogush

Support the fuel tax protest and the anti speed tax speed camera protest - "It's YOUR" Duty!"

Updated 15.12.2002 - all the usual www disclaimers, apologies, acknowledgements, caveats, etc, apply.

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Peoples Fuel Lobby, Less Tax on Fuel, Peoples Fuel Campaign, Lower Fuel Tax, Cut Fuel Tax,
Boycott the Pumps, Dump the Pumps, UK Fuel Crisis, Road Users Forum, and dozens
of other sites all campaign for a reduction in motoring taxes.

Speedtrap Bible, UK Speed Trap Guide, Speed Cam.co.uk, speed-camera-action, Speedlimit.org, Safe Speed, Optional Extras and many others campaign against revenue raising speed camera traps and speed taxes, and for safe driving and sensible speed limits and speed camera location and utilisation.

For links to other campaign sites, including the Original Fuel Protest Site, see the Protest page.