Why are motorcycles not exempt from road tax?

[R1Geezer]

The government claims to be wanting to discourage car usage so why don't they abolish road tax for motorcycles?

[R1Geezer]

JJ I take your point and tend to agree with the iintentions but it's just not practical, you'd have to duplicate the whole DVLA for bicycles. You have to have a registration system, road worthyness system, some sort of licencing. That's if you can find insurers to touch it with a barge pole. We can't even get them of the sme66ing pavement !

[R1Geezer]

stop it with the revenue sh1te, it's a well known public fact, even accepted by smokers that smoking is not a net contributor, geddit!

[hundreddolla]

Not meaning to hijack this thread but with regards to the cyclists on pavements rule, has anyone EVER seen the police ticketing or even reprimanding cyclists for riding on the pavement?!?! I've had cyclists run into me whilst i was waiting at a bus stop. Ive also had to leap out of the way when cyclists have come racing past / towards me on the pavement.

[jake-the-peg]

It's a well known myth that smoking is not a net contributer

Its almost always put forward by people who forget to take into consideration that although smokers die early we all die and that those who die of lung cancer save the NHS from treating their dementia

However the idea that Government is purely motivated by maximising tax take is laughable and motivated by a persecution complex. If that was the case they'd simply legalise and tax cannabis.
However I don't think the tax take from motorbikes is a significant factor given that there are only about 1 million bikes on the road in the UK out of 38 million vehicles.

The point is that there is a feeling of fairness that bikers should contribute as drivers do - it's essentially an emotional rather than an economic argument

[joggerjayne]

Geezer ...

In Portugal, bicycles have a licence number.