Courier Exchange

C-charge could be on the cards for Leeds

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The scourge of road pricing appears to be spreading outwards from London.

Manchester has announced plans for its own congestion charging zone, and now a similar scheme put forward for Leeds could severely impact couriers and other freight haulage drivers in the area.

Speaking at a fringe meeting at the Liberal Democrat conference in Brighton, Jonathan Bray of the Passenger Transport Executive Group (PTEG) hinted that road tolls could be the only way to combat congestion in Leeds.

Mr Bray represents transport executive such as West Yorkshire's Metro, the Yorkshire Evening Post reports.

"It can't all be about us saying 'we are poor badly done-for northerners, you should give us more money.'

"We need to do what Ken has done and what London has done. We need to have mechanisms to raise more funding ourselves.

"That might be road user charging, it might be a supplementary business rate.

"The government needs to give the cities more flexibility to raise more of the funding they need themselves."

Paul Cowan of the Local Government Association agreed that "road pricing needs to be part of the longer term solution".

A congestion charge in Leeds would affect those firms needing to drive through the city every day. In London, couriers and other logistics drivers have to pay a daily charge to enter the centre of the capital.

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