At Liberal Polemic, Tom Papworth has submitted a very well written blog to his site that is worth a read. Unfortunately I can't bring myself to agree with his way of thinking.

Quite aside from the potential of an over-charging of people compared to todays "rate" due to essential roads becoming the most liable for the heaviest charging because of what essentially amounts to a monopoly on traversable routes, the scenario of roads vital to only the few becoming hazards which can lead to the knock on detriment of the rest of society, the potential congestion issues that could arise, and the fact that building new roads in the area's where congestion and pollution causes us the most problem is nigh on impossible...I believe such idea's set a dangerous precedent in the way our taxation is seen.

What is clear is that the current habit of treating roads as though they are a public good that must be funded from general taxation is not only theoretically incorrect but also leads to a “tragedy of the commons” expressed through congestion and pollution, causes roads to be built where political forces rather than demand dictate, and raises levels of economically-damaging taxation. Whether the shift is from state to private or merely from taxiing the general public to making the beneficiaries pay, it is time to start treating roads as a very private good.

You see, the the trouble is that it's very easy to pigeon-hole a lot of other services that we receive as a "private good" rather than a public one, in the context of state funding, if we don't look deep enough. The point Tom makes is apparently that the road network doesn't satisfy the arguments for being a public good as the whole network is not under the situation of being "available" to everyone, i.e. a benefit. In a sense he's right, I here in Bristol don't use roads in Essex so why should my money be in any part used to fund them. Unfortunately this misses the point that it is entirely unlikely that the money I pay goes much further than "my share" of the cost of roads in my area to begin with.

The next thing he seems to miss is that such systems he talks about would benefit cities, in particular London, more than they would the extremities of the country. The taxation system is not perfect and indeed means certain people pay more for the roads they use than others, that is in fact one reason that Labours questionable road pricing scheme isn't necessarily all bad, but with a privatisation of our roads the people that lose out are the not just those that use have small infrequent journeys but those that live in Cornwall, North Wales, and Newcastle to name but a few.

The cost of transporting every day goods that people in hard to reach places need will cost more to get to them than it would to those in London, and in reality this will only result in companies charging everyone more for the cost they incur on these legs of their travels. Suddenly a lack of taxation that only car drivers paid for in the first place is now spread out and defined by market forces rather than specific maintenance need to everyone that is a consumer in any way in Britain.

And this isn't all, to try and argue that because you "don't use something" you shouldn't pay for it is a touch naive and far too individualistic. I have never personally needed the police or the fire services, touch wood I never will, so are they a public good? perhaps in the light of this police should ask for payment from the victim or their family before pursuing a crime, the fire service take a cheque before putting out the fire? I also don't have kids yet so why is any of my money going to education when privatisation clearly offers a better economic solution for me personally right now?

Unfortunately Tom's views, in my opinion, skip over the issue of priorities between privatised services and amenities compared to state funded demand driven ones and they ignore the more delicate picture of wider social good in line with the scales of economy that are in effect. He is spot on with one thing though, and that is the following.

Yet this does not mean that no private interest will build a lighthouse. One or two shipping magnates may decide that their own losses from shipwrecks are so great that they would personally benefit to such a degree from the building of a lighthouse that they are willing to bear all the costs even though others might benefit.

While I personally see that the roads are a public good, and should be funded through appropriate taxation (even if that's not the current case), it is stupid to look a gift horse in the mouth. For governments to try and control too much when an additional option is being funded by an outside source is beyond ridiculous. However when you look at the Skye bridge I doubt anyone could accuse the party in power of staring too deeply in to any animal's gob.