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Road pricing. Seems to be the phrase that's on every British driver's mind recently. There's a prevailing fear that the government are hell bent on driving the little man off the street and locking him in his house. For a political party crafted out of the rock of anti-elitism, Tony Blair's Labour are doing a good job of squashing the hardworking, tax paying Brit under the regulations and taxes that will eventually favour all those who can reasonably afford to own and fill a BMW, Audi or Mercedes.

I work hard for a living, and I admit I have to drive a lot just to hold on to my job. I live in a very rural part of the country with no trains and hardly any buses. Even if I could get the train from where I live, there isn't a station in the town where my job is located. So I'm afraid to say, the car is my only option. As for finding work in my home area, forget it there's nothing there.

I don't like having to travel away from home for work; it means I have to live away in the week, away from my wife and daughter. Not ideal, but a job is a job. Mr Blair, however, thinks I'm wrong for driving my car to work. Maybe he would rather I joined the unemployment queue and claim a nice big fistful of benefits every week? I'm laughing at the thought of that, but I'll tell you what, if he has his way and I get priced off the road that's exactly what will happen.

Over the past few weeks we inhabitants of this sunny isle have had the perfect example of democracy in action. We found out the hard way that governments nod their heads and pretend to be listening just for show. No. 10 Downing Street set up a website that enables Joe Public to petition the Prime Minister on a whole variety of issues. A nice idea, a democratic idea. A man from Telford, caught in a similar situation to me, decided to launch a petition to protest against plans for road-pricing. Like me, this guy believed the UK motorist was already paying enough for fuel (unleaded = 0.89p a litre Diesel = 0.95 a litre) and decided to take affirmitive action. Good for him. Well, to cut a long story short, almost 2 million people signed the petition.

Tony's reaction? "That's nice. We're going to go ahead and do it anyway, despite your reservations." Like I said democracy in action. We're fighting for other nations to have democracy all over the world, why don't we start a little nearer to home?

Mr Blair, you may be under the misguided opinion that Britain is prospering, but push back the tapestry of what you want to see for five minutes and you might see the truth. Some people in this country are struggling to make ends meet while you strangle them with stealth taxes and regulation after regulation. If you take away our cars you will take away our livelihoods.

If people can't get to work how will companies operate? If companies are unable to operate they will collapse. If companies collapse then the economy will soon follow. Surely this is not a hard idea to grasp?

It's not about congestion, it's not even about the environment. I'm talking about peoples' lives. Maybe Mr Blair should think about that the next time he takes he family on holiday on the Queen's plane or when he next climbs into the back of his Daimler to travel five minutes across London to Parliament.

Learn more about this author, Alex Samson.
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