‘Exempting buses and taxis won’t exempt the poor consumer’

The decision by government
to exclude buses and
taxis from paying tolls
for the Gauteng Freeway
Improvement Project (GFIP)
will not necessarily benefit
the poor as the tariffs for
trucks will no doubt be
passed on to those very same
consumers.
According to Road
Freight Association (RFA)
spokesman Gavin Kelly, the
decision that only some road
users pay tolls is unfair. As
truckers will be forced to
pay they will, in an attempt
to stay in business, try to
pass these extra costs onto
customers and ultimately the
consumer.
“If you are implementing
a user pay system then every
user of that road should be
expected to pay, including
the people travelling in buses
and taxis. The system is
just unfair,” he told FTW.
“Having said that though the
people in society who can
ill afford to pay more for
their basic commodities are
going to be affected the most
through the tolling of trucks
delivering goods.”
Economist Mike
Schussler, who along with
other leading economists
says the tolling will
compound poverty and
low wages in the country,
confirms this.
“The highest price
increases will be on
the cheapest food items
such as bread,” he said. If
a loaf of bread costs R6
before tolling, Schussler is
estimating that after toll
tariffs the same bread will
cost in the region of R10.
This will be because
products and goods will
now be tolled more than
four times in some cases,
said Kelly. “A product will
enter the toll area in Gauteng
from the port in Durban for
instance and then be taken to
a distribution centre before
being taken to the store
meaning the same product
will be tolled twice – but
that could even double in
some cases. Those costs
are going to result in goods
prices increasing.”
Trade union Cosatu last
week said that should the
tolling go ahead at the newly
announced government
tariffs they would strike, as
South African consumers
could not carry the
extra burden. These cost
pressures, they say, will be
the most severely felt by the
poor.
Kelly said the RFA had
advised both the minister of
finance and transport of the
devastating effects of tolling
truckers, but it all seems to
have gone unnoticed.
“The new tolls will force
trucks onto the already fastcollapsing
road network, and
with trucks being the major
revenue generator in the
GFIP model, this will cause
havoc with the assumptions
in this model.”