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Finance Bill

I want to speak mainly so that I can demonstrate that this is not purely a Scottish issue, despite the eloquent proposition put forward by my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute (Mr. Reid). This matter affects rural communities across the country, albeit in different ways, although it is demonstrated in its most extreme form in the sort of communities represented by my hon. Friends who have already contributed to the debate. That is particularly true for the island communities and the very remote areas in Scotland where the population density is extremely low. I want to impress on the Committee the problems that each of our rural areas have due to the premium on fuel, as has been demonstrated by the hon. Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew), and the necessity to use cars to carry out normal business. It is quite impossible for people in my Somerset constituency to use public transport to get to work because there is simply no system that allows them to do so. In my village, there is one bus a week. A person cannot ask their employer if they can attend only once a week, on the day that the bus runs, and expect to hold down a job. That shows the difficulty for people in my area. Of course, most couples and even families have to go to several destinations, because there is not one place that is a convenient provider of employment to which people can drive from a village or a very rural area. That means that some families need several cars—certainly two, and sometimes more—to allow their members to get to work or school, or to carry out all aspects of their normal lives.