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Finance Bill

My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. He will remember that last year, when we were debating the retrospective change to VED, it was argued that, although there was a strong case for using a VED differential, by making it retrospective we would not be changing behaviour—we would simply be taxing the individual more. That was the argument then. Now, the argument is that if the aim is to achieve environmental goods, there are ways to do that, but if a measure does not achieve an environmental good, it simply becomes yet another form of taxation affecting a part of our community that can least afford it—the poorly paid people in rural areas whom we represent. The solution offered by amendment 5 is elegant in many ways. Rightly, not all the detail is written into the amendment. There is supporting material, as my hon. Friend the Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) says, but more definition is required. Arriving at some of the definitions will be quite difficult, especially for an area such as mine, where the population distribution and density are very different from those found in the highlands and islands of Scotland. It is by no means straightforward to translate the intention behind the amendment into reality in parts of England such as my constituency, but the argument is one that we have to make—and we have to make it repeatedly—because the present system is unfair to people in rural areas. It is particularly unfair to the highlands and islands, but it is also unfair to parts of the south-west. We should recognise that it is unfair to the whole of England, Wales and Northern Ireland.