Heard it all before to be honest. Nothing new here.
Bit frustrating to hear it from a driving instructor, but hey ho.
I do wonder if we as cyclists play the “pay your road tax” card in the right way.
As a general point, the “road tax” argument is now even more difficult to have without sounding like a hair-splitting dweeb.
If you go with the good old “it was abolished in 1938”, “it’s not called road tax”, “it doesn’t pay for roads” or the “we pay the same as low emission cars” routes then you might well get someone countering that by saying it has been re-introduced (in the 2015 Summer Budget), the government called it “road tax”, it is now hypothecated for roads, and low-emission cars now pay it like everyone else.
Then you’re left trying to argue that actually only applies to new cars registered after 2017 and the hypothecation doesn’t (re)start till 2020.
😕
I usually just say something like “local roads are paid for by council tax. I pay council tax like everyone else.”
Or even better, just respond to “You don’t pay road tax” with “I know, isn’t it great? I don’t pay for petrol either. Or parking.”