That Mike Rutherford who seems to be in favour of 4x4's has done yet another argument in our favour!
If you disapprove of 4X4s and vow that you wouldn't be seen dead in an SUV, let alone purchase one of the damn things, that's fine by me. I might not happen to agree with your opinion. But I respect it.
You and me are entitled to our own views and beliefs. We live in a free country (although it's anything but 'free' following the revelation only last week that every Brit pays, on average, £10,000 a year in taxes, be it income, transport, VAT, National Insurance or any other tax).
But for now at least you are free to choose whether you want to own a car, you're free to decide whether it should be a 4X4 (yes, they are 100 per cent legal and no, they haven't been banned) and you're equally free to drive it on the vast majority of roads in Britain. That's all fair enough, isn't it?
But Government is by far the biggest financial beneficiary of all when a motorist signs on the dotted line for a factory fresh 4X4.
If you're looking for something or someone guilty of profiteering in mercenary fashion, from 4X4s, look no further than the Treasury. On purchase, thousands of pounds go direct to Gordon Brown's department in VAT. And much more money - possibly tens of thousands - more rolls into his fiefdom in further taxes and duties on the fuel, oil, servicing and repairs during the course of one car's life - which may be several decades long.
If you exercise your legal right and choose to put your hard-earned wages into a 4X4 workhorse, that's called freedom of choice. It's your business, not anybody else's and certainly not mine.
Unlike the Government, 4X4 manufacturers, their employees, dealers, shareholders and associates, I don't care and don't get richer or poorer depending on whether consumers choose or don't choose to buy 4X4s. If these vehicles were wiped off the face of the earth tomorrow, my income as a freelance journalist and broadcaster wouldn't drop a single penny. In fact, it would probably increase because I'd be writing endless stories about the withdrawal from the British market of a product that's legal in every other country in the World.
Having said all that, I have to warn you that you may be putting unnecessary restrictions on your day to day mobility if you have the unshakeable courage of your anti-4X4 convictions.
You'd prefer to languish at a bus stop than accept a free ride from a Jeep-driving friend or relative who's going your way late at night, would you? And are you really willing to risk your health and well being when, after collapsing on the pavement, you say no to a kindly driver who stops to help by offering to whisk you to hospital in his gas-guzzling Hummer?
Or perhaps you're snowed in as many people were last week, have no way of collecting your kid as arranged, but one of those appalling school run mums offers assistance in her seven seater Audi Q7. Do you curse her and her 4X4 beast as you do most days? Or do you acknowledge the effective automotive tool for what it is - an all wheel drive micro bus with seat belts for every occupant and countless other safety related features that conventional buses and coaches simply can't and don't have?
After presenting countless phone-in programmes on radio it's my experience that a person who dislikes something is very unlikely to start liking it because it comes highly recommended by somebody else.
For example, the 4X4 is a bit like Marmite, Man United and Margate. There are individuals who loathe them all with a passion, and there are others who are positively passionate about them. Personally, I'm not a fan of the 'food', football team and seaside town listed above. But I'm absolutely and genuinely delighted for those people who are. Similarly, I'm more of a curry, Charlton Athletic and Canterbury kinda guy and if you're with me on those three choices, fine. If you're not, that's fine, too. It's called tolerance, and Britain would be a far better place if we had a bit more of it.
So if somebody decides that he or she wants to work and save hard, pay their income and other taxes, buy a perfectly legal 4X4 and pay VAT and more taxes, put fuel in its tank and have it serviced for years (guess what? That's even more in VAT and other taxes) then shouldn't that man or woman be tolerated by others who don't happen to think the same way or have the same needs, desires or disposable income?
Similarly, was Britain's Chancellor, Gordon Brown, right to be so intolerant towards 4X4 manufacturers and customers in the Budget? Especially as he did so in the very week that Land Rover and its British headquarters and British workforce officially and proudly launched the latest version of its British designed, British engineered and British manufactured Defender 4X4, which is an iconic British product that's exported all over the world.
One last thing. On the same day that Brown made his Budget speech, British Winter officially ended and Spring started.
Shouldn't we all turn over a new leaf? Or are you going to be so intolerant of your law-abiding, tax paying, 4X4 owning neighbours by insisting that they should not buy, own and use such cars?
