Behind the scenes, 2024 has been a busier year for the TTAG committee than may have been apparent. The initial part of the year was focused on building public support to lobby MPs and councillors to act for change on the matter, and research into the funding support received by users of other crossings around the country.
Though Sheryll Murray, the then MP for South East Cornwall, had already announced her support for our campaign, the announcement of the general election on July 4 had other MPs and prospective MPs also engaging with us.
It was apparent from this that there was growing recognition by candidates on the importance of this issue to people on both sides of the crossings. Also sadly, that it was a much bigger issue for people from South East Cornwall than those from Plymouth.
On April 15, a toll revision application was made to increase the toll. We redirected our efforts to building public opposition to the toll rise by encouraging people to send in their objections prior to the deadline of June 14.
Ultimately, we achieved more than double the number of objections that had ever been submitted to any prior toll rise application, this despite feedback from many that it was a waste of time as the decision was a foregone conclusion.
A public inquiry was set for October 15, 2024 and we set to building our case against the rise.
The objection evidence we compiled and submitted to the inquiry can be found on our website at www.tamartollactiongroup.org/news
We thank all our supporters for their assistance and kind words and wish you all a happy new year.
Vice chair Scott Slavin
Tamar Toll Action Group