A £2 billion congestion tax bombshell is about to hit North Western towns like Bolton and Stockport - to help pay for the "carrot" Manchester received from central Government in exchange for being the "Guinea Pig" for unpopular road pricing schemes planned for the whole country.Research from MART (Manchester Against Road Tolls), shows that the burden of paying for a massive £1.8 billion transport investment loan will fall hard on motorists driving into towns like Bolton, Bury, Rochdale, Oldham, Stockport, and Altrincham.Cllr David White, Liberal Democrat transport spokesman for Stockport said: 'We never felt that charging just to drive into Manchester city centre added up, despite receiving weasel word assurances from City Council leaders. It was obvious there was a need to recoup a shortfall in revenue and that meant taxing towns like Stockport. Their overall plan is to get an elected mayor for Greater Manchester, then without further reference to our communities, they will drive this tax through. So much of this is old politics, a grand plan without telling people what your true intentions are." MART Co-ordinator Sean Corker said: "Manchester City Council has been in the vanguard of increasing the tax burden on local people, yet they have misled people about traffic levels and congestion and are misleading everyone about the pressing need to extend the charging zones. During the consultation process, no mention was made of the outer town charging in any of the scripts or questions put to the public or businesses. Just like Ken Livingstone, Richard Leese will say what ever it takes to get the scheme through then do what ever he likes when it is in place." Manchester Council leaders have refused to reveal their business plan to the public and fellow councillors alike. The reason it seems is that they have always needed the revenue from the other 9 councils to balance the books and finance their grand designs. Each council needs to look very carefully at what they are getting in return for over £2 billion of congestion charge revenue being sucked out of the local economies of the region.Transport investment in Manchester is badly needed, but the money must not have "strings" attached which tie the population of a whole conurbation to a ruinous and doomed road pricing experiment.