SHE makes an unlikely villain, does my neighbour. A trim thirtysomething with three children, she looks about as likely to cause offence as John Prescott does to win Mr Universe. But her demure smile and the love and attention she lavishes on her brood of toddlers is clearly a front, for she has committed a crime so great, it is astonishing that she has not been carted off to Guantanamo Bay already. She drives a 4 x 4.

It seems there is nothing today that can stir such vitriol as an off-road vehicle on a road in a town or city. And a mother in a 4 x 4 outside a school is even worse, a sort of cross between being an armed robber and a terrorist wrapped up in a slab of aluminium, steel and rubber. I know my neighbour must be a bad person because every government minister and local authority lines up to tell me so. Apparently, she hogs the road, pollutes the air and makes life a misery for the rest of us.

The good news is that the authorities are going to make people like her pay — big time. Owners of 4 x 4s are going to be hit with the equivalent of motoring ASBOs so fierce that they will barely be able to show their faces in public again. If they can afford to, that is, once they have been smacked by the Government’s big, green stick.

Yes, I know. Silly, isn’t it? A mum-of-three cast as the motoring devil incarnate, but the only reasonable reaction to the harrumphing of the past fortnight is a shrug of the shoulders and two choruses of “Here we go again”. Congestion bad: raise taxes on car owners. Pollution bad: raise taxes on motorists. England lose in the World Cup: well, not quite, but it could become as good an excuse as any. For pity’s sake, Richmond-upon-Thames council meets next week to decide parking charges for local residents and owners of 4 x 4s may find themselves paying up to £300 a year. This is not a charge for clattering up and down the pavements of the borough or scaring small dogs and old ladies, but just to park outside their own homes.

But the issue of the 4 x 4 is a sideshow in the greater green issue, a convenient label taped over what should be a proper debate about traffic and pollution. At the moment, the Government’s only answer to curbing emissions is to dip into the wallets of more than 20 million motorists who are powerless to resist. Like my neighbour: her choice of vehicle — a Toyota RAV4 — seemed fairly sane to her in the showroom because it is relatively tall and she feels comfortable sitting high above the traffic. It is roomy for the kids and shopping, it pulls the family caravan happily and is robust, so she expects it to last for a long time. But now she is faced with paying more taxes that she cannot afford or dumping a car in danger of becoming a pariah on the used forecourt.

And what would she buy as a replacement family car, assuming she has the ready cash to go out and buy something new that fits the brief of both Chancellor and harridan local authorities such as Richmond? Something the size of a jam jar with the entire family lumped in together, required by law to fit two baby seats and one junior car seat into a rear area the size of a shoebox? But then, it wouldn’t pull the caravan, so the family may have to fly abroad for a holiday on a nice, hugely polluting jet instead.

She could buy an electric car, which would be excluded from Richmond’s parking laws — if she can find one and then a model capable of travelling more than about 150 yards on a charge. Perhaps we could all buy one and, when we come home from work and plug in to recharge each evening, all the lights in the street will go out because there are not enough power stations to cope. And what happens to the highly toxic batteries at the end of the car’s life? Or maybe she could buy a hybrid, a car powered by a diesel or petrol engine linked to a battery. Well, the choice is so limited as to be down, effectively, to just two models: the Toyota Prius and the Honda Civic Hybrid, both relatively small hatchbacks that wouldn’t offer the versatility my neighbour needs.

So what is she to do? The answer seems to be to pay up, no questions asked. She, and many like her, are about to feel the pain of the Government’s big, green stick and there is nothing she or we can do but take the pain.

Green and lean

Toyota Prius 104 grams-per-kilometre of CO2 emissions

Honda Civic Hybrid 109

Citroën C1/Toyota Aygo/Peugeot 107 109

Citroën C2/C3 diesel 113

Daihatsu Charade 114

Planet warmers

Ferrari 575 Superamerica 499 grams-per-kilometre

Aston Martin V12 Vanquish 448

Maserati Spyder 400

Rolls-Royce Phantom 385

Porsche Cayenne S 4x4 380

SOURCE: SMMT