Just an interesting aside to this argument. It would appear there are some in the US that think the same way about ADS-B. From today's AVWEB
Reason Foundation On Why You're Delaying ADS-B
Why
You're Delaying ADS-B. Sounds a bit like over here.
In Poole's more ideal scenario, a balanced group of "aviation stakeholders" would presumably act in place of Congress or the FAA. Directly affected by the costs and technology, stakeholders would universally see the benefits of retiring old radars before attrition turned them into money-sucking vortexes. Stakeholders would futher recognize the improvements in safety and airspace capacity won through cockpit displays of weather and traffic (ADS-B). Those incentives might then, according to Poole, drive a desire for rapid implementation of ADS-B/in plus ADS-B/out strong enough to fuel the inclusion of financial aid to help GA users offset costs. All of this for the benefit of the aviation community as a whole. Rapid implementation under this plan would also mean large-scale production of hardware, leading to lower overall costs, further softening the blow.
Robert Poole. Reason Foundation
Interesting, considering the bonafides of this think tank makes for considerable thought if they propose "financial aid" for US GA.