This has been on and off for a while but seems to be back in favour again. There is a House of Commons select committee looking at it and it could be introduced "within weeks" apparently.
I have just had my p38 MOT'd and the mileage I did from the previous MOT in 2020 was only 350 miles. Admittedly it was SORN'd for 5 months.
I quite fancy getting a second p38, maybe a decent petrol one and just leave it parked out in the road to be used now and then. If it is not used, it costs nothing.
I hope the new scheme is not going to be half and half. A fixed charge and a mileage charge. I have got a shed full of spares I have collected over the years to run a second, even a third.
Gulp.... I did 28,000 miles between MoTs in the last year and that included lockdown where we were only doing essential journeys.
Will the per mile component be the same price for all vehicles or vary depending on year / make / model / engine size / emissions (or relative to cost of current road tax)?
If relative to current road tax those of us with older vehicles with big engines could still pay less per mile than a newer vehicle of similar spec.
Over the years there's been several times of discussion about doing away with road tax and adding an additional tax to fuel... but can't see that happening because it doesn't allow for all the same big-brotherish type controls.
Don't think they have thought it through that far Lpgc.... but they will (one way or another) "Max the Tax" for sure......
This will make them £££ and they will say it's 'all about pollution and the need to encourage folks to walk, cycle etc.'
It will cost £££ too of course, via ANPR techniques galore (?); They can't use MOT mileage figures unless all cars are subjected to the tax (ie. including those under 3 years old)
AA say they should make it apply after a 3K Miles allowance per car.......
RAC say they will use tracking technology; Big Bother Is Watching You ! (sic)
davew wrote:
RAC say they will use tracking technology; Big Bother Is Watching You ! (sic)
Sales of GPS jammers will go through the roof then......
Probably for the best I pay £340 a year for my P38 and only do around 4000mi per year in it..
If you are going to levy a per mile charge, then wouldn’t it be easier to up the tax on fuel by say £0.50/l and forget road tax altogether? If you have a vehicle that is tax exempt, then you claim back against that expense every three months. (We have something similar here with road tolls so people who have to use a toll road for their daily commute can claim back the costs). That also fixes the various classes of engine capacity etc.
Electric vehicles pay a charge (pardon the pun) on every kWh they draw from a charge point for their road tax. Before we move down the path of saying they are tax free, we all know they won’t be in the future, unless you restructure the whole road funding base etc.
Just a thought.
It raises more questions than it answers, but it has now been out for written submissions by "interested parties" so could be introduced in the October budget. A black box tracker for everyone? I don't think so, too many cars on the road, but maybe a new car requirement? I am guessing.
Using MOT recorded mileage is problematic as davew pointed out (cynically ha ha).
However, they are not going to get the revenue and the books have got to balance.
People now working from home more, coupled with a switch to hybrids.
My guess is it is going to be transferred to fuel duty, but how to tax electric cars?
a per mile road tax is how you tax an EV, i would say thats the big push behind it . same as here
I have got a phev that I charge at home on a cheap night time rate. If they put an extra charge on kWh from charge points it wouldn't affect me. I seldom use them, they are too expensive. Some cost more than running on diesel.
Can't see how they could monitor mileage either. Split between battery and diesel mileage is not easy to separate out.
Hmm. More questions than answers.
In fact Dave there is a view that 'Smartmeters' will/could be used to monitor EVs being charged at 'some other rate', and 'at a particular time' anyway.
The big concern seems loss of VE 'Duty' (ie. TAX) and Petrol/Diesel 'Duty' (ie. TAX) as EVs increase in number of course.
'Thanks' to the pandemic (and loss of some of these "Duties") it seems many of ideas on 'the future of motoring' - including Road Use Pricing (ie TAX) - are now just being brought forward by decades..... ?
( Such ideas -and concerns- are outlined in: https://institute.global/policy/avoiding-gridlock-britain )
Furthermore if you have the time/inclination I recommend watching this presentation by Will Norman
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmvhAZs4-tg
-He is the "walking/cycling commissioner" for London (paid for by TfL....) and his ideas for 2041 are exactly the kind of thing now being brought forward. On TV the other day he stated that of the 410m miles a year travelled by drivers in London 'they estimate a third are journeys of less than 2km"...... This is, of course, eco-garbage.... (Coming soon to a city near you - if not already !)
Dynamic tariffs and pay per mile are not necessarily the same thing but if smartmeters in homes had dynamic tariffs (dynamic as in change the cost of charging an EV depending on the time of charging) and cost of batteries came down low enough, then to get around the higher peak time charging cost people could fit a separate battery bank to charge up off-peak then charge the EV battery from the battery bank and charge their EV during peak times at the off-peak rate.. and maybe charge from battery to battery faster than charging from mains to battery.
It's 'a complex model' of course Lpgc but longer-term eco-pundits are suggesting that in the future "tired" EV battery banks be 'recycled' to store (Solar/PVC) power in residential situations.... although folks could do that now anyway with lead-acid batteries of course. (Again that just puts us in a "Nice idea, impractical for most" situation ....)
Back on pay-per-mile - and being cynical and sceptical (!) - we 'big(ger) block' drivers will just continue to be hit, because 'they' can. We are 'easy targets'. Yes, we are already hit with higher fuel taxes via low mpg but that's 'not enough', apparently.
It is inevitable that we will pay more with any P-P-M scheme. They will say/imply that such schemes are 'fairer' but anyone really expecting to pay less that we do currently via VED etc may be in for a surprise. Whilst the Commons Select Committee debating this will probably be full of platitudes and 'promises' of course they are really just 'testing the waters' for 10 years hence (with an option to bring things forward if/when they believe they can get away with it... ?)
I always get frustrated and angry by the urban-centric way this country operates. We legislate for the 'masses' with very little thought for the further flung parts of the country.
If you live in Durness or Kinlochbervie, your nearest hospital will be near 100 miles away - each way; nearest big supermarket... 100 miles, each way. Doing a per mile road tax would hammer them. They're also many miles from a trunk road, where theoretically the tax gets spent.
Would there be any dispensation? You'd like to think so... but the track record of the policy makers isn't good.
I shall step down off my soap box...!
It's not just urban-centric but London centric. Nobody needs to have a car, they can use public transport they say. If you are in London with a bus every 2 or 3 minutes and a tube station just down the road, yes you can but if.like me, you live in a village 6 miles outside a city with a bus once an hour up until 9pm, if you haven't got a car you are stuck. If you are even more rural, then what I have is probably considered practical. In rural areas a car isn't a luxury, it's a necessity.
It's all to price any non electric vehicle off the road ---- yet they are seriously dangerous --- in accident can burst into flames and can't be extinguished & damage to planet for materials for batteries BUT government doesn't care about that----- maybe MPs got shares in EV sales ----- I will just buy cooking oil for my discovery ---- they could simply put 1p on liter of fuel to fund road issue
EVs are 'the answer' Symes, didn't you know...?.. Just like Diesels were proclaimed to be (by a group of influential politicians who probably could not even wire a 3-pin plug correctly ...... "Brown Is Ground", right ?)
Don't worry though, I am sure they will find a way to fleece EV drivers in the future; eg. "Lithium is expensive to re-cycle" so let's tax it ?....
PS: Non-Urbanites fear not: From documents/suggestions I have read the "Townies" P-P-M -free "allowance" - 3K miles - is (probably) going to be extended to 4K miles in the country (so that's alright then...) . And again, yes, on top of VED