The Budget

The road fuel tax will be targeted at pensioners first. The better off who worked hard and saved for their retirement are most likely to vote Tory. So get them all killed off sooner so they can't vote the "wrong way" next time.

On 13 Sep 2024, jon wrote

Apart from an annual road tax, there's presumably a big issue of how to replace fuel tax when electric takes over from petrol/diesel.

Pay per mile makes sense if they can figure out a simple way to charge and collect it, and whether the charges should be a flat rate or different depending on, say, the weight of vehicle. (Wear and tear on roads must surely be worse for heavier/larger electric vehicles with more or more powerful batteries).

Weight of vehicle makes sense, as it's pretty straightforward. It was a great gesture, not to tax electric vehicles, as long as hardly anyone had them. But, we still need to maintain the roads, and the money needs to be raised somehow.

Pay per mile - which is after all a fair tax - will probably come in and since MOTs record mileage, should not be hard to police. Then they will make sure that old cars pay double a new electric car, just to signal some *extra* virtue and keep car manufactures happy.

It already is. I pay tax for the car, not how much mileage I actually do. Which is not very much these days at all

MOT records mileage. They simple direct debit you based on last years figures.

I thought EVs were already scheduled for 190£ from April next year, that's what I'm expecting, up from zero this year.

nib

I read somewhere that Road Tax does not actually have anything to do with road repairs?

I pay no road tax on my 1.2l petrol car, I think, because it has Stop/Go. I can see that perk going :(

On 13 Sep 2024, Jim the Geordie wrote

That rings a bell for road tax; I don't know whether fuel duty is the same, but it wouldn't surprise me at all. Governments generally dislike hypothecated taxes, as they prefer not to be restricted on what they can do with the money.

No way, that's far too simple and there's no money in it for 'lobbying' companies. They will want to charge differently according to which road is used, and which area, and which time of day and day of the week. There will be an attempt to charge depending on the political colour of the area.

It will be found necessary for every vehicle to carry a tracker, at the owner's expense, of course.

odometer tampering will become more of a thing ...

You pay tax at the pump too ...

Only from when the vehicle (in the case of a private car or van) is three years old.

Something would be needed to bridge that gap.

Well, unless the three years' mileage were all charged for on the car's third birthday or thereabouts.

If fairness (and equality of treatment) were what was being aimed at, the annual road tax for an electric car would have to be measured in thousands as a flat rate solution.

My car had its tenth birthday several months ago (I bought it new). It currently still has fewer than 23,000 miles on the clock. I had the use of another car for a large part of that decade.

Doing only about 5,000 - 6,000 mile per annum these days, I suppose I might benefit from a pure mileage charge and no fuel duty or Road Tax. And it would need to be arranged with both of those QPQs in order to restore fairness as between different road users.

It is extremely hard to do.

And would probably cost more than the tax saved.

-- If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.

Joseph Goebbels

That would not be enough. As a flat rate solution, the annual Road Tax for EVs would need to be measured in thousands of pounds in order to make up the "lost" fuel duty plus VAT (with an allowance for the 5% VAT on domestic fuel) with an amount for Road Tax on top of that.

Less than I pay in road tax. And I wouldn't if it were electric though.

-- If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.

Joseph Goebbels

And VAT on the fuel duty. Are there any other taxes that attract VAT? Alcohol and tobacco duties, maybe? What "value" (as opposed to cost) does a tax add to anything?