Government to offer loans to buy cars

Graham_Devon

Lotus-eater wrote: »

What do you want, a medal?


I've been thinking about this since last night. About 70% of new cars are bought by businesses, most won't want to buy atm, but some will be secure enough to buy at this time....for the right price. So companies with huge fleets will buy up the unwanted models for vast discounts, maybe at less than cost price.

This will all remain secret while we as the std consumer will be given modest discounts.

Is this realistic?

Theres no way it could remain secret. Especially when you got people like Hendy who work both in the fleet, sales and used car sales arena. It would be let out real quick.

If they are to continue producing cars at a higher pace than people are buying there are only two things that can happen, well 3.

- Major cheap "New" (but actually 2 years old just a new reg) cars on the market. I'm talking half the price you'd get say a ford focus on the road today. And little 6k new cars like a basic corsa going for 2-3k just to get shot.

- Government legislation forcing us to buy, through legislation as stated. Would be easy to make MOT's tougher or simply say cars over 10 years old not allowed on the road, maybe increase taxes for older cars etc.

- They dump the cars. Bury them, send them off to third world countries.

All this plan has done, is like the banks, they were bailed out and never lent, it gives the manufacturers the go ahead to sit on a load of stock....until they say, 'Mr Government, we need some more money, no ones buying our cars'. To which there will be a "we have to help these people" .....and a few more fields taken over by cars.

Graham_Devon

Don't buy a Nissan!!

They can't be tested!

They have had to resort to this, which is their own test track:

StevieJ

Generali wrote: »

Actually I lived in France twice. The horrors of French bureaucracy influenced some of my views.

It's interesting that nobody on this thread or any others about the various bailouts is prepared to look at the costs and who is going to pay them in any serious way. The reason, IMO, is that as soon as you do it becomes clear that it's not possible for the taxpayers of the UK to pay all the losses of the banks, car makers, builders and goodness only knows who in future while also making good on currently unfunded future liabilities.

It seems to me that the jury on how much this will cost is still out! e.g. who is to say that the govt will not eventually make a profit when they unload the shares of Lloyds grp etc back onto the market (that bank could be in a very dominant position).

WTF?_2

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Thats what I said earlier.

Some new legislation will be bought in to force us into buying if we don't buy ourselves, thats pretty much a given. Anything to save face of the government. Let's face it, the ONE single reason they are doing this is because most of the production and jobs are in key labour areas.

Woolworths was all over the country, these are key seats where car production happens.

The French did something like that didn't they? As did the Irish a while back when they finally introduced an MOT system. In fact, I think they offered a couple of grand to buyers of new cars.

We'll probably see some sort of new 'eco' emissions standard designed to make anything older than about a decade illegal. Or mandate some sort of 'safety standard' that means that older cars have to be taken off the road.

Of course they can tax us like crazy and inflate away our savings in order to give the nationalised banking system the money to lend to us to buy all those cars... I'm sure if we really put out noses to the grindstone and keep our heads below the parapet we might be just about able to pay the taxes and debts....

SingleSue

Graham_Devon wrote: »

- Government legislation forcing us to buy, through legislation as stated. Would be easy to make MOT's tougher or simply say cars over 10 years old not allowed on the road, maybe increase taxes for older cars etc.

Eeeekkk that would be me in trouble, my car is 17 years old!

Generali

StevieJ wrote: »

It seems to me that the jury on how much this will cost is still out! e.g. who is to say that the govt will not eventually make a profit when they unload the shares of Lloyds grp etc back onto the market (that bank could be in a very dominant position).

It's true that it is theoretically possible for the Government to make a profit on this. Governments don't have a stellar record for profiting from turnaround situations though!

The biggest worry for me is the open cheque that the Government has written. The liabilities that the UK banks have run into many trillions. Of course the likelihood of total loss is vanishingly small, it just won't happen. The costs could well cause the UK Government to fail to meet other commitments.

bubblesmoney

SingleSue wrote: »

Eeeekkk that would be me in trouble, my car is 17 years old!

i remember singapore (many years ago) didnt allow dented cars on the roads or unsightly looking cars on the roads. i heard they had to scrap cars over 10y old then. dont know if uit is still the same now. but know the older cars were getting resold to malaysia etc which is just a few miles away by crossing the bridge.

i found out about this from some localites there when i enquired how there was not a single car on the road with a scratch or dent and all cars looked new. they had congestion charging in city centre more than a decade ago.

StevieJ

Generali wrote: »

It's true that it is theoretically possible for the Government to make a profit on this. Governments don't have a stellar record for profiting from turnaround situations though!

The biggest worry for me is the open cheque that the Government has written. The liabilities that the UK banks have run into many trillions. Of course the likelihood of total loss is vanishingly small, it just won't happen. The costs could well cause the UK Government to fail to meet other commitments.

The govt is hopefully staying arms length from these banks, I am fairly hopeful that these will turn out as top class investments. Now here is the rub, what do the flag waving Tory faithful want? UK to recover in the next 12 months?

Generali

StevieJ wrote: »

The govt is hopefully staying arms length from these banks, I am fairly hopeful that these will turn out as top class investments. Now here is the rub, what do the flag waving Tory faithful want? UK to recover in the next 12 months?

Well I wouldn't describe myself as the Tory Faithful but I would rather see the UK back on her feet sooner than later.

My suspicion is that 2009 is going to be pretty bloody however.

Graham_Devon

StevieJ wrote: »

Now here is the rub, what do the flag waving Tory faithful want?

A common sense approach to problems instead of unthought, U-Turn begging, and downright wasteful policies.

You call people flag waving tory faithful but omit the fact that the labour keep using the tory policies with their own bit of spin on it.

Must admit though. Labour did well with Bailout 1. Did well with the VAT cut. Did very well with the new car tax regime that now isnt. And who can take away their tax rebanding? Personally I find that one of their first policies in which they announced that started saving the world.