Am I the onnly one who has worked out that the new road tax system is a complete con?

Strider590

thenudeone wrote: »

It's deliberate policy to put a little discouragement to those people who think a bigger car makes them seem like a bigger person, and who thinks that they are entitled to put three times as much pollution as average into the atmosphere. Nothing wrong with that IMO.

Your looking beyond the face of it, I commend you for this, however you still need to look a bit deeper.

The whole thing feeds into the global warming scam, it's just another way of making us accept paying insane taxes in the name of saving the planet. And how is paying £400 a year on car tax going to help the environment? does any of that money go toward environmental stuff? hell no! it doesn't even go toward road maintenance!

You'll also notice that it encourages people to buy newer cars (this is where the lies become obvious), the actual production of a new car has greater environmental impact than that car will have during it's entire shortened (by planned obsolescence) life time.

It's all about consumerism!!!

Encouraging consumerism does only one thing, it creates more money from taxes to fill the govt coffers.
Consumerism is this planets biggest threat, the mass production of items has a HUGE impact on natural resources and the output of toxic chemicals into the environment.

So if anything, by encouraging people to spend money on "being green", we're actually causing more harm than good.

Every few years the "excuse" (and it really is) for buying a car new car varies, in summer it's "I need air con", in winter it's "I need a 4x4". "I want to save the environment", "I want to save money on fuel by spending more money on a car", "my current car is costing me too much".

scheming_gypsy

jase1 wrote: »

Abolish the road tax and put a penny on the fuel tax.

surely that should be 'abolish vehicle tax and use a penny from the already stupidly high, fuel tax'

thenudeone

Strider590 wrote: »

You'll also notice that it encourages people to buy newer cars (this is where the lies become obvious), the actual production of a new car has greater environmental impact than that car will have during it's entire shortened (by planned obsolescence) life time.

The use of taxation to influence buying and driving behaviour has been around for at least a decade when they charged the absurd rules which encouraged company car drivers to make unnecessary journeys so that they hit the minimum business mileage required to avoid a higher tax charge; so it shouldn't have a been a surprise to anyone that less fuel efficient vehicles were going to be hit one way or another.

Only the terminally stupid would replace a servicable second hand car with a new one and take a huge hit on depreciation as well as a high capital cost, just to save a hundred or so pounds a year on road tax.

Oh ... wait ... that describes quite a lot of the British public.

So yes - I agree that there can be unintended consequences such as excessive consumerism, but for most people what it has done is that when they are looking to buy a new/newer car, fuel efficiency and the cost of tax are certainly more important factors than they used to be. This can only reduce the amount of fossil fuels used and pollution created, and incentivise car makers to continue to improve fuel efficiency; so on balance it's a good thing.

gilbert_and_sullivan

eilidh_s wrote: »

I have a 2 year old hilux, it is £290 and yes it is a gas guzzler. Could your estate car in fact be a 4x4?

Something wrong here, it should be £200/£205, it's commercial vehicle rate.

knightstyle

It is interesting to note that here in France they did away with the car tax as it was expensive to run and put a centime or two onto the fuel tax. Fuel is still cheaper than the UK, 1.109€ for 95 petrol and 1.279€ for diesel. Todays local prices.

gilbert_and_sullivan

Be careful of wht you wish for, it's only a matter of time till road pricing comes in...and the perfect citizen monitoring system with gps.

bigmaz

I have a similar view to the OP. I think I have actually posted a similar comment on here somewhere. Its all well and good the people replying to this saying there are cheap cars out there for £35 per year tax.... But "cheap" is relative.... Not everyone can afford these cars, and are therefore discriminated against.

arielcohen

With most newer cars having lower emission its just a matter of time before they notice that Road tax isnt giving them as much money as it used to and then they will just find another way to make up for the diffrance. Road pricing seems like the next step for them.

Though in my opinion road pricing is very similar to just increasing fuel duty as both work they same way...the more you drive the more you pay, just fuel duty will take into account emission as the lest efficient your car is the more you pay for the distance you travel. Maybe with all the gps data your car will collect their wont be any more disputes when some idiot decides to hit a stationary car and then go on to tell the insurance that it was partially his fault, and that you were moving.

Hammyman

attila_ wrote: »

£290 a year means you have a guzzler. The tax is to incentivise public to to use lower carbon emitting vehicles: not a discrimination against gas guzzlers.

Oh. Dear. Low carbon emissions does not equal better fuel economy.

Trebor16

knightstyle wrote: »

It is interesting to note that here in France they did away with the car tax as it was expensive to run and put a centime or two onto the fuel tax. Fuel is still cheaper than the UK, 1.109€ for 95 petrol and 1.279€ for diesel. Todays local prices.

I think your price for 95 octane unleaded is way out. When I was in France a year ago 95 octane was in the region of €1.30-1.35 per litre. It has gone up since then. France 24 reported that petrol had hit a record high of just over €1.50 in March, and while prices have dropped a bit since then they haven't fallen to €1.11.

The AA report for June lists 95 octane at €1.61 and diesel at €1.43.