New VED from April 2017

Norman_Castle

Joe_Horner wrote: »

The ironic part is that the pedants, in this case, are actually wrong in their pedantry because "road tax" is, demonstrably, a perfectly valid (if informal) description of it.

It makes those who insist on "correcting" the term at ever opportunity look really rather foolish

The ironic part is repeatedly insisting VED is really a road tax is pedantic.

marlot

King_Nothing wrote: »

I think the current system is rubbish and punitive, I have to pay £290 to use my car on the road, meanwhile someone else with a different car only has to pay £30 and could be doing three times the mileage that I'm doing.

Let's say you do 10,000 miles a year, and the other person does 30,000. And both cars do 30mpg.

You will use about 333 gallons a year, or just over 1500 litres. You'll spend £1665 on fuel, of which around £1180 is tax (fuel duty + VAT).

Your friend uses 1000 gallons a year, or just over 4500 litres. He spends just under £5k on fuel, of which around £3540 is tax.

Adding in the road tax, you spend £1470 in tax. He spends £3570.

The road tax matters, but not by as much as you might think. If it were down to me, I'd scrap it altogether and put the cost onto fuel.

Norman_Castle

^VED exists to encourage buyers to choose cleaner cars. If it was added to the fuel cost it could encourage purchasing more economical cars but these may not be the cleanest.

Personally, if emissions could be kept low, I'd prefer it to be added to fuel costs. This would possibly help reduce congestion but would add to business costs.

facade

The present system is based on CO2 emissions, which are inversely proportional to mpg, so the £30 car will do a lot more mpg, and use a lot less fuel than the £290 car.

It won't be 13:1 but it might be 2:1, as £30 is 111-120g/km and £290 is 201-225g/km

So it halves what the friend spends.

Low VED is a win/win situation

marlot

facade wrote: »

The present system is based on CO2 emissions, which are inversely proportional to mpg, so the £30 car will do a lot more mpg, and use a lot less fuel than the £290 car...

True to a point. As long as the CO2 levels reflect real life. But to me there is a bigger and bigger divergence.


On my car the manufacturer halved the VED rating of later cars by putting a thinner oil in the gearbox and diff. It looks better on paper, but in the real world there is absolutely no difference.

Joe_Horner

Norman_Castle wrote: »

^VED exists to encourage buyers to choose cleaner cars. If it was added to the fuel cost it could encourage purchasing more economical cars but these may not be the cleanest.

"Cleaner" in the sense that VED is calculated means less CO2 per km. That is the only "pollution" that the banding considers.

But CO2 per km is exactly the same as fuel economy, just expressed in different units. So, tes, the more economical car will be "cleaner" as far as road tax banding is concerned.

Your statement is like saying "well, he was speeding in MPH but he might not have been in KPH".