Proportional Car Tax - based on CO2 AND Mileage per year
Discussion
For so many people out there who are Petrolheads, the dream of owning a sporty weekend car is impossible due to the high CO2 only VED UK car tax.
An example would be a 10 year old Porsche Boxter 3.2 - a phenomenal car which is now within the grasp of so many people second hand, but ludicrously expensive to tax. My local council is now even linking our parking permits to the car's CO2 band.
My thought - any car which is MOT eligible should have it's yearly mileage captured as part of the MOT. You are then proportionally taxed for your net CO2 emissions based on your car's CO2 band, but more importantly according to the actual mileage you have done in the car.
Surely someone must have realised that the guy mini-cabbing his Prius 30,000 miles a year is emitting more CO2 than me doing 5000 miles in my 3.2 V6.
Let's start a campaign!
An example would be a 10 year old Porsche Boxter 3.2 - a phenomenal car which is now within the grasp of so many people second hand, but ludicrously expensive to tax. My local council is now even linking our parking permits to the car's CO2 band.
My thought - any car which is MOT eligible should have it's yearly mileage captured as part of the MOT. You are then proportionally taxed for your net CO2 emissions based on your car's CO2 band, but more importantly according to the actual mileage you have done in the car.
Surely someone must have realised that the guy mini-cabbing his Prius 30,000 miles a year is emitting more CO2 than me doing 5000 miles in my 3.2 V6.
Let's start a campaign!
WW79 said:
For so many people out there who are Petrolheads, the dream of owning a sporty weekend car is impossible due to the high CO2 only VED UK car tax.
An example would be a 10 year old Porsche Boxter 3.2 - a phenomenal car which is now within the grasp of so many people second hand, but ludicrously expensive to tax.
Hardly "ludicrously expensive". A 2008 Boxster 2.9 would be £315/year, and a 3.4 S would be £540. Compare to the rest of the running costs, and it's not ridiculous at all. If you want a Boxy, but want to pay less, then anything 2001-2005 would be £315, and anything pre-01 would be £255. Bargain!An example would be a 10 year old Porsche Boxter 3.2 - a phenomenal car which is now within the grasp of so many people second hand, but ludicrously expensive to tax.
WW79 said:
My local council is now even linking our parking permits to the car's CO2 band.
Lemme guess... London? Wonder what insurance for a Boxster in London is, compared to that VED...?WW79 said:
My thought - any car which is MOT eligible should have it's yearly mileage captured as part of the MOT. You are then proportionally taxed for your net CO2 emissions based on your car's CO2 band, but more importantly according to the actual mileage you have done in the car.
I've got an even better idea... There's a really easy way to sort a per-mile tax element that's also economy/efficiency dependent... Put some tax on fuel!Oh, wait a sec. There's already about 80p/litre of tax... Maybe you're actually arguing for something that already exists, then?
S11Steve said:
If I'm in the position to buy a £15-20k weekend toy, then a maximum VED of £550 per year is not a huge sum in comparison to likely fuel, servicing and insurance costs.
Crazy isn't it. I don't know why they don't scrap VED and just have fuel duty, would save a fortune in administration. Now that MoT and insurance are all on easily accessible databases that could be used by ANPR to pull people I can't see any benefit in it.RizzoTheRat said:
Crazy isn't it. I don't know why they don't scrap VED and just have fuel duty, would save a fortune in administration.
Because it's a nice easy annual check on whether the keeper details are "live", and a nice easy "Is this car on the road?" for comparing to the insurance db.It's also a nice easy way to "nudge" buyer behaviour and preferences...
RizzoTheRat said:
S11Steve said:
If I'm in the position to buy a £15-20k weekend toy, then a maximum VED of £550 per year is not a huge sum in comparison to likely fuel, servicing and insurance costs.
Crazy isn't it. I don't know why they don't scrap VED and just have fuel duty, would save a fortune in administration. Now that MoT and insurance are all on easily accessible databases that could be used by ANPR to pull people I can't see any benefit in it.I would go the way that Belgium went, have a number plate that goes with the driver, not the car.
TooMany2cvs said:
Because it's a nice easy annual check on whether the keeper details are "live", and a nice easy "Is this car on the road?" for comparing to the insurance db...
Couldn't that be worked out from the insurance and MoT databases though? I suppose VED expiring without a SORN is an easy way to flag it up though.S11Steve said:
This does puzzle me somewhat.
If I'm in the position to buy a £15-20k weekend toy, then a maximum VED of £550 per year is not a huge sum in comparison to likely fuel, servicing and insurance costs.
That's not entirely true. The £20k is in an asset and if you've bought wisely, you can get the money back by selling it. If I'm in the position to buy a £15-20k weekend toy, then a maximum VED of £550 per year is not a huge sum in comparison to likely fuel, servicing and insurance costs.
Fuel and servicing depends on how much you use the car, and for the latter, whether you do it yourself or take it to a main dealer for the stamp. You can make those costs whatever you like.
Insurance is based on risk. For an older driver with a clean record the insurance is going to be less than £300 - but that is small fry on the off chance you crash into a Chiron and the insurer has to foot the bill, so you're paying for a service that has value.
That £550 is just a random figure and serves no obvious purpose. It doesn't matter how safe or dangerous you are, how much the car is worth, how much you use it - it's just an arbitrary number and difficult to explain. I get that it is based on emissions, but if it's only used one weekend a year then it's out of proportion. And if road tax is spent on road maintenence, then what has emissions got to do with having to resurface a road? It's the volume and type of traffic that's the problem there, not the gases coming out of the exhaust.
The comment regarding admin costs is a valid one too. Why have an office and a load of employees responsible for car tax when you could tack it onto something more meaningful and cut costs along the way?
£550 is quite a lot of money when it's not applied in a meaningful way.
Brainpox said:
That's not entirely true. The £20k is in an asset and if you've bought wisely, you can get the money back by selling it.
A 10yo Boxy still has a good chunk of depreciation ahead of it. Cheapest 2008 on Autotrader are £10k+, with only the scrattiest <£12k. Plenty of original Boxies <£5k, with the scratters <£3k. There's even one <£2k...They're numerous enough that it'll be a while before they start to appreciate.
TooMany2cvs said:
I've got an even better idea... There's a really easy way to sort a per-mile tax element that's also economy/efficiency dependent... Put some tax on fuel!
Oh, wait a sec. There's already about 80p/litre of tax... Maybe you're actually arguing for something that already exists, then?
This - the amount of CO2 coming out of the back is directly proportional to the amount of fuel you put in.Oh, wait a sec. There's already about 80p/litre of tax... Maybe you're actually arguing for something that already exists, then?
Brainpox said:
That's not entirely true. The £20k is in an asset and if you've bought wisely, you can get the money back by selling it.
Fuel and servicing depends on how much you use the car, and for the latter, whether you do it yourself or take it to a main dealer for the stamp. You can make those costs whatever you like.
Insurance is based on risk. For an older driver with a clean record the insurance is going to be less than £300 - but that is small fry on the off chance you crash into a Chiron and the insurer has to foot the bill, so you're paying for a service that has value.
That £550 is just a random figure and serves no obvious purpose. It doesn't matter how safe or dangerous you are, how much the car is worth, how much you use it - it's just an arbitrary number and difficult to explain. I get that it is based on emissions, but if it's only used one weekend a year then it's out of proportion. And if road tax is spent on road maintenence, then what has emissions got to do with having to resurface a road? It's the volume and type of traffic that's the problem there, not the gases coming out of the exhaust.
The comment regarding admin costs is a valid one too. Why have an office and a load of employees responsible for car tax when you could tack it onto something more meaningful and cut costs along the way?
£550 is quite a lot of money when it's not applied in a meaningful way.
Nobody has ever suggested that the revenue raised via VED (even if it is exclusively spent on road maninteneace, which I’m not convinced it is) has to be raised via who uses the roads the most. Few other taxes are raised based on how much you use a particular service. For example, I don’t pay less “education tax” because I don’t have any kids in school. Fuel and servicing depends on how much you use the car, and for the latter, whether you do it yourself or take it to a main dealer for the stamp. You can make those costs whatever you like.
Insurance is based on risk. For an older driver with a clean record the insurance is going to be less than £300 - but that is small fry on the off chance you crash into a Chiron and the insurer has to foot the bill, so you're paying for a service that has value.
That £550 is just a random figure and serves no obvious purpose. It doesn't matter how safe or dangerous you are, how much the car is worth, how much you use it - it's just an arbitrary number and difficult to explain. I get that it is based on emissions, but if it's only used one weekend a year then it's out of proportion. And if road tax is spent on road maintenence, then what has emissions got to do with having to resurface a road? It's the volume and type of traffic that's the problem there, not the gases coming out of the exhaust.
The comment regarding admin costs is a valid one too. Why have an office and a load of employees responsible for car tax when you could tack it onto something more meaningful and cut costs along the way?
£550 is quite a lot of money when it's not applied in a meaningful way.
Gavia said:
Nobody has ever suggested that the revenue raised via VED (even if it is exclusively spent on road maninteneace, which I’m not convinced it is) has to be raised via who uses the roads the most. Few other taxes are raised based on how much you use a particular service. For example, I don’t pay less “education tax” because I don’t have any kids in school.
Which adds to the randomness of it. It's not a tax for anything in particular, it's just a random number that happens to go up every year for no reason.Brainpox said:
And if road tax is spent on road maintenence, then what has emissions got to do with having to resurface a road?
It's not - VED goes straight into the general taxation pot. It's got no link to the car other than the government would like to change behaviours of the populace at large from driving high-emissions cars to lower ones.My VED for a 2007 5.4 litre estate car is £540, which is ~£100 more than the annual insurance
However, the tank costs £90 to fill and gets you ~200 miles, so I'd expect to drive around 5,000 miles over the year, which likely to cost me £2,250 in fuel.
VED doesn't really concern me, in light of that.
(I'm not going to talk about the maintenance costs, which are fierce currently).
TooMany2cvs said:
WW79 said:
My local council is now even linking our parking permits to the car's CO2 band.
Lemme guess... London? Wonder what insurance for a Boxster in London is, compared to that VED...?Brainpox said:
Which adds to the randomness of it. It's not a tax for anything in particular, it's just a random number that happens to go up every year for no reason.
It's hardly random. It's a tax on having a vehicle on the road. The amount varies depending on engine size, emissions, emissions-and-new-price, depending on age. It then goes up every year in the budget roughly by inflation (to the nearest round number).TooMany2cvs said:
It's hardly random. It's a tax on having a vehicle on the road. The amount varies depending on engine size, emissions, emissions-and-new-price, depending on age. It then goes up every year in the budget roughly by inflation (to the nearest round number).
It's random in that there's no reason for the tax to be set at the levels it is set at. Emissions are measured in the amount of gas released over a certain distance, implying the figure is irrelevant unless there is a distance applied. Therefore it should be linked to how much the car is used and not just the fact it has a big thirsty engine in it.Brainpox said:
It's random in that there's no reason for the tax to be set at the levels it is set at.
In that case, EVERY tax is "random".Brainpox said:
Emissions are measured in the amount of gas released over a certain distance, implying the figure is irrelevant unless there is a distance applied. Therefore it should be linked to how much the car is used and not just the fact it has a big thirsty engine in it.
And vehicle taxation is also based on the amount of fuel used, which is directly linked to both amount of use and efficiency. Two for one!Brainpox said:
It's random in that there's no reason for the tax to be set at the levels it is set at. Emissions are measured in the amount of gas released over a certain distance, implying the figure is irrelevant unless there is a distance applied. Therefore it should be linked to how much the car is used and not just the fact it has a big thirsty engine in it.
Do you somehow see 22% income tax as consistent, or VAT at 20% or IPT at 12%. What about the tax on Scotch which is much higher than other alcoholic drinks. Why isn’t that random?All tax is just an amount that gets added into the pot and ideally is enough to fund all the state services and pay back some of the national debt. Your argument is the only thing that’s truly random here.
Nope, VED is not that expensive and so should not change.
Certainly don't want it added to fuel prices, they are high enough already. Any excuse to add to the cost of fuel should be dissuaded fiercely. Tax and Vat is enough as it is, if VED is added to fuel it would never be done proportionately, it would most certainly be more than we pay now for most of us and punish those that cannot use alternatives.
Increasing the cost of fuel will also push up the prices of everything else, unless you then implement a system whereby haulage don't pay the extra tax, but that means more administration and more complexity in a system.
Sooner or later a whole new taxation system based around electric cars is going to be needed, so why much about with the current one too much.
Certainly don't want it added to fuel prices, they are high enough already. Any excuse to add to the cost of fuel should be dissuaded fiercely. Tax and Vat is enough as it is, if VED is added to fuel it would never be done proportionately, it would most certainly be more than we pay now for most of us and punish those that cannot use alternatives.
Increasing the cost of fuel will also push up the prices of everything else, unless you then implement a system whereby haulage don't pay the extra tax, but that means more administration and more complexity in a system.
Sooner or later a whole new taxation system based around electric cars is going to be needed, so why much about with the current one too much.
WW79 said:
For so many people out there who are Petrolheads, the dream of owning a sporty weekend car is impossible due to the high CO2 only VED UK car tax.
An example would be a 10 year old Porsche Boxter 3.2 - a phenomenal car which is now within the grasp of so many people second hand, but ludicrously expensive to tax. My local council is now even linking our parking permits to the car's CO2 band.
My thought - any car which is MOT eligible should have it's yearly mileage captured as part of the MOT. You are then proportionally taxed for your net CO2 emissions based on your car's CO2 band, but more importantly according to the actual mileage you have done in the car.
Surely someone must have realised that the guy mini-cabbing his Prius 30,000 miles a year is emitting more CO2 than me doing 5000 miles in my 3.2 V6.
Let's start a campaign!
Far easier - remove all VED for any petrol/diesel cars and put it all on fuel, you want to do a million miles in a Nissan Bluebird go right ahead and we'll cash in on the tax, do 500 miles a year in a Cobra V8 that'll be pennies to HMRC then.An example would be a 10 year old Porsche Boxter 3.2 - a phenomenal car which is now within the grasp of so many people second hand, but ludicrously expensive to tax. My local council is now even linking our parking permits to the car's CO2 band.
My thought - any car which is MOT eligible should have it's yearly mileage captured as part of the MOT. You are then proportionally taxed for your net CO2 emissions based on your car's CO2 band, but more importantly according to the actual mileage you have done in the car.
Surely someone must have realised that the guy mini-cabbing his Prius 30,000 miles a year is emitting more CO2 than me doing 5000 miles in my 3.2 V6.
Let's start a campaign!
Anything pure EV would need to be taxed via another route.
Mileages can and would be altered in your system imho
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