Road tax

[gumby6371]

Just been thinking about the current road tax bands while giving my two penneth on another post, are they fixed for a certain period of time?

At some point there will be so many low or zero tax eco boxes on our roads the government will be forced to scrap the current scheme as there won't be enough revenue coming in. Hiking up the cost of less efficient models would force people to buy the eco version and make the problem even worse.

Not really expecting any solid answers on this one but thought I'd post the question anyway.

[Welly]

That's an interesting point. You know it's all bollocks though, whatever the Tax man giveth on one hand he taketh away on the other.

How short-sighted is it when they believe churning out low-tax motors is more environmentally friendly than improving our roads or public transport systems. I'd be delighted to travel on a low-cost CLEAN bus to work if there was one.

Under the current system it would follow that old motors' Road Tax would continue to rise until many will be forced into a 'greener' car, a sad day indeed.

Until then all I can repeat is the knowledge my Mother imparted on me in 2009.........EAT MY 208g/km BUSWANKERS.

[rwb]

There are already two lettering systems, depending on the year the car was manufactured -- IIRC if you're after a V6 407 then you get really stung for tax if it's a later one.

I expect that they'll re-shuffle the letter boundaries again soon.

A problem with low car tax is that it makes it more feasible to own a car that does very few miles, yet people who do few miles are the most likely to be able to manage without a car, and the easiest to price off the road... if that's what you want (rather than what you say you want in case there are any tree huggers or militant cyclists listening...)

Or do they want us to buy lots of new cars on finance to fuel economic recover? Buying things you can't afford is always a recipe for success.

If I ruled the World then car tax would be about £500/year and inlcude 3rd party insurance.

[rwb]

Until then all I can repeat is the knowledge my Mother imparted on me in 2009.........EAT MY 208g/km BUSWANKERS.

[Rolebama]

I think they have the free tax eco thing sorted. Those of us who pay tax will lose a month at selling time, and another month when we tax the replacement. It seems that as of October tax will not be transferrable to new owners. That will make them an extra few quid.
I have also noticed over the last years that there are more traffic lights, with oddball phase changes, and mini-roundabouts cropping up which seem to serve no real purpose other than to cause us to stop and wait with engines running, or, in the case of roundabouts, at least have to slow and accelerate again. FWIW as an example, before the M25 it used to take me an hour to get to what is now J6 of the M25. Using the same route today, after an hour's driving I am not even a third of the way there. Naturally, this is blamed on congestion, but there is no congestion other than what is caused by traffic lights forming 'convoys'.

[Doggy]

The development I'm most conscious of the the increasing number of trucks sticking to the single carriageway speed limit of 40 mph, (which hasn't changed for years, but now that we have GPS-linked tachograph spy technology, operators are 'enforcing' the rules to save fuel).

This leads to more convoys as it's not easy to overtake a gaggle of say two trucks and four cars.*

* unless one has warp drive available.