Abolish car tax

saabsaab

In the context of an upcoming GE if a party was to include this on a manifesto would there be support?


Abolish car tax replace it with a flat registration yearly fee say 50 p.a. then transfer the shortfall onto fossil fuels at the pump. Much fairer the more you burn the more you pay. Overall there would be no loss to the exchequer. Could also apply to electricity. Much greener policy too..


Poll attached

AlfaZen

saabsaab wrote: »

In the context of an upcoming GE if a party was to include this on a manifesto would there be support?


Abolish car tax replace it with a flat registration yearly fee say 50 p.a. then transfer the shortfall onto fossil fuels at the pump. Much fairer the more you burn the more you pay. Overall there would be no loss to the exchequer. Could also apply to electricity. Much greener policy too..


Poll attached

Except they are pushing people away from fossil fuels so it would be a diminishing return over the next 10/20 years. This coupled with less spent on servicing (VAT) with EVs and the Government will be faced with a sizable hole in the take from Motorists. Watch them dream up new taxes the ensure the cost of owning a car EV or otherwise continues to get more expensive every year.

Early adopters may be saving now but that will change once the rest of us plebs are forced to move to EVs (if we can afford to).

colm_mcm

If you asked me last year when I was paying a lot for tax I would have said yes.

kuro2k

Government abolished the tax in the late 70's and added the cost to the price of fuel. Yay said everybody!!

The following year a nominal fee was introduced............ this nominal fee was increased in following budgets and later became motor tax

Do you really trust the government to not do the same thing again??

saabsaab

AlfaZen wrote: »

Except they are pushing people away from fossil fuels so it would be a diminishing return over the next 10/20 years. This coupled with less spent on servicing (VAT) with EVs and the Government will be faced with a sizable hole in the take from Motorists. Watch them dream up new taxes the ensure the cost of owning a car EV or otherwise continues to get more expensive every year.

Early adopters may be saving now but that will change once the rest of us plebs are forced to move to EVs (if we can afford to).

fair points but the electricity could also be taxed in the future and the the 50 could rise incrementally to cover any shortfalls. Would also promote less fuel use and the move to alternative travel.

kennethsmyth

saabsaab wrote: »

fair points but the electricity could also be taxed in the future and the the 50 could rise incrementally to cover any shortfalls. Would also promote less fuel use and the move to alternative travel.

Yep if you follow this through its a very good way of transferring over the costs to any type of motor vehicle as more people take up ev.

Standard rate of 100 for petrol
Standard rate of 200 for diesel
Standard rate of 50 for ev

Further % tax on petrol and diesel as needed to disincentivise fosil.

All of the above can be tweaked year on year to provide same taxation income to state.

saabsaab

kuro2k wrote: »

Government abolished the tax in the late 70's and added the cost to the price of fuel. Yay said everybody!!

The following year a nominal fee was introduced............ this nominal fee was increased in following budgets and later became motor tax

Do you really trust the government to not do the same thing again??

No. Putting the tax onto fuel wasn't tried before. Car tax was abolished on smaller engines from 1977.

Akabusi

The best we can hope for is the Tax we pay is spent wisely and efficiently. Sadly we are way off that, apparently there are plans for a dual carriageway between Castlebar and Westport, of all the infrastructure needed that would be well down my list.

CiniO

They've done it in Poland in mid 90's.
Abandoned motortax which was collected by local authorities, and instead government promisted to compensate local authorities with money collected from fuel tax.
Fuel tax wasn't rised though, so you can't say that cost of motortax for car owners was moved to fuel...

Seemed to work allright.

ednwireland

kennethsmyth wrote: »

Yep if you follow this through its a very good way of transferring over the costs to any type of motor vehicle as more people take up ev.

Standard rate of 100 for petrol
Standard rate of 200 for diesel
Standard rate of 50 for ev

Further % tax on petrol and diesel as needed to disincentivise fosil.

All of the above can be tweaked year on year to provide same taxation income to state.

great if you can afford a new car and screw everyone else! how about taxing electricity from home car chargers as we need to get all types of vehicles off the road

Tazio

...

EDIT' removed my own post.

kaahooters

your idea is bad, and you should feel bad.

itll go like this

"good news, were getting rid of car tax lads, but were gonna put 50cent on the price of pertol, diesel, green diesel, electricity and all home heating oils and cooking oils (cos daysuls can run on chip fat) to make up the shortfall. "

year two.

the short fall was greater then expected , so were introducing a levey on all vehicles of 1% the value of the vehicle to cover the shortfall"


year three,

2% this time guys,

ect ect ect.

leave it as it is ffs, your not an echonmist.

kennethsmyth

LIGHTNING wrote: »

So like when the Government told everybody to get environmentally friendly and get A tax band cars then two years later went "oh crap" and then upped the A tax band rate by like 50%?

The above structure would be known that it would move as the % of different types of cars are changed. People would not go into this blindly, it could actually be worked out in advance and spread over the 10 years to 2030.

Cee-Jay-Cee

I would be for a universal tax of €300 regardless of the type of car being used. It should be inclusive of all cars including pre-2008 cars where the government have already taken a huge wedge in tax My neighbour bought an Accord 2.2 diesel in 2006 and still has it, he renewed his insurance the other day as he has done every year since new. He has paid over €13,000 in tax since the car was new which is an absolute disgrace. He has more than paid his fair share in tax and at this stage pre 08 cars should be paying a flat rate of €300.

kennethsmyth

kaahooters wrote: »

your idea is bad, and you should feel bad.

itll go like this

"good news, were getting rid of car tax lads, but were gonna put 50cent on the price of pertol, diesel, green diesel, electricity and all home heating oils and cooking oils (cos daysuls can run on chip fat) to make up the shortfall. "

year two.

the short fall was greater then expected , so were introducing a levey on all vehicles of 1% the value of the vehicle to cover the shortfall"


year three,

2% this time guys,

ect ect ect.

leave it as it is ffs, your not an echonmist.

Nope, I'm not an "echonmist" or even an economist for that matter. However it cannot be left the same and the government WILL ensure they collect the same or more taxation from motor cars in the future one way or another. So why not have a logical progression that can be seen to move smoothly over the next 10 years and be amended % and rate each year.

kennethsmyth

Cee-Jay-Cee wrote: »

I would be for a universal tax of €300 regardless of the type of car being used. It should be inclusive of all cars including pre-2008 cars where the government have already taken a huge wedge in tax My neighbour bought an Accord 2.2 diesel in 2006 and still has it, he renewed his insurance the other day as he has done every year since new. He has paid over €13,000 in tax since the car was new which is an absolute disgrace. He has more than paid his fair share in tax and at this stage pre 08 cars should be paying a flat rate of €300.

Cant be universal as the idea is to encourage users to buy ev or at least change towards petrol/hybrid. Therefore there has to be a distinction in the fee to own a type of car.

kennethsmyth

LIGHTNING wrote: »

So like when the Government told everybody to get environmentally friendly and get A tax band cars then two years later went "oh crap" and then upped the A tax band rate by like 50%?

No matter what the government will seek to recoup the same or more taxation that motor tax etc. brings in now. Why not have an actual plan that is transparent and known to the public so they can see what will occur in the future and plan themselves accordingly.

BorneTobyWilde

Car is a car, people use what they have, the ones with bigger engines should have low tax as they burn more fuel, they pay more tax in long run.
Why it's the other way around I'll never know. Sad that the cancerous diesels are costing the health service millions, yet they won't lower petrol price to 1 euro as to encourage people to switch to a petrol.
Only in Ireland, all about the money.

kennethsmyth

ednwireland wrote: »

great if you can afford a new car and screw everyone else! how about taxing electricity from home car chargers as we need to get all types of vehicles off the road

Firstly, there are secondhand electric cars at present and additionally more will come online as the years progress.

Secondly due to our geographical layout of homes and our lack of public transport cars are a necessity to many in Ireland unless you live in major cities. To start reducing cars you have to start with putting the more economical and less polluting on the road and then reduce them over time as transport increases/ individual car ownership declines.

Regarding taxing electricity from home car chargers - not as simple as you think.
1. Electric cars maybe utilised in the future (near future as wallbox has just released a charge box that allows return of electricity to grid) to balance the power grid - they are essentially power storage when not in use.
2. A lot of electric car users have solar pv and do charge from this when available.
3. Most ev users charge at night when we are producing more power than we can use and in effect again are utilising electricity that would go to waste.

There are more reasons, electricity is electricity and already taxed etc.. but as you can see from above electric cars can actually help the power/pollution situation not just have more cars on the road.

And before anyone says it just moves the pollution to the plant, this is not a full truth, the plant is far more efficient at producing electricity with less pollution than thousands of petrol or diesel cars. Also again new houses and lots of retro fitted ones are installing solar pv so the actual pull on the grid will not be linear.

kennethsmyth

BorneTobyWilde wrote: »

Car is a car, people use what they have, the ones with bigger engines should have low tax as they burn more fuel, they pay more tax in long run.
Why it's the other way around I'll never know. Sad that the cancerous diesels are costing the health service millions, yet they won't lower petrol price to 1 euro as to encourage people to switch to a petrol.
Only in Ireland, all about the money.

I do not support the government but its simple maths that the state needs a certain income to support services (like councils with rates) and therefore a certain amount of taxation is always required hence they cannot lower the petrol price as more people moving to petrol would reduce the total taxation income.

Regarding bigger engines having lower tax, that makes no sense as in addition to not encouraging traveling by car by taxation on fuels they also want the actual cars to be more efficient and less polluting i.e. smaller engined (but size is not used for taxation anymore its co2 levels are) hence the tax on larger cars.

Larger cars are more efficient on certain roads such as motorways but most of our driving in ireland is town/city etc. so smaller engines suit better here.

saabsaab

A quick calculation would indicate an in crease of 9-15 cent per litre depending on the breaks. Not far off normal fuel price variations.

ELM327

It's been done once and they added it back.
On that basis, no.

saabsaab

ELM327 wrote: »

It's been done once and they added it back.
On that basis, no.

No, never tried before see one of the previous posts!

bazz26

Another year, another similar thread.

If they abolished motor tax then where would a good deal of revenue come from that is used to fund the public services, social welfare, etc? They would just increase the other taxes we pay such as PAYE, VAT, etc to make up the shortfall. And then as said they will just introduce it again anyway under some other name Moving it to fuel would just encourage mass fuel laundering.

_Kaiser_

Nope.. aside from the historical precedent, all this would do is punish those who are already spending a fortune commuting from a county or two away to Dublin, or who live rurally and similarly have no viable options but to drive everywhere.

Be grand for the enthusaiasts who want to run sportcars at the weekend, or the tree-hugging types, but those aren't reflective of the average road user in those scenarios.

Idbatterim

the vast majority of cars sold now, have as good as free motor tax!

sales of new diesel cars should be phased out by 2025 here at the latest in my opinion and no importing of them either. You should be able to reclaim vat on petrol, not just diesel. New taxis by 2023 or so, should only be electric if they are your every day saloon or hatchback, they offer incentives for cars that arent used typically 95% of the day. You'd wonder if it would make more sense to incentives or force high those doing high mileage, like taxis and chauffeurs to go electric...

the timelines here, are just so slow.

stimpson

Add in 3rd party insurance like in New Zealand and you have a deal.

saabsaab

bazz26 wrote: »

Another year, another similar thread.

If they abolished motor tax then where would a good deal of revenue come from that is used to fund the public services, social welfare, etc? They would just increase the other taxes we pay such as PAYE, VAT, etc to make up the shortfall. And then as said they will just introduce it again anyway under some other name Moving it to fuel would just encourage mass fuel laundering.

It would come from the extra price of fuel! Tailored to fit. Another benefit would be that untaxed cars etc would be caught up in the net. Our C & E could be expanded as there would be savings in admin in road tax sections the local authorities.

Idbatterim

kennethsmyth wrote: »

Yep if you follow this through its a very good way of transferring over the costs to any type of motor vehicle as more people take up ev.

Standard rate of 100 for petrol
Standard rate of 200 for diesel
Standard rate of 50 for ev

Further % tax on petrol and diesel as needed to disincentivise fosil.

All of the above can be tweaked year on year to provide same taxation income to state.

I honestly think the minimum motor tax for a diesel should be E500 for new cars. It would stop people buying them and destroying the environment, to save a pittance on fuel and then often suffer diesel issues, that are costly to repair, issues often caused, because they do low mileage. So they save virtually nothing on fuel anyway. But its awful for public health. the entire situation around diesel has been a disgrace!

if the actually cared about the environment, they would massively increase motor tax on fossil fuels. Ireland doesnt have a motor industry like germany and japan etc. Nodoby has to buy a new car and 99. something percent of cars on the road are totally unremakrable anyway!

People biggest decision to change , is influenced by what a number on a plaster sticker on a piece of plastic , displayed on the front and rear of the car says...

saabsaab

stimpson wrote: »

Add in 3rd party insurance like in New Zealand and you have a deal.

We could look at that too!

stimpson

saabsaab wrote: »

there would be savings in admin in road tax sections the local authorities.

:pac:

Cee-Jay-Cee

kennethsmyth wrote: »

Cant be universal as the idea is to encourage users to buy ev or at least change towards petrol/hybrid. Therefore there has to be a distinction in the fee to own a type of car.

That may have been the case years ago however it no longer applies as the car manufacturers themselves are dropping diesel cars from their line ups and moving to hybrids and EVs so in less than a decade diesels will no longer be an option. And people wont automatically go out and buy a new car just because the tax is cheap if they cant afford to buy a new car in the first place, people drive what they can afford. Tax should have no bearing on it. A universal tax would probably yield as much in returns as the current two-tier fcuked up system where the poorest are hammered and the richest awarded.

bazz26

saabsaab wrote: »

It would come from the extra price of fuel! Tailored to fit. Another benefit would be that untaxed cars etc would be caught up in the net. Our C & E could be expanded as there would be savings in admin in road tax sections the local authorities.

No it wouldn't really, as I said in the rest of my thread, pushing it on fuel will just encourage more and more fuel laundering as those who avoid taxing their car would probably be the first to seek out cheap laundered fuel too. You would also have droves driving over the border every day from nearby border counties just to fill up with cheaper fuel up North so avoiding any tax down here.

Idbatterim

Its a pity that countries with ambition and who care for the enviroment, dont tell them diesel are done, way before 2030. because its the big markets they care about. If germany banned them, the us dont buy them, the uk ban them in many cities, like other countries, it might not make sense to keep producing them, in europe at least. of course a fortune has been spent on diesel and diesel technology, nowhere more so than germany presumably. would be great to see them banned, way before the irish timescale...

Idbatterim

bazz26 wrote: »

No it wouldn't really, as I said in the rest of my thread, pushing it on fuel will just encourage more and more fuel laundering as those who avoid taxing their car would probably be the first to seek out cheap laundered fuel too. You would also have droves driving over the border every day from nearby border counties just to fill up with cheaper fuel up North so avoiding any tax down here.

yeah unless you came to an all island agreement. Ill tell you what, drop motor tax and have fuel E2 a litre or higher, youd see a big difference in driving patters...

kennethsmyth

Cee-Jay-Cee wrote: »

That may have been the case years ago however it no longer applies as the car manufacturers themselves are dropping diesel cars from their line ups and moving to hybrids and EVs so in less than a decade diesels will no longer be an option. And people wont automatically go out and buy a new car just because the tax is cheap if they cant afford to buy a new car in the first place, people drive what they can afford. Tax should have no bearing on it. A universal tax would probably yield as much in returns as the current two-tier fcuked up system where the poorest are hammered and the richest awarded.

Agree to a point (i have an 07 1.8 civic on old tax system and also an electric car so see both points).

We still need to incentivise electric over hybrid to bring emmissions down dramatically, so there has to be additional benefits to purchaser. See Norway as an example. Our government on the other hand is reducing benefits before there is any critical mass at all. (3.8k seai grant for businesses was taken away)

Blut2

kennethsmyth wrote: »

Yep if you follow this through its a very good way of transferring over the costs to any type of motor vehicle as more people take up ev.

Standard rate of 100 for petrol
Standard rate of 200 for diesel
Standard rate of 50 for ev

Further % tax on petrol and diesel as needed to disincentivise fosil.

All of the above can be tweaked year on year to provide same taxation income to state.

Thats a good, simple plan.

100e for EV
250e for petrol
500e for diesel

is probably better/more realistic though. More revenue raised for the exchequer, a reasonable minimum level (100e a year is fair for EVs), and enough of a difference in pricing to discourage diesel purchases for people unless they actually drive enough miles to make it worthwhile. ie fewer diesel SUVs driving around Dublin on the school run.

They're going to have to revamp the current system ether way, given there are so many modern diesels on the roads now and they're so undertaxed.

bazz26

Idbatterim wrote: »

yeah unless you came to an all island agreement. Ill tell you what, drop motor tax and have fuel E2 a litre or higher, youd see a big difference in driving patters...

That's all good from the perspective of those who do feck all driving, it makes little difference to them. But adding additional hardship to people who have to commute long distances to work is not a solution. Taxing your way out of a crisis is both lazy and not the answer.

kuro2k

saabsaab wrote: »

No. Putting the tax onto fuel wasn't tried before. Car tax was abolished on smaller engines from 1977.

An additional charge was put onto the cost of fuel when the tax was abolished

saabsaab

kuro2k wrote: »

An additional charge was put onto the cost of fuel when the tax was abolished

Not in proportion to the tax lost.

saabsaab

bazz26 wrote: »

That's all good from the perspective of those who do feck all driving, it makes little difference to them. But adding additional hardship to people who have to commute long distances to work is not a solution. Taxing your way out of a crisis is both lazy and not the answer.

How do we reduce the dependence on fossil fuels? Encourage a switch to electric or fuel efficient vehicles. I would say extra excise duties is part of the answer.

fergus1001

Akabusi wrote: »

The best we can hope for is the Tax we pay is spent wisely and efficiently. Sadly we are way off that, apparently there are plans for a dual carriageway between Castlebar and Westport, of all the infrastructure needed that would be well down my list.

and Michel Ring is going to call it after himself apearantly " The Ring Road"

Idbatterim

bazz26 wrote: »

That's all good from the perspective of those who do feck all driving, it makes little difference to them. But adding additional hardship to people who have to commute long distances to work is not a solution. Taxing your way out of a crisis is both lazy and not the answer.

creating rip off housing, forcing people into commutes or to save a small bit on their mortgage, to spend that amount on a car with big depreciation , finance, tolls potentially and fuel costs etc aswell. Is just idiocy...

kuro2k

saabsaab wrote: »

Not in proportion to the tax lost.

That's why they increased in charge in every single budget after. I believe they told people that they were introducing the small charge to cover admin cost... HA HA!!!!!

If the Government drop motor tax and put it on the cost of fuel, they WILL reintroduce motor tax at a later date and we will be back where we started.

I'm not really sure why you don't understand this

is_that_so

saabsaab wrote: »

It would come from the extra price of fuel! Tailored to fit. Another benefit would be that untaxed cars etc would be caught up in the net. Our C & E could be expanded as there would be savings in admin in road tax sections the local authorities.

It's well over €1 billion and how exactly would councils maintain their section of the roads? It's a non-runner anyway because any party worth their salt would bring up 1977 and we've become a lot more clued into blatant gift horses and election buying.

Idbatterim

the car manufactures have been massive benefactors, first of all diesel is the dream fuel and given very preferential treatment, people buy them in their droves. Then its found out to be the demon fuel and there will be a big push to PHEV and BEV... At least BEV is the endgame...

is_that_so

Beneficiaries - people who benefit. Benefactors support you financially and are nice to you!:D

Chippy01

kuro2k wrote: »

Government abolished the tax in the late 70's and added the cost to the price of fuel. Yay said everybody!!

The following year a nominal fee was introduced............ this nominal fee was increased in following budgets and later became motor tax

Do you really trust the government to not do the same thing again??

I remember that.
No more ROAD tax they said, we'll just put 'x' amount onto the cost of the fuel so that the more you fuel you use, the more 'road tax' you will pay.
BUT, to keep track of the amount of vehicles on the roads, we will introduce a £5 per vehicle 'registration fee'.

That £5 went to £10, then to £20.
Then they introduced the old engine sized MOTOR tax. And the rest is history.
Feckers never took the road tax back off of the fuel when they introduced the motor tax, did they?
So now we pay twice for the same thing.

saabsaab

is_that_so wrote: »

It's well over €1 billion and how exactly would councils maintain their section of the roads? It's a non-runner anyway because any party worth their salt would bring up 1977 and we've become a lot more clued into blatant gift horses and election buying.

The money would be raised through fuel excise. 1977 wasn't the same and is forgotten by most. Anyway the poll is showing a large number are in favour!

Silent Running

Electric car driver here. Fire away and put the motor tax on fuel.

saabsaab

The polluter pays principle and carbon fines would favour this type of system. Not only that but it is fairer the more fuel and road you use the more you pay!