Wednesday, Apr 30, 2008
The AA: Negative equity not just on your home
Times: Secret tax adds £200 to cost of running family cars
More great news for Gordon as yet another tax marketing gaffe hits the road - so to speak.
"The AA said that many people were falling into a “negative equity” trap, with their cars worth thousands of pounds less than outstanding loans"
Posted by growler @ 09:23 AM (687 views) Add Comment
22 Comments
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1. uncle tom said...
Tthe high band threshold is 225g and my Audi A4 is 227g...
...happy? - me? - not!!
2. p. doff said...
UT
Is that the 3.2FSI Multitronic then? You'll have to change it for a 3.0 TDI quattro manual for virtually the same performance but only 204g/km.
3. Duncan said...
205 doesn't sound too good considering the band below is 200 to 225
My Vectra is 202 :-( At least it is paid for :-)
I wonder how long it will be before all new cars are sitting just below a threshold.
Its as bad as stamp duty.
:- Duncan
4. uncle tom said...
Just a humble 2.5Tdi Quattro SE Auto - and it's four years old..
5. ontheotherhand said...
I have a dented 2003 people carrier for moving my family around. The reason I bought the people carrier is that the government made it law for every child to have a booster seat and they just don't fit a normal car. This extra £200 is on top of the £25 new 'congestion' charge for driving accross the river in London. Clearly working nuclear families are not welcome in London.
6. renting2 said...
On the contrary ontheotherhand, working nuclear families are more than welcome in London, as long as you bring all your dosh with you!
7. waiting for the crash said...
A another very stealthy tax!
Will the sheeple wake up to this Labour govt and will any real opposition emerge?
I have a 10 year old car, so not paying this tax this time round and I don't buy new cars for reasons all to do with price and maintainability.
8. tyrellcorporation said...
I have a Saab estate (2002) and it comes in at 202g (just over the 200g threshold). I'm fuming as I do about 5000 miles a year and my tax will rise by about 30% YOY. In fact I'm tempted to get something a bit more powerful and polluting to take it to just under the threshold for the next band.
9. also sold to rent said...
Just swap to a Prius and road tax is £35. Or a VW polo bluemotion and it's nowt. These 'feebate' style taxes are essential to reduce transport emissions. However, me thinks they should be applied to the cost of the new car rather than the road tax. That way the whole vehicle fleet becomes more efficient over time. See http://www.oilendgame.com/pdfs/Implementation/WtOEg_FeebatesUpdate.pdf for a lengthy and dull explanation, or just google 'feebate'.
10. renting2 said...
Once they've forced the cars in the higher tax bands off the road, they'll have to tax something else. Probably the very cars they're giving tax breaks for at the moment.
11. Green Clay Duck said...
ontheotherhand: children aged 3 and over do not have to sit on a booster chair if the car does not have room for a third booster chair. They can use just the normal seat belt.
From:
http://www.thinkroadsafety.gov.uk/campaigns/childcarseats/childcarseats.htm
"The child must use adult belt if the correct child restraint is not available as follows:
- in a licensed taxi or private hire vehicle; or
- for a short distance in an unexpected necessity; or
- two occupied child restraints prevent fitment of a third."
12. tyrellcorporation said...
The Chinese, Indians and emerging economies must be laughing their socks off at us idiots taxing ourselves into oblivion.
13. Brownisarobbinggit said...
Hide behind the green issues and introduce another tax -my family has voted labour forever - labour fear the` time for a change movement `- well Mr Brown and and his evil little Darling we are off to the Blues - enjoy your lack of mandate leadership whilst it lasts you will go down as the worst prime minister in history , you rob form the people who voted you in and give to the super rich - line your pockets when you have gone with your speeches etc etc - but with no amount of cash will you be able to erase your stain from this country. Without Tony to keep you right you are exposed as the fraud you have always been.
14. also sold to rent said...
renting2, that is exactly right. Feebates should be based on average emissions, so once the most polluting cars are gone the average goes down, so then the next most polluting get a fee, and the most efficient cars still get a rebate. It's genius, but does get labelled as 'meddling' with free markets. However, markets are rarely as 'free' in reality as they are in theory, as recent housing market spin has shown.
15. geed said...
8. also sold to rent said...
It’s not the practical implications that are at debate here, it is the moral issue of taxing road users to the high hilt. Commercial passenger planes spew out tons of CO2 emissions, but they get subsidised fuel. If the government was as serious about the environment as it is making money out of its countries people, it would want to be seen ploughing any extra revenue on road tax and fuels into developing alternative methods of propulsion and subsidising the train network. Our train network is the laughing stock of the world and stupidly expensive to use.
Instead this extra revenue will be used to balance the books after bailing out NR and supplying these dodgy banks with relief loans.
The motorist is the easiest target in this country as driving a car is now considered anti-social behaviour. However, the modern UK motor industry is one of the most forward thinking, innovative sectors of engineering and has contributed greatly to the overall reduction in emissions. Legislation in Europe is strict and ever tightening and governs a number of different emissions and not just the well known CO2 gas. On top of this many vehicles now built are almost totally recyclable when they have reached the end of service.
The revenue the government already gets could go to the many universities and research facilities in the UK that specialise in modern Automotive Engineering, yes that’s right, we may not own any car companies anymore but we still are one of the leading engineering development centres in the world – no thanks to this government.
Once the public transport is modernised (including the introduction of a network of bike paths), any extra taxes gained from the motorist should be used to develop incentives to use these systems. It common sense really but the powers that be are too busy meddling with corporate banking and trying to prop up the housing bubble…..
Rant over for now
16. geed said...
.............Oh and would happily use trains and my bike for the weekly commute and keep my Nissan GTR (I wish) for weekend fun, I used to to do it when I lived in OZ and felt like I was thoroughly justified in owning a car ( it was actuallly a big 4wd used for camping) for pleasure when I used it so little during the week.
17. renting2 said...
You have to tax bad things like cars, alcohol, tobacco and work.
Trouble is that taxing it hasn't actually stopped it, or even dented it much (I suspect health issues forced tobacco use down, not tax).
Ergo, if taxing it doesn't stop it, then it's a failed strategy that we should fight to have removed.
If they didn't tax these things so much, maybe they'd be forced to raise the money by taxing the real culprits properly, ie the people we complain about on this site!
18. growler said...
I have to hand it to Gordo. If you really want to upset people through rising inflation, expensive/tighter loans, negative PR on the taxation, house price crashes, lack of control of banks and buuilding societies - you couldn't really do a better job. So with the house likely losing you money and now your car (you can't afford to change) as a daily reminder of the mess we're in.... All we need now is redunancy - which is starting to make nasty noises in various sectors.
19. micasasucasa said...
9. also sold to rent said...
"Just swap to a Prius and road tax is £35. Or a VW polo bluemotion and it's nowt"
Apparently, with the Polo, it's only the version that has no extras (i.e. central locking) that has zero tax :(
20. Jj said...
What about all the poluting company cars out there. Shouldn't these be targeted more than individuals. Most company Cars are 2.0 litre and above , hardly any hybrids that I've seen in the fleets. Oops, can upset businesses can we.
21. also sold to rent said...
geed, I pretty much agree with everything you said. To retain any integrity the government has to declare any green taxes as revenue neutral. Also I just noticed news that 1st year tax is even heavier (over £900 on the most polluting vehicles) which is what mentioned earlier. Of course, the sensible thing to do is add a fee to these inefficient cars (as they are doing) and give a rebate to efficient cars (yes) and other forms of efficient travel, i.e. buses and rail (not yet). So at least they are getting there, but they must declare revenue neutrality.
These same feebate systems will (should/must) also be applied to all energy consuming devices, starting with the most consumptive first. Usually that means fridges and freezers. So instead of a meaningless efficiency grading system from a to d, you put 10% on the cost of inefficient fridges and take 10% off of efficient ones. Then consumers, being rational, pick the efficient (cheaper) ones. Voila! The only people who lose out are the energy companies.
22. also sold to rent said...
And as for commercial passenger planes, they won't be around for much longer anyway. Fuel will cost way to much to make flight an economic form of mass transit. High speed rail is the future and the US will lament their lack of railways. As it says here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rail_usage_statistics_by_country), the number of intercity journeys by rail in the US per capita is so small as to be almost immeasurable.