British drivers travelling abroad will be effectively taxed twice under Rachel Reeves’ new pay-per-mile scheme.
The Chancellor is expected to announce a new levy for electric vehicle (EV) drivers in the upcoming budget.
I believed the idea of introducing electric vehicles was so that they would be more environmentally friendly, but now she wants to tax drivers as well, even more tax on top of more tax and more on top of that, and in France as well. I wasn’t aware that we were in the EU anymore, so how can she put a tax on our cars when they’re not even in the UK? Something’s not quite right here!
We already pay UK Vehicle Excise Duty, so why is she taxing us even more per mile? And how is she getting away with it? There is simply no justification for introducing an overreaching and bureaucratic charging regime, which is going to seriously inconvenience people.
The tariff will also apply to drivers when they are driving on foreign roads.
Motorists visiting France would pay the new tax on top of the ‘péage’ tolls, which exist on French motorways, effectively taxing them twice.
On average, a 1,530-mile trip from Calais to Nice would cost an additional £45.90.
Critics of the new policy said that the fees applying on non-UK roads was ‘unfair and a huge flaw’.
The average EV driver will pay an extra £250 per year by 2028 under the new tax.
In the meantime, hybrid vehicles will also be subject to a new, albeit reduced, fee.
The Treasury will reportedly make the case that the new tax is required to cover falling fuel duty revenue as more and more vehicle owners go green, with up to six million extra EVs expected to be on the roads by the time the scheme is introduced.
Reeves will also argue the move will be fairer as petrol drivers already pay £600 a year on average in fuel duty.
It will also help the Treasury raise an estimated £1.8 billion by 2031 and help plug a fiscal hole caused by the green transition due to the loss of revenue from petrol cars. It seems like they want their cake and they want to eat it.
Edmund King, president of the AA, told The Telegraph: ‘You would effectively be paying tax twice – to both the French and UK Government.
‘I can’t really see any practical way around it. It would be pretty bureaucratic to have to check your mileage at Dover and have it stamped on some kind of certificate to say you’re leaving the country for two weeks.
‘There are already concerns about the extra checks at the borders, so I think it would be a nightmare. It seems EV drivers would have to pay double taxation.’
The scheme would be aligned to the annual payment of vehicle excise duty (VED), which affects all UK motorists and EV drivers have had to pay the charge since April.
The new element is being described as ‘VED+’ and being framed as a way to get motorists of green cars to pay more each year.
EV drivers will have to calculate the number of miles they will drive in the year ahead and pay a fee.
If they fall short of that sum, drivers don’t have to fret because the funds can be carried over to the following year, and if they drive more miles than estimated, they would need to top up their payment.
Ministers have been debating pay-per-mile taxes as a long-term substitute for fuel duty for decades, but they now want you to pay extra.
The 52.95p per litre levy on petrol and diesel presently raises £25 billion a year, with an extra £5 billion made from the VAT.
However, repeated polls have revealed that road-pricing is extremely unpopular among motorists and has been branded a ‘poll tax on wheels’ which amounts to an extra ‘stealth road tax’.
But critics warned any hikes on drivers would be ‘disastrous’ amid a cost-of-living squeeze and because it would threaten to stoke inflation.
The Treasury did not rule out a 3p tariff for overseas mileage.
A spokesman said: ‘Just as it is right to seek a tax system that fairly funds roads, infrastructure and public services, we will look at further support measures to make owning electric vehicles more convenient and more affordable.’
Concerns have also been raised that the tax could be extended to all cars.
On top of this, Reeves is also contemplating ditching the 5p a litre Fuel Duty relief in her Budget this month, in what would be a £2 billion to £3 billion raid on hard-pressed drivers.
This woman is totally mad, and she is the most despised Chancellor of all time. And she appears to want to destroy everyone’s livelihoods, except foreigners and illegal migrants. She needs to give her head a little wobble.
They just want your money. Everything they say is just some form of platitude or vilification, and all they care about is taking as much of people’s money as they can get, and they’re all sociopaths and thieves, and they are deplorable – in the end, you will own nothing and have no privacy.
What else is she going to tax? Perhaps she will tax our faeces – every time we plop one out in the toilet – we shouldn’t give her any ideas, but then at least she would have to pay for her own shite.
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 