Pay-as-you-drive

[Simon]

I said as soon as the move to ban ICE cars was made a year or two back that the government had effectively just introduced a date for road charging, and of course it's now back on the table.

This is so clearly going to happen. No way are they going to forgo £40 billion of revenue. So you'll need to start including that in your maths of "electric cars are soooo much cheaper to run" etc.

[Mito Man]

It won’t be much of an argument once they apply it to ICE cars too and then a few years later you have no choice but to buy an electric car.
They have us strung by the balls and have the perfect excuse in covid to keep tightening the string till it turns purple.

[Simon]

I don't see how they can 'apply it to ICE cars' as it'll be too easy to simply disable or unplug if done to existing vehicles. This kind of integration needs to be done at the manufacturing stage, and it's at least a decade or 15 years out to be able to do that, but to coincide with car sales going electric only.

[Mito Man]

That’s far too complicated. We already have a proven ANPR system working and it’s very effective in London, simplest way is to just expand this out country wide.

[JonMad]

If they apply it to ICE cars will they remove the tax from fuel, or just double tax you? I can guess the answer to that.

[Mito Man]

That’s almost as ridiculous as taxing people when they’re alive and then taxing them again once they die!


Oh.

[GG.]

Technically it’s taxing people on what they earn, taxing it again when you buy an investment, taxing any gain when you sell it and taxing any wealth you have left when you die...

[Mito Man]

Prior experience suggests we should do the opposite to what the government advise.

“Buy a diesel, it will save you money” ...

*a few years later*

“Buy a petrol car, it’s better for the environment” ...

*a few years later*

“Buy a hybrid, it’s the best of both worlds”

*a few years later*

“Buy an EV, it’s so good we’ll even subsidise it”

And that’s when you know the shafting will be twice as bad!

[Simon]

That’s far too complicated. We already have a proven ANPR system working and it’s very effective in London, simplest way is to just expand this out country wide.

<goes looking for not-sure-if-serious-meme>

Sure, if you wanna only cover major roads, but there are enough minor and residential roads that you can use that'll never get coverage of that means that you can't expect to cover the majority of movements outside of cities.

[Jobbo]

That’s far too complicated. We already have a proven ANPR system working and it’s very effective in London, simplest way is to just expand this out country wide.

<goes looking for not-sure-if-serious-meme>

Sure, if you wanna only cover major roads, but there are enough minor and residential roads that you can use that'll never get coverage of that means that you can't expect to cover the majority of movements outside of cities.

The major issue is going to be that traffic is pushed onto smaller roads, isn't it? Yes, there needs to be a system of taxation but no, it doesn't need to be built into the car from the factory. If road pricing is introduced (as I think is fairly certain) it'll catch all vehicles, I'm sure.

[Mito Man]

I have the misfortune of living in one of the councils in London which has put ANPR cameras on every side street to stop rat running. It can be done.

[JonMad]

Embed them into every speed limit sign, that should cover it.

[Beany]

I have the misfortune of living in one of the councils in London which has put ANPR cameras on every side street to stop rat running. It can be done.

Yes, and those sidestreets already have power and networking available with little more than a tap off existing supplies.

Not quite as simple anywhere outside of an actual town.

[Simon]

I have the misfortune of living in one of the councils in London which has put ANPR cameras on every side street to stop rat running. It can be done.

Sure, but London ≠ rest of the country. You just can't put ANPR everywhere. The only way to do it is with GPS tracking on a per vehicle basis, which means receiver units in every car and that'll be too easy to disable or remove.

[Mito Man]

It’s pretty suicidal for a government to consider fitting GPS to every car in terms of public approval.
Last time I checked every village in the country has electricity. And if there’s X years to roll this out they can easily improve mobile networks to deal with the black spots.

[Simon]

Each car must already have the auto-call assistance feature (in event of a crash) and mandatory speed limiters are coming in 2022. It's not a stretch to think that in 10 years or so it'll be mandatory for all NEW cars to have a GPS receiver in them. That's the only way to get the road coverage.

I think they'll have to do that for new (electric) cars as opposed to a UK wide retrofit because that just don't work. ANPR won't work either as you'd have to get power to every junction of every road everywhere. That isn't gonna happen.

So my prediction is some mandatory gps charging device on new electric vehicles from 2030/2035 or whenever. Check back in 10 years to see if I'm right.

[Jobbo]

Simpler just to increase the tariffs on electricity. When the main consumer of electricity is charging EVs then it'll just be built into that.

[Simon]

As there is a push to move away from gas and towards electricity (heat pumps etc) for domestic heating, this is a terrible idea. There are 27.8 million households in the UK. Hitting each one of those by increasing their electricity bill by £1500 just to replace lost fuel duty, plus more for the cost of heating would be a disaster for millions already in fuel poverty.

[Jobbo]

Simple though. I guess the problem is more going to be people becoming self-sufficient with solar power generated at home.

[Mito Man]

Out of the box idea.
Record mileage at MOT as usual - charge however much per mile for use based on said mileage.