End Of Tax Discs Cost £80M, As Unlicensed Vehicles Soar.

[mikey4444]

http://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-guardian/20151127/282458527873827/TextView

We told them it wouldn't work, but the Government carried on regardless...will they never listen ?

[bednobs]

we being who? how did "we" tell them?
why doesn't the prime minister read answerbank i wonder

[Svejk]

Will they never listen?
You've been crowing about all their u-turns. You ought to make your mind up.

[mikey4444]

Bedbobs...it was common sense to expect this to happen.

[bednobs]

was it? not to me

[bednobs]

to me it makes utter common sense not to have to buy a tiny piece of paper costing in some cases 100's of pounds in order to only rip it when trying to get it out of the perforations ;)

[ummmm]

The tax disc is pointless nowadays.

[fiction-factory]

Mikey- would you agree or disagree with having to put a disc in our front windows to show we have a TV licence?
Yes there will be some people who forget to renew (as the date on the disk was a good reminder) and there will be some who have been trying it on hoping to get away with it, but hopefully enough will get picked up in time to make them realise they are likely to be found out.
I don't think the police have checked tax discs physically for years- they use licence plate recognition and this is linked to the DVLA (or whatever they are called now). And even when people reported cars with no tax disk ( I know I tried it) I don't think anyone followed it up.
I would rather the licence fee be scrapped (even though mine is only £35 a year now) and the price be added to petrol but I know that won't happen.

[shoota]

The insurance for my French car costs 465 euros.
As well as Europe wide comprehensive insurance for any experienced driver over 25 it includes:
'Road tax'
Breakdown cover
Emergency assistance cover (if I break a leg up a mountain the charming young lady at the brokers assures me she will personally come and soothe my fevered brow.)
And a load of other stuff I can't think of immediately. All I have to do is have the car in France 1 day a year and display a tear off square of green card (about the size of an After 8 mint) in the windscreen.
I reckon that's at least £300 cheaper than here and you only need concern yourself with one payment per year.
Their equivalent of the MoT is due every two years as well.

[fiction-factory]

Sorry vehicle duty not licence fee- although I would like to see TV licence scrapped too as too many of us are subsidising the non-payers

[vulcan42]

The problem is it's only the police have access to vehicle duty info and they are getting to be a rare sight at accidents. If they don't attend you have no way of knowing if the other person involved is taxed, insured or has valid MOT.
At least the disc gave you a bit of a clue.

[fiction-factory]

I understand there are rings around some cities where automatic number plate recognition takes place, and the police do checks (from the comfort of their cars) on vehicles driving suspiciously/dangerously. I'm not sure in practice that police used to spend time looking for cars with no discs. maybe traffic wardens did though.

[Old_Geezer]

"Road fund licence", despite the accountancy trick legislation meant to fool folk into thinking it was ok to steal the money demanded from drivers for other uses, the public knew what it really was for and the name stuck, even though not referred to as such by tricky authorities.

Folk still get reminders though, don't they ? Perhaps it is the lack of reminder every time they look at their car windscreen that causes the issue. Still never mind, if that is the reason, another total lack of understanding of human failings by those with power, I'm sure those who forget can all be fined and the authorities fill the coffers up that way. May even be what was hoped for: who can tell ? Wouldn't put it past 'em.

[fiction-factory]

Vulcan- after an accident I think you could check about insurance from the number plate- or your insurer would do it. I'm not sure we as drivers need to know if the car was taxed

[mikey4444]

FF....staying on-topic, my point about the scrapping of the tax disc is it would appear to have cost us tax-payers a great deal of money. Its also resulted in twice as many unlicensed vehicles on the road, as compared to before the change.

The main reason that the Government decided to make the change, was that it would save at least £10M per year, but has instead cost £80M.

So, going by these figures, the exercise would appear have been a failure.

To quote the RAC's David Bisley......"Sadly, the concerns we raised about the number of car tax evaders going up at the time of the tax disc was confined to history have become a reality"

[vulcan42]

fiction-factory, yes I accept that but I always thought having a disc which matched the number plate was a good start.

[stuey]

Mikey, go to my last post in "Winters of my childhood" in CB.

[mikey4444]

Glad to Stuey, but could provide a link please ?

[VHG]

>>>End Of Tax Discs Cost £80M,

Not quite true.

Road Tax evasion was already costing about £35 Million a year before they got rid of tax disks.

So it is now costing an EXTRA £45 million not £80 million

However I agree with everyone else that it is disgraceful.

Surely a group of road traffic police catching all the drivers with no road tax would pay for itself each year if they caught enough drivers.

[fiction-factory]

You may be right, mikey. I just think we need to give it time. Hopefully those who thought up the scheme and justified it to the government will have a bonus scheme which increases or reduces their pay in line with revenue. But i suspect not.
However I'm not sure we can be sure the increase in unlicensed vehicles is due to this change. Why would such a dramatic change result from this? All I can think of is that under the old system some people were put off evading because it was visible but are now perceiving that there's more chance to get away with it.

[Peter Pedant]

doncha have to factor in the cost of operating the paper tax system ?

[ Dog licences cost 7/6 were abandoned when they accepted it cost more to collect than it gave ]