4x4 drivers face huge charge rise in London

I don't think they mean just actual 4x4's, but the higher groups that off road style 4x4's fall into... usual sloppy reporting.

Are are they going to try to charge me more for my Quattro than the similar looking FWD Audi 90 sat next to it in the queue? Could you get a partial refund if you proved your Land Rover is running 2wd

Just like my green tax worries, we are all next.

BBC experimented that pay as you drive on the news last night, a bloke paid £6* (+all usual costs petrol ins, tax etc) in pay as you go from rural-town, uses car for surveying had two jobs to go to. with taxi and train it worked out at £20. No win then I say! I'm beginning to hate this Country.

So what if you dis engaged two of the wheels then is it cheapers, what about extra discount for one wheel drive? thers an idea ;D

Edit. *breakdown: 2p per mile rural 5p P/M A roads, #35p/m in town (a right swer fest lost in inner city then! Fun Fun Fun!

Believe me an old battered Land Rover IS just the vehicle for making sure non of the rep mobiles hassle you when going round Hyde Park corner! ;D



Good point!

No it's by tax band not number of driven wheels. It's just that 90% of 4x4's fall into the higher tax brackets and that makes a easier headline than "some cars to pay more some to pay less depending on which tax band they fall into!" (screamed the Sun)

It may be that your landie falls into a lower tax bracket as they don't have huge engines. They do tend to pollute a bit though!

I can't remember where I read it... I could be talking utter rubbish! It might just have been one of those "think-tank" suggestions that the press hyped up.

The new road tax laws confuse me... do 1.6 litre + cars get the highest amount of tax? Or are there higher bands for these newer least efficient new cars?

You're a damn sight closer to a democracy over there than we are it seems! There was (as far as I know) no public referendum on the London congestion charge... nor pretty much anything else.
I see that the Swedish Government still manages to ignore the will of the people though

Yes, Ken did want to stop all pre 1992 non-catalytic cars from entering the Congestion zone.

It was always a bit of a non-starter, particularly now the zone will extend to the classic car populated Kensington and Chelsea.

All those City bankers will be annoyed if they can't drive their pagoda SLs back from the Gloucestershire cottage!

TBH, the thing about 4wds is London is mainly due to envy/dislike of the drivers, and some do drive so badly/selfishly you can kind of see Ken's POV.

Also there is a disgusting new US disease called the stretched SUV now spreading to this country, all of which need to be crushed at point of import on several grounds, most importantly taste!

a bit harsh DP! We didn't want it either!

This just means that more cars will be cloned to avoid the charges, the already overcrowded tube system will be stretched even further. The city will be harder to police with more pedestrians and hey, this brings us back to the good old "terrorism" angle, how are you going to catch terrorists using your fancy new ANPR cameras if you've forced everyone out of their cars?

Next step - numberplates for pedestrians, extra charges for people who walk slowly or have a wheelchair.

I support pay-per-mile systems as I rarely use a car on a day-to-day basis, about 50% of my journeys are pointless or could be avoided in some way but at the moment, I've paid my tax so why not drive places? I'd rather scrap RFL and flatrate insurance and the twelvety million percent duty on fuel and whap it all on a per-mile scale depending on roads.

HOWEVER, £25 to simply cross a invisible line going into a city is absurd! It's got nothing to do with pollution as people don't drive into london to do laps and sightsee, they drive in to park up so a mega-engined 4x4 will use barely more fuel than a fiat panda in that day. They'd rather all these executives with their BMW X5's and Discoveries buy a little car for commuting would they? How much pollution does the manufacturing of another car release? And don't get me started on public transport, it's unreliable and dirty.

Except under the new scheme, anyone who owns a vehicle in the highest band (like a Range Rover.....or a 1.8 Passat) not only has to pay £25 a day, they get no discount for being a resident...