Hi Everyone,
This was just announced an hour ago (link below)
https://www.caradvice.com.au/903101/victoria-to-tax-electric…
Seems to me like we are going backwards. Now Victoria and SA are the only 2 states in the world with these rules.
What do you guys thing? is this the right direction?
You drive an EV from Ballarat to Melbourne every day?
"bUt fUeL cAR uSeRs pAY fOR ThE rOAds, wHy shOuLD eLEctriC VEhiCLes bE eXemPT" - narrow minded people playing right into the hands of middle class politics.
This is exactly the strategy they use to play motorists against one another. What we end up with is zero progression and a further fall in our fight to slow climate change.
Instead of focusing on those who drive electric vehicles just because they don't pay for fuel and thus don't "pay for road tax", how about we focus on the fact that more money is drawn out of fuel tax than is being spent on building and maintaining roads? Thus this argument from the government is a fallacy and simply presented to pit the masses against one another when really the fault lies in their incompetency in managing fiscal policies.
A similar other scenario is when they start to play around with tax brackets between the threshholds of $35k and $200k. Only idiots (and there are a lot of them) argue along the marginal ladders, when the bulk of the problem lie within the ultra-high income earners who stash away their cash in property, offshore accounts, side businesses etc.
Stop whining and pay your share. We get it. You thought an EV would be cheap. Sucks to be you huh?
Don't own one. And if you think buying a tesla makes it "cheaper", you're as daft a donkey. The upfront costs far outweigh the fuel costs in Australia.
This just seems wrong.
Why does an EV have to contribute anything to public roads & infrastructure?
Once there are 100% EV's, it'll only be kitty tears that will pay for it.
/end sarcasm
I'm not suggesting that there's an easy answer, but EV owners can't be that blind that at some point they will have to contribute to the public infrastructure. The proposal appears to suggest that they will continue to maintain a significant discount which I think is fair enough considering the fairly large financial cost involved in buying an EV.
True and some contribution will have to be made one way or another.
However they've been sold the dream by many others who say get a battery setup, solar etc and you'll never have to pay for fuel (or energy to power your EV) again.
The Tesla owners I know also push that same story, that get your Tesla, get the battery pack and some panels, make sure you're home to charge off that setup and you wont ever pay for anything again.
Sometimes people are willfully blind to these things.
This surcharge this early on will impact the way EVs are looked at and make people question the purchase no doubt.
People who buy EVs are usually lefties who love to be dominated protected by the gubment so I reckon they should be really thankful for another tax they are getting up theirs.
After all, this money will go towards "progressive" programs to help spread awareness of "hot" topics.
I'm not sure which lefties you're acquainted with, but my opinion of the general lefty is that they can only afford expensive avocado toasts and retro fixie bikes. I doubt they could afford their rent, let alone an EV.
I doubt they could afford … an EV.
They can't, that's why they take a bank loan to "save the environment".
I know, I know, a bit too far fetched, but the whole EV car idea is being propagated as "saving the world", so associate them with people who are willing to save the world but expect the government (my tax dollars) to subsidize their spending - free charging points, less taxes for EV etc.
Road tax doesn't really make sense. Even the "non road users" use the roads - you can't get bread, eggs and milk from woolies if we don't have roads - even if you walk to do your shopping.
As peoples behaviour shifts away from thier current tax base so the tax mans eyes will follow.
They are always looking at new ways to raise taxes.
Just look a superannuation.
After conning everyone to get into super with its tax free status, now they are looking to tax it in any way the see reasonable.
So the same reasoning applies to motor vehicles.
As the article states, as the amount of petrol driven vehicles reduces, so does the petrol excise tax collected.
In California a few years ago they allowed FREE parking for electic vehicles are a way of promoting thier use.
Now thats all gone and they pay the same parking fees as anyone else.
And when Paul Keating was Treasurer they said he would tax air if he could.
And what did we get under the Rudd Labor Govt? - A carbon tax which is effectively a tax on air.
Ditto with E10 fuel and LPG for cars.
As more cars moved onto E10 and LPG to save a few bucks the tax concessions have been gradually been reduced.
LPG was once only 1/3 (and less) the price of petrol. Nows its half or more.
E10 was up to 5c/L cheaper then regular unleaded. Nows its only 1c or 2c.
And now with the Billions of dollars of debt our govts have racked up they are going to be looking are more ways to collect taxes
LESSON HERE
You aint seen nothn' yet!
Feels like there's no good incomplete solutions…
ACT: $15k interest free loans, no stamp duty, 2 years free rego on EVs
SA/VIC/NSW: This rubbish
I don't even have an electric car but I'm glad I don't live in either of these states.
Those govts are real myopic bonkers to eyes of the world and of energy efficiency research. Fuel efficiency of modern cars is consistently improving each year, narrowing the gap with PHEVs which are singled out to be taxed. Just a blatant discrimination. As PHEVs usually switch to 100% combustion engines on long distance to avoid high battery drain rate at speed, is there a justification for $2/100km tax for that distance? These govts might as well tax the home solar energy because of reduced electricity consumption and GST with it.
draconian tariff reductions effectively are in reality.
People like Daniel Andrew’s make it easy for the Libs to consolidate power.
So the roads that are owned and tolled by private companies are going to be exempt from the tax, right? I mean why am I paying to use those roads twice, once as a toll and then the per km tax?
Does this mean the actual fuel tax is a scam? If electric cars are taxed at 2.5c per km and the government thinks that is fair, why are petrol users taxed so much?
I suspect that electric cars with small wheels that can be changed for big wheels will become way more popular.
TIME FOR THE MONSTER TRUCK TESLA.
There is this misconception about taxes, that the state has to add this tax because of lost revenue of selling fuel. The money that you don't spend in fuel and taxes, is used to buy something else that has taxes, or God not permit, maybe you will save that money for rainy days and avoid asking money to the government social services.
Not a completely terrible idea to charge for road usage, but shouldn't they first subsidise the initial purchase price or create incentives for people to own an EV?
Tax the diesels ffs
Taxing electric because it produces no immisions and the charge port could be at the persons home, with a good driving record.
Yes tax them it makes sense, anything in Australia makes sense, more taxes raised.
yep slitting kids throats makes sense here….
Dam straight.
but that's after the sexual abuse remember…
@petry: Well what ever parse tense pre tense, if it's a delayed thing to discover, then the persons dead, and the new policy to prevent such behaviour the government will name on behalf of you, the petry law, because that also makes no sense.
There is no tax needed, the govment is already making money from EV's in the form of reduced medical costs for the entire population from lower emissions.
Recent studies have linked traffic pollution with reduced lung and cognitive function, and an increased risk of asthma, breast cancer, lung cancer, childhood leukaemia, heart disease, emergency hospital admissions and death.
https://theconversation.com/counting-the-ways-vehicle-emissi…
Well the federal government have to need to further reduce emission as we are now already over our legal requirements from the Paris accord (probably largely due to Covid and people staying in more) so that edict probably slowly gets passed down to the states.
LNP wants cars that runs on coal.
FFS , talk about willful stupidity
You know Dan Andrews is a Labor Premier, right?
Wait do they charge you this tax even if you drive on private property / roads? If not how do they prove you drove a certain number of kms on public roads
Its called technology, EV are high technology and will need to be connected to the grid to function. GPS and maps is how they will know.
Same as everything else for taxed vehicle use; they’ll ask for you to keep a log book.
[sorry duplicate comment pressed send twice]
What if you jack the wheels up and connect them to an electric generator?
The govt can always cut all taxes related to cars. In 20 years time, Bolivia may as well have safer and better roads than Australia :)
Remember, no such thing as free lunch.
Tax/revenue wise, what vaping is to cigarettes is what EV is to petrol.
Check out this article about how much taxes people pay for those more expensive electric cars GST, stamp duty etc to compared to fuel excise on cars.
It makes surprising reading.
(https://www.caradvice.com.au/847108/are-electric-vehicle-own…)
Pretty silly comparison choice between a Corolla and a Model S.
A Kona electric is ~$65k while the same trim level petrol is ~$40k. Neither pay LCT and the GST difference is $2500. The electric gets a $100 VIC registration discount per year and pays nothing for road usage, despite its 300kg increased mass causing greater infrastructure damage.
In no way is the electric owner in this comparison paying more tax over the life of the vehicle, as in the article. Servicing and repair costs will presumably also be greater for the ICE, which all incur GST if we're playing that game.
IMO road usage should be charged on the basis of distance travelled, time and location used, and mass of the vehicle. These are the factors affecting infrastructure damage and reduction in road capacity, so make a good basis for charging. It's just as bad for someone to be ripping up the pavement and clogging up the traffic regardless of the drivetrain of the car they're using to do it.
Easy solution to stop all the whingers is to abolish the fuel excise and make all vehicle pay a cents per km road usage tax.
Reward those who don’t drive much, tax those that do. Encourage people to drive less, reduce road congestion, spend less tax money and upgrade road capacity less often as there is incentive for less cars to be on the road.
Make the rate for ICE more expensive than the EV rate, sliding pricing scale still encouraging use of EV tech over ICE but acknowledging the reality that roads still need to be built and maintained through taxable revenue.
Price per km low to high
EV
PHEV
4 Cylinder
6 Cylinder
8 Cylinder
Make trucks pay a higher rate based on size / weight like they already do for rego.
Agree, but this is kinda already the case.
Driving more = more fuel used = more excise paid. (Same for small vs large vehicles).
The problem is most people can’t reconcile this in their heads. I feel like these are the same people that whinge that cyclists should pay rego.
Govt needs to payback covid debts somehow. Totally unsurprised. Generally rich people buy electrics anyways so they can afford it!
Admin on collecting this is prob 4 million - tax recovered 30 million estimated -
Long term costs on lowering ev uptake - ???
I don’t think the tax is high enough to materially reduce EV uptake.
They’re smart getting in early before the federal govt tried to do it.
Also, finding opportunities for new taxes that won’t hurt your re-election is really hard. They were extra clever doing it before the EV tax base grew substantial enough to hurt them with protest votes.
I'm sure there will be a legal challenge to this tax down the road, but to be fair, governments will always be looking for new things to tax using existing powers. Esp early on when less owners = less backlash. Will be interesting to see how they admin the tax (kms based) and the cost of admin vs revenue raised.
Did anyone actually mention this:
"According to its data, the Victorian government anticipates raising around $30 million annually via the electric vehicle tax, although Mr Pallas said owners of such vehicles would continue to pay less to use the state’s roads than drivers of vehicles fitted with petrol or diesel engines."
All this for $30 mil.???
This is chump change. Why would you do all this for $30 mil.???
Is the negative press worth $30 mil.
If you were saying $3 bn. well then… I guess that's ok but $30 mil.???
As I said above - it’s all about the long term.
They’re smart getting in early before the federal govt tried to do it.
Also, finding opportunities for new taxes that won’t hurt your re-election is really hard. They were extra clever doing it before the EV tax base grew substantial enough to hurt them with protest votes.
Also I would like to add that for me….
10,000km avg. for a year x 0.025c = $250…
LOL…. just pay the blood sucking mutha lovers…
additional $375 each year, while plug-in hybrids would face an additional $300 fee.
Based on 15,000 km a year.
Not bad.
It's about time electric vehicle owners started contributing in the same way (or a similar way) all other motorists do. I hope this is implemented in NSW sooner, rather than later. In fact, I'd rather a per km tax on ALL vehicles, and removing the current fuel excise. That would be much fairer for all concerned.
This man right here ^^^^
Make it an even playing field.
Further, petrol diesel has uncosted externalitiies thats EVs dont have.
I'd rather a per km tax on ALL vehicles, and removing the current fuel excise. That would be much fairer for all concerned
except for those in rural areas who will get smashed.
easy
rural addressed vehicles get exemption
of course there will always be outliers in a user pay system
you a courier ubereats or in my case, i used to be a field engineer… then yeah… but then for buinesses cases, claim tax?
Surely if those people in rural areas are driving further (than their non-rural counterparts), they would also be buying more petrol, and hence currently paying a lot more in excise. No?
if you are rural just buy a diesel 4x4 right?
@tonyjzx: I don't understand your point. If you were suggesting that rural people driving EVs would be disadvantaged under a per km tax, then it's only because they have been getting a "free ride" which they weren't getting prior to the introduction of EVs. It's also unlikely there has been a big uptake in EVs in rural areas anyway, given their limited range and scarcity of charging stations. Your assertion that rural areas would unfairly get "smashed" is, therefore, misguided at best.
@dcash: i live in the city
IMO I feel its fair for every concession to be extended to rural folks. Even if the concession is deemed to be unduly preferential to rural people I still think thats ok.
Its the duty of city areas to subsidise rural.
@tonyjzx: But do rural "folks" get subsidised petrol at present? I reckon you'll find petrol actually costs more in rural areas than in suburban, in most cases. Certainly there are no tax concessions on petrol excise in rural areas, so far as I'm aware. I'm not suggesting we shouldn't look out for rural folk, I just think we're talking about two different issues.
Great news!
Yeah too expensive. Keep driving your fossil fuel car.
Next up… Coal powered steam engines are the future. Australia is uniquely placed with plentiful coal supplies to power steam engines for the next 100 years.
Wait until you find out how our coal power stations work!
This has to be one of the STUPIDIST decisions Dan Andrews has made, and boy has he made a few………
Fuel excise is a Commonwealth (not State) tax. So any States trying to replace a "missing" fuel excise with a State tax are not trying to recover something they lost; they are trying to create a new revenue source.
Vertical fiscal imbalance (basically: Commonwealth taxes, States spend) means that the Commonwealth almost always needs to grant States money to do stuff. This means the Federal Govt. can have undue influence over what individual States do ("don't do what we want? No $ for you!").
A State-based tax on vehicle usage might help to reduce that influence…
There's a petition going that looks like it has some momentum
https://www.change.org/p/all-politicians-and-australians-sto…
Considering electric cars are heavier than the typical ice car, and can accelerate faster, and stop faster, they are likely to cause more wear and tear to roads. Plus some models of electric cars don't handle pot holes well, so roads need to repaired more urgently to avoid damaged to these cars. All these lead to increased cost, and someone has to pay for it.
youre basing that notion on a certain brand, some would say erroneously
I dont think that applies to the general level of say sub $50k EVs
But that certain brand is selling the bulk of the EV's. I went to The Great Ocean Road over the weekend and saw 3 EV's. All Tesla Model 3's. It's only fair they pay their way. Pretending Tesla is not a luxury carmaker is a joke. People who own them can afford to pay for what they use. They are working on sub $10K Ev's in Asia. It's not smart to be an early adopter for regular people at this time.
Easy… everyone just needs to buy electric bicycles to get around. Problem solved.
I will never pay a clean air tax on my tesla ev car………..
I fought veteran affairs Australia for 15 years and won …..iwill fight this tax.
I will register my car in another state before I will pay, failing that I will drive unregistered..
I have throat cancer and it looks like it has come back after 2 years so I have nothing to loose.
I am prepared to sit outside of Victoria parliament with a sign and protest until they give up this funked up tax……..
Just received an email from Vic Roads asking for my odometer reading from my PHEV.
I can't believe it has got this far, especially since:
Not even considering the environmental impact of not making a change.. Pure ridiculous!
Even if you don't own a EV/ Hybrid, this is a warning shot that the government will soon charge a road use tax over for EVERYONE, and there is no way the Fed government are going to remove fuel excise. So you will be paying double. Vote with your feet, don't stand for this rubbish. Next election don't vote for this government. Thats the only sure way to make this go away.
The state government aren't charging petrol cars / trucks / buses to use the roads!!
You haven’t heard of fuel excise?
Fuel excise is a federal tax.
So again, no petrol car (except a PHEV), truck or bus pays the state government to use a road..
It is literally highway robbery.
This will open the flood gates to charge ALL cars. This double taxing was previously 'un constitutional'. I recon ICE cars will be rego+ fuel excise + 5c/ km.
Your lucky if you can even get a seat especially on the way back.
Not to mention the unreliability, lateness and regular bus replacements that happen.
unfortunately its not something they can be relied upon.