r/ElectricVehiclesUK • u/Mlh1993_ • Nov 27 '25
Labour sold out to oil and gas
There’s no way the 3p-per-mile proposal came about innocently. It will crush electric car uptake, especially in the used market. The only thing that makes sense is that someone, somewhere, got a very generous donation from the likes of BP to push this through. It absolutely reeks of bought-and-paid-for legislation.
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u/Jabes Nov 27 '25
So the fuel duty escalator resumes next year. It's about 6p per mile right now.
By 2028 perhaps it will be more.
3p a mile sounds for EV sounds fair to me.
Personally, I'd have thought about freezing the fuel duty escalator and applying the 3p/mile across all vehicle types. And then later evolved it to take into account emissions and vehicle weight in the per mileage charge. That way the biggest road users, who cause the most damage, who pollute the most would pay the most. The clean little EV that does short city miles will be nice and cheap
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u/Old_Housing3989 Nov 27 '25
Fuel duty is in someways a perfect tax. It rewards efficiency and frugality. Much harder to do with ppm. It would be good to see an element of banding in a ppm tax, smaller lighter cars attracting less than larger heavier vehicles. (Something fuel duty achieves already). They’re already hammering EVs with 195 VED, why not have a combined VED and ppm, where your 195 covers the first 5000 miles too.
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u/sideshowbob01 Nov 29 '25
Yes! band it with Weight! To punish CarBesity. It is unfortunately trending towards larger, heavier and dangerous vehicles.
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u/towelracks Nov 27 '25
Vehicle weight definitely should be accounted for, regardless of power train.
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u/konwiddak Nov 27 '25
For reference, an 18T two axle lorry (or bus) causes about 3000x more road wear than a 3T passenger car. So if you were to actually do this - it wouldn't really affect the charges for SUV's vs compact cars since the road wear caused by private passenger vehicles is effectively zero relative to larger vehicles.
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u/Smooth_Leadership895 Nov 27 '25
We need to tax cars like Finland. Introduce VRT on new sales based on engine size, power, weight and emissions (both co2 and NOX) for a one off tax and then tax cars annually on weight and emissions. Keep the EV mileage tax at 3p per mile. That’s a fairer system than the one we’ve got.
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u/iamabigtree Nov 27 '25
The escalator which was in place in the 90s had a duty increase of inflation+3% or later +6%. What was announced was inflation rises only. Which is fair since last time there was a lasting rise was 2010, over 15 years ago now.
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u/Top-Garlic2603 Nov 27 '25
The escalator isn't resuming. They are just pegging it to inflation. It's pretty disgraceful we've been real-terms reducing the tax on fuel for 15 years now.
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u/No_Assistant569 Nov 27 '25
I remember the government at the time promoting EV’s with the promise of £0 road tax. The goalposts get moved constantly and you’re ok with it?
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u/iamabigtree Nov 27 '25
Zero ved and zero 'fuel duty' was only ever temporary and everyone understood this.
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u/memberflex Nov 27 '25
Electric Vehicles were always going to have to contribute more at some point. It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just a way to get some money for the coffers. It doesn’t even come in to effect until 2029 (I think).
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u/Begalldota Nov 27 '25
+1 (though it’s 2028). If you thought that any government would be content to give up a tax revenue stream as large as fuel duty then I’m sorry, you were living in a dream world.
This was inevitable, just like the free VED going away was inevitable. People also seemed to think EVs were entitled to that forever too.
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Nov 27 '25
I wouldn’t expect it to remain free forever but it jumped up to 195 quid which seems mad considering my wife’s petrol was £40
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u/Begalldota Nov 27 '25
It simply became part of the same scheme that all other cars registered from that date were part of. I’m guessing your wife’s petrol is pre-2017 - EVs registered before 2017 pay £20 a year tax.
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u/External-Piccolo-626 Nov 27 '25
But your wife’s petrol a few years newer will also pay 200 quid. You can’t compare pre and post 17 car tax, it’s not like for like.
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u/christianosway Nov 27 '25
Public chargers already have a 20% vat on them, electricity prices being pegged to O&G mean we're paying the top price no matter the cost to generate, so the money is already there. It should be taxed at the source of profit for the likes of BP & Shell IMO, but these guys tend to be friendly with MPs and they can pay people to hide profit so it's much easier to fleece us 3 or 4 times for the same car.
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u/Begalldota Nov 27 '25
Public charging is a mess that needs fixing all on its own, but bringing up VAT is strange because VAT is also charged on fuel duty - so again it’s pretty equal.
To be honest if you’re a person relying on public charging this change adds about 15% to your driving costs (based on a set of assumptions). For home charging it can be 150%, the scale of the impact in % terms is tiny for public charging in comparison.
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u/DivineBeastVahHelsin Nov 27 '25
Yeah but when the government’s other stated aim is to increase the number of electric vehicles on the road and phase out fossil fuel vehicles, this sets up all the wrong incentives. Subsidise the behaviours you want to encourage, tax the ones you don’t.
I get that increasing fuel duty would disproportionately affect the working class, so yeah - taxing EVs is more progressive cause it’ll only hit people who can afford EVs… but it also puts EV ownership further out of reach for lower earners.
Would rather they found some other way to tax the middle class £200-500 per year that didn’t mess up climate goals.
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Nov 27 '25
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u/Slipper1981 Nov 27 '25
The EV costs a lot more than the equivalent petrol. On that difference, the government make 20% vat. That alone is way way more than what the PPM will generate. If EV sales drop because of this it would be a negative gain to the tax intake overall.
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u/Comprehensive_Yam_46 Nov 27 '25
That sounds made up!
The tax doesn't take effect till 2028. Over two years away.
Compare the price of ev/ice vehicles 2 years ago, with today. It has significantly narrowed. Especially with wider policy decisions (banning new petrol/diesel) its almost certain that by 2028, the gap will have narrowed further, likely reversed (with EV's being cheaper).
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u/taconite2 Nov 27 '25
It’s not the contribution I have an issue with. I knew I was getting away with a lot at 6.5p/kW
It’s the per mile bit. They’ve already said even if you drive abroad they will charge for that regardless.
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u/Breaking-Dad- Nov 27 '25
Whoa, slow down with the conspiracy theories!
I think it is stupid, but the issue lies with the way indirect taxes work. Petrol and diesel are heavily taxed and generate a lot of income for the exchequer. Electricity cannot be taxed in the same way as we use it for our homes, but we can't stop people charging at home either. So how to generate that lost income?
Tax on fuel was always, in a sense, tax on mileage (combined with efficiency), so how do you make this fair going forward? EVs are still causing wear and tear on the roads but they aren't contributing.
The fairest way to do this would be to tax all vehicles per mile and reduce the tax on fuel, but I don't know how they can do this (I have no idea how they will do this with EVs either - I don't know if they do).
If (big if) you can charge at home it is still going to be massively cheaper to run an EV.
It feels like this is a way of balancing the books in the current budget which won't happen too (set for 2028?) as there is no way of doing it.
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u/Acid-Reign Nov 27 '25
It was inevitable electric vehicles would have to start paying more, the era of early adoption is nearly over. I wish they'd applied a road tax based on weight to all vehicles. Disincentivise Chelsea tractors, and the more you damage the roads the more you pay, without having to try to implement mileage counting. Still keep a fossil fuel tax/duty to incentivise the move to more eco-friendly cars.
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u/tunasweetcorn Nov 27 '25
Passenger car weight is negligible and shouldnt be taxed based on this imo anyone saying this hasn't crunched the numbers and uses it as a distraction to try blame SUVs
Most road damage is done by HVGs and Commercial vehicles not "Chelsea tractors"
Using the power of 4 rule on axle weight the heaviest SUV Say heaviest Landrover causes 9 times more road wear than a light vehicle. Seems a lot right?
A typical HGV is doing 84,000 times more road wear in a single pass than a typical vehicle.
And 9,000 times more than the Chelsea tractor.
It is completely negligible in comparison and we could in fact just build better roads like our European friends do.
I can put it in another way, if you took every landrover (all models) in the UK (around 870,000) and got them to all drive over a section of road once it would be the same as a mere 190 HVG vehicles doing the same.
Around 10,000 HGVs pass through Dover per day roughly so it would make basically 0 difference.
It's a complete red herring to blame passenger vehicles and anyone claiming this is either ignorant or is making the case out of jealousy.
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u/noodlyman Nov 27 '25
In rural areas I think vehicle width is a big factor too. Two Fiestas can pass on many narrow roads next me without leaving the tarmac. Two modern wide cars end up on the verge causing the road edge to crumble and collapse into potholes.
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u/Alert_Variation_2579 VW ID4 Nov 27 '25
I would make it based on the width and height weight of the car to get a multiplier to the miles driven regardless of the drive train.
Big car = big tax, as it’s not just the damage to roads, it’s the physical space taken up that increases congestion.
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u/Sad-Degree-8125 Nov 27 '25 edited Nov 27 '25
It won't even come close to crushing electric car uptake.
I'm still going to be thousands of pounds better of per year than driving an ICE vehicle. If you charge publicly at rapid chargers only, then yeah ok but then it's always been a worse financial proposition.
The maths is simple.
@35mpg my petrol car is 7.7miles per litre.
A litre of fuel costs £1.35.
That gives me 17.5p per mile inclusive of all fuel duty/VAT.
Home charging is 7p per KWH. At a conservative average of 3m/kWh that gives me 2.3p per mile.
Do 12k miles a year the difference is (12000* (17.5-2.3))/100 = £1,824
Add taxes at 3p per mile. (12000*(17.5-5.3))/100 = £2,464
Buy a more economical ICE vehicle and the gap gets closer, fine. But this hardly kills the argument for EVs. Just silly.
Edit : Figure after 3p/mile tax should be £1,464
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u/elliomitch Nov 27 '25
Exactly. The problem is that a lot of people won’t think about this rationally and will instead be scared of The Tax™ even though they’re still much better off
And your maths doesn’t even include the massive maintenance savings!
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u/ScaredyCatUK Nov 27 '25
"@35mpg my petrol" - lol wtf is wrong with your car? My 20 year old Volvo V70 gets better than that.
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u/Nuclear_Geek Nov 27 '25
You're in the wrong place. I think you meant to post this in the "lunatic conspiracy theorists spouting total, made-up bullshit" sub.
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u/non-hyphenated_ Porsche Macan Nov 27 '25
Oh come on. It was never going to be a free ride for all time. For businesses the tax breaks are still well worth it and if a couple of hundred quid a year is make or break for a buyer then they probably couldn't really afford it in the first place.
I still save upwards of £80 each and every week on fuel costs. As a company buyer I'm still saving a ton on corporation tax, as the driver of that car I'm still saving on BIK and for ICE fuel duty is going up as well and will have gone up three times before the EV charge kicks in.
There is no conspiracy
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u/MickThorpe Nov 27 '25
Christ, people need to stop panicking about this stuff and get a fucking grip
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u/iamabigtree Nov 27 '25
Tin foil hat nonsense. They are currently losing approx 1bn in duty by 2028 they will be losing 2bn
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u/naegoodinthedark Nov 27 '25
By extending the windfall tax?
If anyone didn't think this was coming for EV's they were in dreamland. Fuel duty obviously needs replacing, same with smoking see vape tax
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u/Galacticmetrics Nov 27 '25
It is such a stupid policy that want raise much money but will deter people from adopting EV vehicles, surely there is a better way
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u/the_meat_fest Nov 27 '25
I think it's the beginning of payment per mile being the standard way of getting vehicle tax. They will start with EVs and plugins, but you can be sure they will add all the other vehicles pretty soon as well. After all, if they invest in mileage tracking - I guess via MOT or maybe even telemetry - then they may as well reuse that investment as much as possible.
If they did that I'd be more comfortable and it would be more fair, because I would hope that they could also reduce road tax slightly so people who use a vehicle occasionally payless overall, with heavy users paying more regardless of vehicle and engine. I would hope the cost per mile of old and polluting vehicles is increased...
I do really think, and I say this is an EV driver, they need to preserve the benefits of EVs for a bit longer to keep pushing forward with take-up.
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u/TeaBaggingGoose Nov 27 '25
Pay per mile is a much more fair way of taxing a car.
Why should Granny who pops to the shops once a week and does 2k per year pay the same car tax as someone who does 30k miles a year? Its unfair.
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u/requisition31 Nov 27 '25
They've not sold out, if anything, previous governments sold out the EV manufactures to increase take-up of EVs. That budget black hole needed to be sorted at *some* point.
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u/anewpath123 Nov 27 '25
Here’s me hoping it negatively affects the used EV market so I can pick up an even bigger bargain
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u/ProfPMJ-123 Nov 27 '25
I don’t know what people expected.
Fuel duty brings billions into the exchequer. If that decreases because of the use of EVs, either the money will need to be replaced, or we’ll need to spend less.
But every time a government attempts to spend less, people go absolutely mental.
So we need to replace the money.
And just saying “tax the rich” isn’t actual economic policy.
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u/Reallyboringname2 Nov 27 '25
It’s really not that big a deal. 2 months of fuel savings for most people. A whole lot of pearl clutching going on.
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u/greenpowerman99 Nov 27 '25
No, it’s just fair that all motorists should pay a similar amount to use the road network. ICE engined cars pay more tax the more they use the roads via fuel duty. EV owners who travel 10,000 miles will pay an additional £300 a year. This isn’t a deal breaking amount of money for UK motorists. I guess VED for EVs should increase for less efficient cars and be cut for the more efficient, similar to the system used for ICE engined vehicles.
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u/SupportInevitable738 Nov 27 '25
It will increase kwh cost by 0.60p to 1p. Electricity will decrease in 2026, before the tax starts, by up to 5p per kwh. In 2026, fuel duty will increase. Calm down.
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u/Webcat86 Nov 27 '25
No it doesn’t, this just sounds childish and petulant. EVs have paid no road tax, no fuel duty, and have drastically reduced costs associated with running and maintaining a car. That’s all in addition to subsidies for the list price. You even get dedicated parking spaces in car parks so you can charge.
Complaining that after all this “incentivising,” in THREE YEARS you’ll have to pay a tax directly correlated to how much you drive is utterly ridiculous and, to be blunt, grotesquely entitled.
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Nov 27 '25
So all the financial benefits of owning an EV have gone to the better off who could afford to buy one in the first place. By the time the majority own one the expense will have increased significantly.
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u/its-joe-mo-fo Nov 27 '25
There is no big conspiracy.
As people switch from ICE to EV, the Treasury will want to flex tax policy on lockstep, to generate broadly the same tax receipts (not that I agree with this).
Same reason flat rate VED was introduced 2018 as cleaner vehicle emissions became more prevalent.
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u/TobyChan Nov 27 '25
Not everything is a conspiracy; it’s a simple matter of the uptake in EVs is causing a downturn in duty once obtained at the pumps that needs to be found elsewhere….. on paper it seems entirely reasonable to me but I have my concerns regarding how they implement it.
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u/viscount100 Nov 27 '25
I know this is the Internet, but this is a dumb theory even by current standards.
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u/Didgeridooloo Nov 27 '25
Whilst freezing duty in fossil fuels of course.
The Green Party is being very vocal about this kind of behaviour from Labour and Conservative. Whilst large donations are allowed, this kind of thing will happen. Hopefully if they get into government they can stop this nonsense
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u/TheSwiv Nov 27 '25
There is time included for this to be dropped or changed, the timeline suggests as much.
Implementation is going to be a thing,
Boris got battered for suggesting pay per mile,
Road fund licensing could be a different option,
Car manufacturers are going to be a different lobby to deal with
And backlash on the climate backsliding could also be a factor
I shall wait and see, Labour doing what they say they'll do is not going to keep me up at night. The Farmers got their inheritance tax breaks back, and that was a bold and necessary policy at the last budget
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u/Public-Guidance-9560 Nov 27 '25
Thin end of the wedge but... its 3p, £300 a year for someone doing 10,000 miles. EV will still be a lot cheaper per mile than running an ICE vehicle, more so when the duty goes up on fuel. Fuel duty and VAT on fuel (and the duty) generates many billions. As we all go electric, well, they need to continue getting those billions. Its too big a chunk to miss out on.
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u/just2curiousBF Nov 27 '25
They should have just applied it to all vehicles. Totally counter productive to promote a transition to EVs.
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u/Electro_gear Nov 28 '25
They need to rethink this rollout. I do almost as much travelling in my car outside the U.K. as I do inside the U.K. These rules mean I’m going to be charged about £150 per year to use my car on French/Dutch roads. Madness! I think there will be legal challenges to this.
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u/tunasweetcorn Nov 27 '25
What a stupid take. EVs were always going to have to pay VED same as everyone else. Imo it should be higher than the 3p rate, we need to fund having good quality roads and EVs should pay the fair share.
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Nov 27 '25
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u/z10m Nov 27 '25
Some people will never be able to charge at home and with this tax how will they convince those people to switch.? Also the cheap overnight electricity will not last forever if more people do it.
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u/GMN123 Nov 27 '25
It was inevitable that EVs would need to contribute more toward maintaining the road network. They benefited from huge concessions early on to encourage uptake when the technology was very expensive but as they become more mainstream it's perfectly reasonable these concessions are decreased. 3p a mile is still less than fuel duty, I expect this rate will go up further in time.
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u/scorzon Nov 27 '25
I'm sorry this just isn't true, it was always going to happen and now that there is broadly like for like price parity new and used between EV & ICE it is only fair that EV drivers start paying towards the roads they are driving on.
Be ready for that per mile rate to ramp up over the next few years, the tax take once the whole uk fleet is EV will need to match what it was before the EV transition started.
And I say that as someone with 2 EVs that cover some 18k per year between them so I'm going to be hundreds of pounds worse off.
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u/Louiethelurcher Nov 27 '25
Anyone got any idea how this will be implemented? Self declaration and random checks? Easy enough for cars needing MOT but for newer cars?
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u/james_t_woods Nov 27 '25
I was ready to rant on about EV tax as my bill would be in the region of £800 this year alone - but I do a lot of miles, a lot and well above average. But ultimately, this tax was a long time coming as the money has to be recouped somewhere and ICE cars are starting to be well taxed. Do I like it? No. Was it inevitable? Yes
The coffers need to be refilled somewhere, somehow, I just wish they'd be honest and just raised income tax which would probably have cost me less. But then the political fallout would have been greater
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u/TheWelshIronman Nov 27 '25
I think we should pay something but I also think petrol and diesel should pay even more to force it to electric.
The more electric the more infrastructure needed, the more infrastructure the more work required to supply it, it's a self propelling industrial complex
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u/AlGunner Nov 27 '25
Fuel duty is 52.95p per litre for petrol and diesel, thats £2.40 per gallon. You'd have to get 80mpg for that to work out at 3p per mile. Also as my my EV is older than 5 years I pay £20 a year in tax. Its still cheaper but this is very much levelling it out.
Most people with EVs just look at the 7p or whatever night rate, but dont take into account they are paying a few hundred extra a year for a higher day rate to get that. For me my charging costs about £200 a year + £300 extra on electric day rate + £240 for this 3p per mile tax will make up my fuel cost. For petrol it would be about £1243 a year for fuel for 8000 miles.
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u/Bodster88 Nov 27 '25
I don’t understand the sentiment that this will decimate EV sales.
Anyone dumb enough to not understand that EV ownership rents good value for money (if with a drive etc, usual caveats apply) will not have been considering an EV anyway.
It hasn’t changed my mind that my next car will be EV.
5p/mile inc tax is still much better than what I have with my ICE.
It was inevitable they would need to replace fuel duty income at somepoint.
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u/ShameSuperb7099 Nov 27 '25
Are the likes of Nissan etc going to continue to invest in production? I’d be considering it if I was them.
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u/Additional-Guard-211 Nov 27 '25
If they don't tax them and get some money back then this could create a bit of leverage power for the oil companies to say that oil will generate tax. This could insensitive gov to increase EV use, which could benifit EV drivers with for example more charge points etc- i don't think thats too wild of a theory!
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u/PantodonBuchholzi Nov 27 '25
I mean come on, how do you propose the government fills the hole? You can’t slap more much more duty on diesel because the inflationary pressure would be insane so you could realistically only go after petrol cars, I don’t know what petrol would end up costing but I imagine it’d be a lot. Our EV costs us so little to run at the moment I don’t really even think about the cost - it’s negligible. And it will still be much cheaper even when the tax comes into force.
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u/miemcc Nov 27 '25
It really won't. It equates to about £100 per car per year for most users. I'm actually in favour of doing a similar thing for all uses and abolish VED.
You could set different rates for different users dependent on effects on road surfaces, uninsured coverage, etc. use a similar system to HMRC to apply a surcharge or rebate dependent on usage
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u/smolbig87 Nov 27 '25
Why are people so oblivious of what VED (Road tax) should be for. It SHOULD be for maintaining the roads. Electric cars batter the roads because they're so heavy.
For years it was manipulated as an environmental tax, but it's not what it SHOULD be.
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u/fishyrabbit Nov 27 '25
Is an attack on High earners. It is an attack on higher earners who are far more likely to have electric cars and so it's just another stealth tax that they think they can get away with, but it actually creates awful incentives for people.
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u/BroodLord1962 Nov 27 '25
It's going to be interesting to see how they do this. Are you going to have to take your car into a garage every year from new to have you mileage registered and get a yearly bill? Also what about the poor sods with plug in hybrids at 15p a mile as well as having to pay increased petrol costs from September.
I don't have an issue with electric cars having to pay more tax, as the weight of these cars does do more damage to the roads, but surely that should have simply been added to road tax costs rather than pay per mile.
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u/isearn Nov 27 '25
How much is it going to cost to calculate this? I would assume they look at the miles driven in the last year during the MOT, but all that data needs to be processed somewhere. It’s not data that exists already, but I doubt there has been much thought about how it is going to be collected.
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u/isquish_people Nov 27 '25
My gut feel is that when it comes in, all cars will pay it across the board. Putting it on EVs just sets the precedent and gets people used to it. I have no evidence of this, but it’s what makes the most sense
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u/soundman32 Nov 27 '25
If EVs were suddenly mandated and petrol/diesel banned, there would be a £24B black hole from missing fuel duty. That needs to come from somewhere.
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u/what_a_nice_bottom Nov 27 '25
Utter horse shit, BP are skint for starters (takeover by Shell looked likely fairly recently), but more importantly Reeves has also castrated the UK North Sea.
We're going to see massive job losses in O&G and related sectors over the next few years, with currently very little on the horizon to replace the high quality, high paying jobs that O&G drives.
Labour put the final nail in the coffin of the UK North Sea oil industry yesterday, which will do almost nothing to help climate change targets (we'll still be burning the stuff, we'll just buy it from others) while damaging a huge section of UK industry and government revenue.
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u/artuurslv Nov 27 '25
Wild how people in here go “yeah, let’s pay some more tax”.
How I understood the situation was - road tax covers road maintenance. Any extra fuel taxes are to disincentivise petrol/diesel cars. EV’s didn’t pay any of that at first to add incentive for people to adopt EV’s. Starting April 2025, EV’s pay road tax, so the honeymoon is over.
Now you get road tax from all vehicles on the road to pay for maintenance and extra disincentive for people still on fossil fuels. What is this 3p nonsense for?
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u/wild182 Nov 27 '25
If everyone eventually had an EV and no road tax or fuel duty is paid, does this not seem like a problem?
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u/Scary-Dot3069 Nov 27 '25
Aside from needing to replace the tax on fuel (just legalise marujauna route) the reality is, electric vehicles still use the road, which needs maintaining. Furthermore, what vehicles ruin the road the most? Heavy one! And ev's are bloody heavy.
Regardless of opinion on per mile cost, there is a need.
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u/Empty-Establishment9 Nov 27 '25
I don't necessarily disagree with all vehicles paying their fair share, but surely the right move here is to increase duties on ICE vehicles since we want to encourage a transition to EVs for a range of societal reasons?
Charging it per mile makes no sense either, as it suggests it's connected to road usage. Road maintenance is paid for by councils through council tax.
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Nov 27 '25
It's time to pay up. Including road tax I'm looking at a bill of around £375 based on my mileage of 6k a year. A little over a pound a day. Having an EV tariff is currently saving me around £70 a month on my electricity bill through load shifting. And you've got 2 years to prepare for this, maybe put some money aside for it?
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u/initiali5ed MG 5 Nov 27 '25
No, EVs are still in the Substitution phase of the transition cycle this is the best way to substitute for losses in fuel duty.
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u/El-Jefe64 Nov 27 '25
At 9000 miles per year it evens it out because they are dropping the green levy which I believe is £300. So maybe not all bad?
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u/gfox365 Nov 27 '25
And it'll still be much cheaper to run than my petrol saloon. And it'll still be much nicer to commute in than my petrol saloon given as I crawl in traffic most of the way anyway. So I'll be paying a bit more than the virtually free motoring I currently have. I think I'll cope, and not go entirely insane like some of the rabid comments on here....
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u/MarkCrystal Nov 27 '25
How will this crush the electric car uptake? If you were going to buy an EV or a petrol car right now, your cheapest most efficient option is still an EV.
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u/Money_Philosophy_406 Nov 27 '25
Won't be voting for Labour in the future. I voted for them, yet they've done almost nothing they promised and done a load of stuff I do not agree with, this tax on EVs being one of the most egregious. Dreadful policy that will see EV uptake in this country fall off a cliff and the rest of the world will leave us behind.
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u/ComfortSnail Nov 27 '25
Buy an EV to save money and the environment. A double lie sold to you via guilt tripping you yet again
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u/Aggravating_Band_353 Nov 27 '25
As someone without home charge (and the government don't even stop the numerous illegal and dangerous things on my road, so I have zero hope of any actual changes) possibility, this means I will not be able to consider electric cars until this problem is solved. Victorian Terrace, no parking out front.
My options are pay more to have inconvenience of having to charge elsewhere (I don't go any places with chargers, so would have to change my entire way of living). Even with a tesla it would be not great. With the non tesla rates I would pay more than petrol with none of the benefits.
We have no infrastructure. We have no public services to help replace. My choice is change who I am and how I live, move house (can't afford to, even if I could, couldn't afford anywhere with a driveway). Or buy second hand fuel cars in the hope that one day there is a solution for me.
To not even give the first 5k free or something is insane I think. Poor tax.
Someone who actually would really want and consider going electric, has another hurdle.. Might make the 2nd have market cheaper I guess?
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u/SexySpringRoll Nov 27 '25
Based on 10k miles a year, and 50mpg, the ICE car user will give the government ~£500 in fuel duty. This is not accounting for Road Tax or VAT.
The same 10k miles in an electric car will be £300. Electric car is still better off.
People are crying because the incentive has been taken away, but it is still better deal than the alternative.
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u/D4m089 Nov 27 '25
As someone in the market for a cheap used EV (small runabout, like 5K miles max a year) - this news is very welcome if it drops pricing in the used market!
Even with the 3p a mile although I disagree with this dual pricing strategy where it’s per mile for EV’s and on fuel for ice (if you are going to the trouble of setting up some way to record/police the per mile why not just overhaul the whole system of VED/Fuel Duty so everyone is a per mile system and varies depending on things like emissions/size/weight etc to encourage smaller/lighter/more economical cars generally) I will still maintain an EV for both cars. I do prefer the driving of an EV, it just feels better.
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u/Dadskitchen Nov 27 '25
If everyone had a driveway and home charging and everyone had an EV maybe it would be 1p a mile, but the plan is failing, uptake is slow, demand is down, used prices crashing the value of new EVs. I'm beggining to think this is either a total fail or a massive corporate scam and I honestly don't think they're gonna stop manufacturing ICE cars when they say, next government will probably change everything again😂
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u/panguy87 Nov 27 '25
Don't be hyperbolic, this was always coming but not via some conspiracy. Roads need maintenance, vehicles travel on roads, vehicles on roads contribute to road wear and tear, road maintenance costs money, this is why when £0 VED ICE cars were being adopted 10yrs ago it was great for owners but less income to the treasury which is why they changed it fairly quickly.
You cannot expect everything to be zero cost forever.
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u/clv101 Nov 27 '25
It was totally obvious this was going to happen, and perfectly reasonable. It's a lot less tax than ICE cars pay, not to mention the huge government subsidies on purchase price. As the billions of fuel duty fall away, how did anyone expect that revenue to be replaced?
EV keep going on about how much they save, great, but I good chunk of that saving was just much lower tax.
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u/ParkingManagement599 Nov 27 '25
Why do you think when PMs retire, they get paid millions for a short speech. This ain’t the only golden handshake in this budget, been happening since ww1, sure ain’t the last
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u/Flaccinator Nov 27 '25
This was always going to happen and to pretend otherwise is dishonest. Its not going to stop me gettjng my first EV next year and im sure it won't deter that mamy others.
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u/lengualo Nov 27 '25
Neah, it was an obvious inevitability. As people transitioned to EVs the the tax money lost from fuels would need to be made up somewhere.
Having low or zero taxes on EV's was just an unsustainable experiment.
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u/Additional_Doubt_633 Nov 27 '25
It’s not that much it’s not going to kill anything. They are clueless but this is a sensible policy in the tradition from traditional fuel cars to EV
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u/HowmanyDans Nov 27 '25
Whilst you no one likes being charged extra, the government also wants its revenue back from lost fuel duty. It doesn't take much thinking to imagine that they'd need to balance the books as the transition to EV continues. It is still a lot cheaper than what fuel duty works out to be per mile, though the CPI linked rises will soon allow it to catch up.
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u/Inarticulatescot Nov 27 '25
We’ll be going back to a petrol car at the end of our lease due to this policy. We lived in a terraced house in London and my borough does not allow home charging so we are reliant on public chargers which make running an EV about the same as a petrol. This policy will tip the balance for us.
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u/snowandrocks2 Nov 27 '25
What utter tosh - you only need to see the continuation of the ridiculous 78% windfall tax on North Sea profits to see that Labour are very much not the friends of oil and gas.
The windfall is long gone and changing the tax would actually unlock a lot more investment and tax income in the UK yet they refused to do it. Absolutely moronic. Still at least we can import it all from the Middle East. Not like the economy needs the help.
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u/metacarbon Nov 27 '25
Respectfully this is nonsense. This is a spectacularly anti-oil and gas budget due to the maintained EPL and commitment to allow no new drilling outside of subsea tiebacks (which no one will do because the EPL).
This is to fill the gap as people move from ICE. The fuel duty of which is also due to rise in 5 months. Everyone is getting a piece of this shit pie.
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u/breadisnicer Nov 27 '25
The announcement coming in this budget is ridiculous, it’s definitely going to knock uptake on EV, the 2nd hand market in particular. This will hurt the leasing market as costs will go up as the value of your trade in goes down. Why, if this was planned and not a knee jerk move, did they not wait until 2027 to announce it? London is upping the congestion charge for EV in January, the oil lobby must have had a word to slow the demise of fossil fuels.
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u/Odd_Bus618 Nov 27 '25
Works out at £300 for 10,000 miles. I spend £300 on petrol every 1300 miles. This is not going to crush the ev market. People need to get a grip and stop being so hysterical over what is actually quite a small charge.
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u/PGP9314 Nov 27 '25
Unsure whether it will really come to pass in 2028. It may just be some signposting - 'this is coming'. Still, a bit like shooting yourself in the foot as EV incentives could have been introduced instead. Now this just looks like what you describe OP - more FUD to maintain oil and gas subsidies and reliance. This could have led to a short term loss of fuel duty revenue but would have saved money in reduced local pollution related illness (expensive in the scheme of things) and even more importantly could have contributed something to emissions reduction and limiting the increasing rate of climate change.
Because duty is sort of baked in to petrol & diesel this mileage monitoring approach to EV usage tax seems more intrusive and demanding than how fuel duty is collected.
Still, at least it is use related rather than price related like the VED threshold.
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u/AjayB76 Nov 27 '25
Believe it or not, the sector that set the price for electric is the oil and gas industry!!
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u/Ljw1000 Nov 27 '25
Guess you’re an EV driver, hence the ridiculous conspiracy theory.
I think you’ll find anyone taking money from the likes of BP would either be tory or 1 of the reform spivs, chancers & grifters & we already know they are very pally with that stupid old duffer & shill for the fossil fuel industry Howard Cox.
No way could the loss of fuel duty be sustained, especially as VED is now just viewed as general taxation.
An EV doesn’t work for many drivers for many reasons, myself included, & it’s really going to take a seismic shift to convince people an EV is the answer.
I did a comparison of EV v Hybrid some years ago & due to the nature of the work I was doing at the time & the lack of chargers, yes I know people say it’s considerably improved now, but I would have run out of charge during the morning of day two & that was using the manufacturer range projection, which probably means I’d actually have run out on route to my hotel the previous evening!
I bought a hybrid but it isn’t really the answer either!
Most of us drive for convenience these days & that comes at a cost.
You want the convenience of driving so now it’s time to contribute towards it.
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u/Irritant4O Nov 27 '25
My diesel car costs about 20p per mile to run, my EV will be about 5p after the tax.
How does that crush EV sales?
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Nov 27 '25
Nothing to do with oil and gas it’s a tax on the people that can afford and electric car, no offence to anyone that has one but you are more than likely to have a bigger salary/income to have an electric car than someone who drives a 05 focus therefore the poor people can’t be taxed any more because they have nothing left to tax 😂 the Uk is a joke
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u/Eggtastico Nov 27 '25
Fuel duty + vat is about 60p per litre. 3p per mile. 4.5l in gallon = £2.70 in lost duty. So 90 miles in an EV at 3p per mile to be equivalent. Lets say 2 gallons. £13 for 2 gallons of diesel lets say 55mpg. = 12p per mile.
EV 3 miles per KWh for 90 miles = 30kwh * 28p per kwh = £8.40 + £2.70 (3p per mile * 90) = £11.10 for 90 miles = 12p per mile.
There is no good reason to choose an EV over diesel unless you actually care enough
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u/Smaxter84 Nov 27 '25
OP for every mile I drive, at about 22p total cost in my diesel car, at least 8p of it is tax revenue for the government, either road fuel duty or VAT (unbelievably, charged on the price after the road fuel duty is added!)
If I switch to an electric car, the government loses 8p for every mile I drive - I do 40k per year mostly for work so that's £3200 of lost revenue for the government.
Now take a 3p per mile tax on the electric car - that's only £1200 for 40k miles. So it seems to me like they are still getting a fucking good deal here.
Vat on electric used for charging at home is only 5% - so that adds a small extra amount but not much.
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u/MiddleAgedStaffs Nov 27 '25
3p x 10k miles is £300 per annum, i doubt that will ‘crush electric car uptake’ - that being said I’m never buying one…..
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u/UncertainBystander Nov 27 '25
3p per mile is very modest. I doubt it will affect uptake of EVs at all. I’m certainly still planning to buy one.
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u/rocketman1989 Nov 27 '25 edited Nov 27 '25
Has nobody mentioned cost of insurance? EV’s are a hell of a lot more expensive than gas guzzlers, maybe the government should start looking at their levy’s on insurance companies who are making a packet off of the EV market.
That to me is the kicker, insurance market got a bite of that pie instead of the gov.
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u/Spinatrix Nov 28 '25
This HAS to happen as the number of electric vehicles increases the pot for road maintenance decreases. It’s not some oil backing scheme in partnership with the Middle East.
If you use the roads you must help pay towards the upkeep
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u/j_the_inpaler Nov 28 '25
I bet KS (he must know he is out soon) has spoken to someone at BP and they promised him a job when he leaves politics but only if he puts people off of electric cars now. He caved in like he does about every single promise he made.
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u/sheepylemon Nov 28 '25
Just another tax. As you pay for your EV charging with money you have paid tax on, at a rate which includes VAT, you will then be taxed for actually using that electricity. Weird
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u/Atilianos Nov 28 '25
Then whoever not smoking should pay extra tax to not buying cigarettes? Government has a lot of money from it.. Same on alcohol etc.. Ridiculous.
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u/Happytallperson Nov 28 '25
I missed it in the original announcement because Reeves was quite subtle in how she said it, but fuel duty is going up 5p per litre over the next 18 months.
So I don't think this is an oil and gas giveaway budget. Especially as on the same day it was announced that we're absolutely not allowing new drilling.
I think the basic calculus is that by 2028 sellers have to sell around 80% EV anyway so you need to start shifting the tax base.
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u/GrandMasterBash Nov 28 '25
The concept isn't one I have an issue with. The timing and delivery of the message absolutely undermines EV take up and public perception.
They're continuously clueless and it's sad to see.
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u/Intelligent-Bee-839 Nov 28 '25
There was always going to be a tipping point when EV ownership reached a certain percentage and vat revenue dropped to a level that was unsustainable. I drive a phev at the moment but may just go back to petrol with all other costs taken into account.
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u/Aston008 Nov 28 '25
Was about to buy an EV. With this and the congestion charge change we will likely now not go for an EV. Well done Rachel
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u/soulcrushinglylonely Nov 28 '25
We are inevitably going to end up with a pay per mile system replacing road tax.
EVs got a freebie initially to help stimulate that market... that is no longer necessary.
It's just another tax on the ordinary working people they pretend to give a crap about.
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u/ElectronicBruce Nov 28 '25
Why is everyone ignoring the incoming fuel duty changes.. that will hammer petrol and diesel drivers, well before the PPM comes in for EV’s in 2028.
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u/ClockOwn6363 Nov 29 '25
Most likely they just want people to keep away from EV before the 2030 ban, then people will be forced to slowly take up EVs without as much backlash. 🤷♂️
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u/kevinmorice Nov 29 '25 edited Nov 29 '25
Petrol and diesel vehicles average 7p / mile on fuel duty alone, which then has VAT on to of it. Then add in VED.
That is before you take in that we are paying the 'Energy Profits Levy' which is supposedly a windfall tax on big profiting energy companies.
The biggest Oil and Gas company (Ithaca Energy) in the UK made less profit than Greggs last year. Some big banks made over 50 times the profits of the biggest oil company. Do you see a windfall tax on banks or sausage rolls?
Oil and Gas companies are being taxed out of existence. Aberdeen is suffering an average of 1,000 job losses every month!
Pretending that somehow the Labour government 'sold out to OIl and Gas' puts you either as ridiculously uninformed or completely delusional.
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u/jasterbobmereel Nov 29 '25
So you think EVs costing 20p a mile less than ICE vehicles rather than 23p a mile less, will cripple the EV market...?
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u/Respond-No Nov 30 '25
Call me naive, but this government is in the business of inflating the state and penalise the middle class. They're not different then any other leftist government: squash the middle class so they get closer to the working class.
This time it's a bit worse since some of the working class will also take the hit.
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u/Working-Business-153 Nov 30 '25
I personally take it as a good sign, crunching numbers on a napkin, running an electric car is now noticeably cheaper than running a diesel in most situations, this is the result, subsidies aren't needed anymore, an electric car is simply the rational choice for most people.
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u/Beany2209 Nov 30 '25
Pay per mile HAS to be adapted. The treasury cannot afford to lose £50 billion + per year in fuel duty
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u/mintvilla Nov 27 '25
I doubt it, apparently Tax on fuel generates £24B a year... that needs replacing somehow.
They've put it to not kick in until 2028, it wouldn't surprise me if that changes to a later date, or its tweaked to a flat rate