So did the greens destroy the Irish car industry ?

Morlar

I can not stand bill cullen but I think he hit the nail on the head with this one :

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/green-gaffe-fuels-car-sales-storm-1797339.html

Green gaffe fuels car sales storm

By Aidan O'Connor

Tuesday June 30 2009

A BLISTERING public row between the Green Party and 'Apprentice' frontman Bill Cullen over the collapsing motor industry deepened last night.

Green Party chairman Dan Boyle accused the tycoon of embarking on a personal and political crusade against his party after the finance spokesman was left red-faced after an embarrassing gaffe live on air.

Mr Boyle was forced to apologise to Mr Cullen on radio after he got his facts wrong during a debate on the 'Today' with the Pat Kenny radio programme.

Mr Cullen has lambasted the Green Party on a number of TV and radio interviews and blamed the junior Government partner for "killing" the motor trade with changes to the car tax regime in favour of less polluting vehicles that cost the economy billions of euro.

He claimed the motor industry has collapsed by 65pc -- and the Green Party is mostly to blame.

Mr Boyle rejected the claims, but was slapped down by the former Renault Ireland chief when he said one-in-eight people in the country were getting a new car every year during the boom years. But Mr Cullen responded: "Hold on Dan, mathematics, you'd want to go back to school. You're saying one in eight of the population, it's one in 80, well 8 and 80 is a huge difference and here we are with the Greens again getting it all wrong."

Mr Boyle replied "I'm sorry, I'm sorry", but the damage was already done.

"You're sorry? It's too late now. You killed the motor trade, people can't buy a new car, you stopped it and it's all because of the Greens," Mr Cullen snapped back.

Mr Cullen later insisted he had "nothing against the Green Party or Mr Boyle "per se",

But he added: "They need to get their heads out of the sand and accept they've contributed to this."

- Aidan O'Connor

mickoneill30

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

Does Detroit know about this?

Who destroyed the car industries in the other countries? Was it a concerted attack?

smash

No they were not a primary cause

The new tax and VRT system have a major role in killing the industry. That's undeniably true!

Hellrazer

I dont think the Greens killed the motor industry.They may have contributed to it but the main people at fault in my opinion are the banks and their refusal to give credit.

I have customers that 6 months could have gotten credit to buy whatever they wanted and now they couldnt finance anything.

darcy.jonny

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

to be honest theres

a) the global downturn in the market
b) cars in ireland being cazly over priced here compared to other eu states
c) the shambols that we call out insurance industry
d) the terrible after sales service we get when we do buy cars
e) the high fuel prices will stop people from buying cars with large engines

take into consideration the greens are not in power in america , britian etc, and there car industries are in the same trouble as our , most of them are actually far worse off e.g. america , so ild have to say the green party definatley have not helped matters but there not responsible for the death of the irish car indusrty , that down to global ecnomics and there inabilitly to be competitive with there eu counterparts ...........

maybe one day we would have a single EU regestration , where vrt etc didnt exist ,, what would happen to the irish motor industry then .................out of business over night

Cionád

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

I'd say the lack of credit, lack of consumer confidence/job security, uncertainty about other taxes/levies and personal debt would all rate above the greens in terms of blame.

Shazforgrub

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

I don't know a huge amount of facts or figures on the issue but my first instinct would be to say he's out by the side of it blaming the greens for the collapse of the motor trade. There's a global recession on, which has been made worse in Ireland by the incompetence of Fianna Fail. A hell of a lot of people are out of work, and a lot more are in fear of losing there job, so obviously they won't be buying a car. A lot more people realise how silly we've been with our cash in recent years, and that a new car every year is unsustainable. Its the building trade all over again, there's only so many houses people need, there's only so many shops that are required, and there's only so many new cars required every year aswell. If we were operating from realistic levels then the hit wouldn't have been so bad for the motor trade, but at the end of the day it couldn't have kept going the way it was

Owen

No they were not a primary cause

What will happen in this thread is that consumers with a little knowledge of the trade will say that the Greens contributed but that's all, and the people working in the trade who know the business intimately will say yes it is the Green's fault. And they'll never agree.

The global slowdown had nothing to do with this. The motor trade was screwed long before the economy collapsed.

bladespin

No they were not a primary cause

Definately had a huge part to play in it, announcing changes to tax bands but not details until after the start of the year was always going to put a full stop to the majority of new sales until the full details were known, at that stage it was too late.

peasant

The fact that the new VRT/motor tax rates that the greens cooked up where introduced in the middle of the sales year 08 didn't help either.

But then again, that was SIMI that asked for this to be moved from January to June/July

Shazforgrub

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

PaintDoctor wrote: »

consumers with a little knowledge of the trade will say that the Greens contributed but that's all, and the people working in the trade who know the business intimately will say yes it is the Green's fault. And they'll never agree.

The global slowdown had nothing to do with this. The motor trade was screwed long before the economy collapsed.

Could you please elaborate further on how the greens supposedly ruined the motor trade?!

bladespin

No they were not a primary cause

Shazforgrub wrote: »

Could you please elaborate further on how the greens supposedly ruined the motor trade?!

See the post above yours.

thebman

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

It damaged it, the housing crisis that has caused the banking crisis is really to blame since people are either bankrupt or can't get credit and sometimes both.

As we are in a recession, I think people just take on a different mindset and decide they'll keep the car for an extra year as they want to spend less as everyone else is (herd mentality).

So no the greens didn't single handedly do it. Its been on the cards for ages. Buying from the north cheaper is something that has only become worthwhile for people recently (it has been cheaper for sometime but most people didn't think it was worthwhile finding out how to go about it).

Paulw

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

I guess if you totally ignore a global recession, major banking failures, credit crunch, job losses, etc, then yeah, of course the Green's are at fault. :rolleyes:

R.O.R

I think they contributed to the decline, but overall there are other factors to take in to account.

The changes to the VRT system more or less mirror a draft proposal put forward by BMW Ireland so the idea was around before the greens put their weight behind it.
http://www.finance.gov.ie/documents/publications/vrt/vrtbmw.pdf

Darsad

No they were not a primary cause

I dont blame the greens I blame Ahern and Cowen for agreeing to this idiotic system which cost the exchequer billions in lost revenue. The motor industry had been in discussions and were preparing to introduce a CO2 based tax system within the engine CC bands. This system would have been revenue neutral and seen small price reductions or increases and not the swing of thousands the current system created. CO2 figures are only going one way and that is down and the gov's take will continue to fall away we will soon have family sized saloons in band A and then we will have to see another re jig of the whole system leading to further problems.

Wile E. Coyote

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

The Greens contributed to it but the motor industry didn't help themselves either with the prices they were charging compared to most other European countries

Padraig Mor

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

Cullen is full of **** - the VRT changes had SFA to do with the collapse. It can be mostly attributed to people being afraid to spend their money due to fears about job security etc. Significant blame can also be attached to the many dealers who simply ordered 'as normal' without considering the economic conditions or VRT changes. At the end of the day, very few models had particularly significant price reductions. The changes just happened to coincide with the market collapse. In typical fashion however, the Irish motor 'industry' is hanging the blame on a convenient target rather than looking in the mirror.

PaintDoctor wrote: »

The global slowdown had nothing to do with this. The motor trade was screwed long before the economy collapsed.

The Irish economy has been going down the toilet since late 2006. The motor trade seems to have started turning down in early '08.

thebman

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

I think its funny that the greens object at all given they basically do want to see the car industry die although they have been supporting cutting public transport too so I guess they are driving demand for cars in some ways :P

igglou

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

Cionád wrote: »

I'd say the lack of credit, lack of consumer confidence/job security, uncertainty about other taxes/levies and personal debt would all rate above the greens in terms of blame.

I'd agree here, sure the fact that I could go and by a 2.0l BMW and only pay €156 in car tax for the year and it was at a reduced price due to a lower VRT encouraged me to change my car in Jan. Though if it were now with my husband out of work and I've been hit with a concoction of levies I wouldn't be changing. So it all leads to what Cionád said.

Darsad

No they were not a primary cause

Padraig Mor wrote: »

Cullen is full of **** - the VRT changes had SFA to do with the collapse. .

Oh right so the fact that pre July 08 cars suddenly lost thousands in value and became almost sale proof over night had nothing to do with the VRT changes. No dealer wanted to take trade ins , It was also a stupid system that allowed for identical cars with the same emission figures to be taxed and valued on different scales .

Owen

No they were not a primary cause

Shazforgrub wrote: »

Could you please elaborate further on how the greens supposedly ruined the motor trade?!

Love to. The announced the VRT changes in the end of 07, which immediately screwed up every deal every dealership had done for 08. Lots of people cancelled ordering due to confusion, others postponed until July. What happened then was a flurry of miscommunication and idiocy from the Greens on what exactly they were going to do about importing of pre 08 cars, and 08 cars, and they couldn't even make up their minds about that until April. Oh, and they were going to implement the changes in Jan 08 - but because they were too busy hugging trees and wading in smugness - they couldn't figure that out either and then delayed it until July - resulting in yet more confusion.

In the meantime every individual with their car on finance learned quickly that they were suddenly in negative equity, the car they bought in 06 which was worth 30k was now worth 20k, despite their balance on their loan still being 30k - effectively meaning they couldn't buy their next car. And then to compound it all, every Dealership in the country lost millions on their cars for the same reasons - which equated to lay offs, and dealership closures.

Then because of the incredible mess the Greens caused, and Joe Public not understanding exactly what the changes were - a lot of people just didn't buy cars. Which then had a knock on effect on all the tertiary businesses - servicing, parts sales, tire shops, body shops, all effected, all resulting in job losses.

If the Greens had bothered their hole to think the changes through and communicate clear information, and perhaps introduce it in 09, rather than the middle of the year, it would have been better for everyone.

Remember, all of this happened before the collapse of the economy - so the Greens are entirely to blame. For some reason posters here think that the economy has something to do with it, but it was going on long before any economic changes.

faceman

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

You would want to be an idiot to think that the Greens are the primary reason for the motor industry downturn. Ask any retailer or consumer facing business if their business is suffering at the moment. Then ask them if its to do with the Green party. Me thinks not.

Lets not forget the motor industry rode the public for years on prices, especially when people were spending the SSIA's. (Ive never once heard Alan Nolan of SIMI mention SSIA's in any of his recent speeches.)

Although I do think the government shafted the industry with the VAT issue. And i wouldnt vote Green if you paid me. They should rename that party the "More taxes for everyone" Party as all they ever want to do is introduce taxes and levies.

Owen

No they were not a primary cause

Anyway, what's funny, is that now that we're all on a Co2 crusade - there's been a shift to Diesel, and while a lot of the new efficient green cars emit very little Co2 - they emit an awful lot of Nox which is toxic to humans.

So expect that when the mess of Co2 VRT changes has settled down, and everyone's content with their cheap motoring, to be raped again by the Greens with Nox & Co2 based VRT - which will devalue everything all over again.

robbie99

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

There are more consumers than motor traders and the consumer wants cheaper cars.

Bill Cullen is scoring an own goal with his criticisms of the Green party because the Green party have helped the consumer by reducing VRT (albeit only on the lower emissions cars).

Bill Cullen and the rest of the profiteering Irish Motor trade can take a hike if they don't want to provide us with cheaper cars. We'll get them from UK ourselves thank you very much. :mad:

Owen

No they were not a primary cause

robbie99 wrote: »

Bill Cullen is scoring an own goal with his criticisms of the Green party because the Green party have helped the consumer by reducing VRT (albeit only on the lower emissions cars).

Helped the consumers by putting every single person and business who had a motor loan into negative equity?

The advantages of having lower VRT are only available to those who either own their cars, or are buying with no trade in. Which are a very small amount of people.

Johnboy Mac

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

For 10-12 years they was one hell of an amount of new cars sold year in year out, plus used cars by main dealers never mind the independents etc. This could never last, well maybe a little longer if the recession (a recession of our own making, see IMF report) didn't hit us. And everybody knows one of the first items to get hit in a recession are new car sales.

It's been on the cards for sometime that the motor taxation system would change to a system based on emissions (the UK is prime example), which has occured and makes it cheaper to buy more effecient cars.

If the motor industry want to point the finger they should look first at themselfs and their lobbist the SIMI.

The only people I'm sorry about are the employees, even the the glorified order takers (Sales staff).

I presume most of the profits made by main dealers have gone into property speculation (plus holiday homes in the south of Spain, helicopters etc) and not back into the core business or kept for rainy days?

Also I suspect their poor customer service skills has had a major impact on the after sales business where they might have been able to survive this down turn if they were more proctive in this area and had not just blindly concentrated on sales.

Having said that I'm sure there are exceptions but not too many.

mickoneill30

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

PaintDoctor wrote: »

In the meantime every individual with their car on finance learned quickly that they were suddenly in negative equity, the car they bought in 06 which was worth 30k was now worth 20k

Is it not that the car you buy devalues by thousands the second you buy it. Maybe not by 10 grand but by a few grand anyway.

PaintDoctor wrote: »

For some reason posters here think that the economy has something to do with it,

Probably for the same reason that businesses all over the country are laying off thousands of employees every month, the same reason we're paying a lot more tax now than we were this time last year. It's called the recession.

Also the recent sterling value has sent thousands of shoppers of cars, TVs, groceries and everything over the border for the last 8 - 10 months. I'm pretty sure that would account for a lot of lost sales.

And finally (total opinion here) some car dealers need a good kick up the hole. I know two people who bought cars from dealers this year. Both of them shopped around and they both had stories of dealers that couldn't be bothered selling them their cars. I'm not talking about customers going in and trying to haggle, I'm talking of customers going in, having to interrupt salesmen from their private chats and then getting monosyllable answers to their questions. Both bought their cars from sales people who bothered trying to sell.

robbie99

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

PaintDoctor wrote: »

Helped the consumers by putting every single person and business who had a motor loan into negative equity?

Everybody with negative equity by definition has a loan outstanding on their car. If you needed such a big loan to get into negative equity then you couldn't afford the car in the first place. It's unsustainable for any business to be relying on consumers who can't afford their products in the first place and those chickens have come home to roost.

Seth Brundle

steve06 wrote: »

The new tax and VRT system have a major role in killing the industry. That's undeniably true!

role? possibly!
Major role? definitely no!

Darsad wrote: »

I dont blame the greens I blame Ahern and Cowen for agreeing to this idiotic system which cost the exchequer billions in lost revenue.

They were elected into position remember!

Wile E. Coyote wrote: »

The Greens contributed to it but the motor industry didn't help themselves either with the prices they were charging compared to most other European countries

The cost of cars here was inflated because of VRT. Dealers don't make that much money per car after costs.

Darsad wrote: »

Oh right so the fact that pre July 08 cars suddenly lost thousands in value and became almost sale proof over night had nothing to do with the VRT changes. No dealer wanted to take trade ins , It was also a stupid system that allowed for identical cars with the same emission figures to be taxed and valued on different scales .

Dealers didn't want trade ins because by then the market was already starting to quieten down.
The changes in VRT & motor tax made people decide harder on what to buy but I don't believe that it stopped people buying significantly.

As already mentioned, there is a global economic crisis. Right across the globe, manufacturers cannot shift stock. Ireland because of its economic activity over the last few years is in a more vulnerable position. Banks aren't lending like they used to. People are nervious about not being in work this time next year. Would you take out a big loan right now?

edanto

PaintDoctor -when are you saying that the Irish economy started to collapse?

Owen

No they were not a primary cause

mickoneill30 wrote: »

Is it not that the car you buy devalues by thousands the second you buy it. Maybe not by 10 grand but by a few grand anyway.

robbie99 wrote: »

Everybody with negative equity by definition has a loan outstanding on their car.

Only for the first 2 years of a loan ... after that you're in equity, most people get to a point about 24 months into a motor loan where they owe less than what their car is worth. But what happened with these changes, was that after the owner of the car got to a state where they could comfortably change car, and use the equity in their loan as a deposit - the Greens came in and put them back 2 years financially again.

robbie99 wrote: »

If you needed such a big loan to get into negative equity then you couldn't afford the car in the first place.

There's a place for mentalities like that. It's called Communist Russia. If someone wants to get a motor loan, let them. By the same logic, we shouldn't be getting mortgages.

Anyway, I'm done with this thread - as I said at the start, there are 2 types of people in this thread. The people who don't work in the trade, and don't have all the facts but will post authoritative reasons - and the people who have worked in the trade, and are here just stating what actually did happen. Whether or not you want to believe those facts is entirely up to you.

EPM

I voted that they contributed to 65% yada yada yada.

You cant deny the current economic conditions are affecting sales to some extent. However, those fecktard greens suddenly ripping the arse out of resale values has put new cars out of reach of most joe soaps, the kind of people that would change every 2-3 years for €x are now being faced with larger cost to change figures that they may not be able to afford or could be in negative equity thus affecting their ability to draw down a loan.

It's should have been common sense not to suddenly reduce VRT on vehicles which had traditionally been more expensive (i.e. diesel). Any VRT reductions should have been gradual to reduce the shock to the market place. It beggars belief that no one actually thought of this scenario when implementing it.

mike65

You can listen to the Dan Boyle/Bill Cullen debate on Pat Kennys radio show here

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/todaywithpatkenny/

click Monday and FF stream to 20 mins in.

bladespin

No they were not a primary cause

Not in the motor trade so of course I speak as a consumer but here's my take:

In late 2007 I was looking to change the car, there was a lot of talk about the changes to VRT etc so I decided to hold off until it was sorted.
There was very little real information on what was going to happen until summer 2008, I wasn't going to change the car at that stage, the depreciation wouldn't have been worth it IMO also when the changes did come out of course my trade in had plunged like everyone elses.

This year I bought a much larger car than I had originally wanted, the price was right and it suited my circumstances too (baby buggy to transport). I bought it privately too, there were so many second hand bargains out there I couldn't justify a new car.

How many were like me? That's 2 sales the dealer lost out on, between timing and pthe second hand market, most if not all my friends did exactly the same, that can't have been good for the dealers.

robtri

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

I think it is riddiculous to say that the greens are the primary cause behind the collapse of the Irish Motor trade...

The collapse is mainly due to the collapse of the local economy, people losing jobs and pay cuts, short time hours, which mean a lot joe soaps either now don't have the money to buy a new car or are worried about their jobs and are unwilling to buy a new car...

Added to that, the banking/finance sector pulling a lot of funding for loans back... means less money to be spent....

all that means feck all money for luxuries like new cars......

Long Onion

VRT, greed, shoddy service and downright apathy have wrecked the car industry. We have adopted an illegal tax which we are now stuck with. Dealership forecourts are full of secondhand cars with VRT already factored in so the government can't withdraw it now even if they wanted to. You pay VRT on safety features such as ESC, ABS etc - it's a ridiculous situation.

Car dealers and main franchisers have ripped us off for years and we have paid way over the odds for underspecced cars. We have put up with cartels fixing prices, outrageous servicing costs and poor consumer support.

Customer service has been, for the most part, diabolical, sh1tty trade-in values, no courtesy cars, rude service managers and little communication.

worse still, we have continued to put up with this, we have signed up to creadit agreements by the new time and continued to hand over our hard earned cash to dealers who had relegated the business of motor tading to second rank after building property empires. So we all must shoulder the blame.

The greens have had a small part to play without doubt but then again, they are the "Greens" - blaming them for wrecking the car industry is like blaming a penguin for eating fish. When your whole policy is based around the ecology you will always lock horns with cars, planes and plastic bags.

As for Bill Cullen, the electric systems of renaults have not done anything to help the indusrty - ask a megane owner.

Padraig Mor

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

PaintDoctor wrote: »

Remember, all of this happened before the collapse of the economy - so the Greens are entirely to blame. For some reason posters here think that the economy has something to do with it, but it was going on long before any economic changes.

Sorry Ned, but that's a load of rubbish.

smash

No they were not a primary cause

darcy.jonny wrote: »

a) the global downturn in the market

True

darcy.jonny wrote: »

b) cars in ireland being cazly over priced here compared to other eu states

Never stopped people buying before

darcy.jonny wrote: »

c) the shambols that we call out insurance industry

Never stopped people buying before

darcy.jonny wrote: »

d) the terrible after sales service we get when we do buy cars

Never stopped people buying before

darcy.jonny wrote: »

e) the high fuel prices will stop people from buying cars with large engines

Again - never stopped people buying before, remember not too long aga petrol was up at 132+... it's cheaper than that now!

You're missing the VRT and Road tax changes completely!

smash

No they were not a primary cause

thebman wrote: »

It damaged it, the housing crisis that has caused the banking crisis is really to blame since people are either bankrupt or can't get credit and sometimes both.

This is a big factor now, but the CO2 changes happened well before this.

thebman wrote: »

So no the greens didn't single handedly do it.

They accelerated it though!

Padraig Mor wrote: »

Cullen is full of **** - the VRT changes had SFA to do with the collapse.

Rubbish - people stopped buying petrol cars... When some cars as low as 1.8 were now due to pay out 2k a year tax because of the new system people refused to buy them!

robbie99 wrote: »

Bill Cullen is scoring an own goal with his criticisms of the Green party because the Green party have helped the consumer by reducing VRT (albeit only on the lower emissions cars).

I think you just cancelled your own point there... VRT became a lot higher on a lot of cars too!

Another thing that's currently helping in the killing of the industry is the rise in VAT.

robtri

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

PaintDoctor wrote: »

Anyway, I'm done with this thread - as I said at the start, there are 2 types of people in this thread. The people who don't work in the trade, and don't have all the facts but will post authoritative reasons - and the people who have worked in the trade, and are here just stating what actually did happen. Whether or not you want to believe those facts is entirely up to you.

I have worked in the trade till recently for 10 years...and I believe that the economy has contibuted more to the decline than the green party.....

smash

No they were not a primary cause

robtri wrote: »

I have worked in the trade till recently for 10 years...and I believe that the economy has contibuted more to the decline than the green party.....

There are a lot here that work or have worked in the trade and you seem to be the only one who didn't see the mess that the VRT and CO2 Tax systems caused before a recession hit... how can this be?

Johnboy Mac

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

steve06 wrote: »

The new tax and VRT system have a major role in killing the industry. That's undeniably true!

It was only the straw that broke the Camels back, nothing more.

robtri

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

steve06 wrote: »

There are a lot here that work or have worked in the trade and you seem to be the only one who didn't see the mess that the VRT and CO2 Tax systems caused before a recession hit... how can this be?

I never said I didn't see the mess the VRT and Co2 taxing system brought about... I did see it, but I don't blame it for the collapse of the motor trade...
big difference...

maidhc

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

Hold on.

Cars have never been cheaper.

WTF am I missing?

smash

No they were not a primary cause

Johnboy Mac wrote: »

It was only the straw that broke the Camels back, nothing more.

No, the economy collapse was the straw that broke the camels back!

maidhc wrote: »

Hold on.

Cars have never been cheaper.

WTF am I missing?

Well if you look around you'll notice the lack of dealerships still going strong, and the lack of finance!

sparklepants

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

I heard the interview on the radio yesterday. Boyle was shockingly bad, Cullen wiped the floor with him, which genuinely surprised me. I don't know why Boyle was on the show in the first place, since he's not an elected representative. He got his senate seat from Bertie, and was given the two fingers by the Munster electorate in the European elections.

But no, the Greens didn't destroy the Irish car "industry" - but they're certainly in the process of destroying themselves.

galwaytt

No they were not a primary cause

bladespin wrote: »

Not in the motor trade so of course I speak as a consumer but here's my take:

In late 2007 I was looking to change the car, there was a lot of talk about the changes to VRT etc so I decided to hold off until it was sorted.
There was very little real information on what was going to happen until summer 2008, I wasn't going to change the car at that stage, the depreciation wouldn't have been worth it IMO also when the changes did come out of course my trade in had plunged like everyone elses.

This year I bought a much larger car than I had originally wanted, the price was right and it suited my circumstances too (baby buggy to transport). I bought it privately too, there were so many second hand bargains out there I couldn't justify a new car.

How many were like me? That's 2 sales the dealer lost out on, between timing and pthe second hand market, most if not all my friends did exactly the same, that can't have been good for the dealers.

Mines a different version of the same story. I bought new in 07 and paid the then-going-rate. Long story, changed down, later that year, and decided to buy 2 cars with 1 car-money. So I bought one, the budget came out, the changes were contained therein, and I bought the 2nd one.

Then lo-and-behold, the VRT changes get reversed, and both cars I had bought, especially the diesel, got absolutely whupped. I lost 10k on a 28k car overnight, and another friend of mine lost 10k overnight on DSG diesel Passat. I personally attribute over 14k out of 41k I'd spent directly to the Green's ****up. In my book, that's 14k they owe me, or 3.2 years motoring, which ever way you look at it. Or, another way, that's an extra 3.2 years that I will be absent from the market to replace them. And that, most assuredly, does cost jobs, tax, income, to somebody. And that is most assuredly the Green's fault.

I am so looking forward to the next election, and the door-bell ringers, it's not funny.........

maidhc

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

steve06 wrote: »

Well if you look around you'll notice the lack of dealerships still going strong, and the lack of finance!

Well all the greens did was make cars cheaper.

The fact no one has money or can get loans is a different matter entirely.

McSpud

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

While the Greens have had some impact Cullen is a bit delusional. A new car is a luxury item & when people don't have jobs or not secure in their current job they don't buy luxury items.

I have money to buy a new car now but due to uncertain job situation will hold off for a while as I don't need a new or replacement car. Similarly I am sure even people who can get credit are probably not keen getting tied to a personal loan in a recession.

If anything the tax changes would encourage me to buy at 2008 car instead of 2006-07.

Johnboy Mac

They contributed to the 65% decline in the Irish car industry

Don't agree Steve06.

There is no way this country could have continued purchasing the amount of new cars as it had been along side the massive importation of UK vehicles, recession or no recession. A downturn was on the cards regardless it was only a matter of time.

But I do conceed that new VRT & Tax rates along with the recession compounded this situation far more rapidly. Remember the novelty factor of owing a new car was growing thin and very used car imported automatically removed a punter from the forecourts of dealerships.