Post-Budget Hikes - Car Tax [Merged]

Mr E

Car Tax.... If you want a 2lt Diesel car, expect to be quite a few hundred euro worse off (petrol rise, VRT rise and now car tax rise).

Why wasn't this stuff included in Wednesdays budget? What other little extras can we expect in the weeks to come?

- Dave.

The Government is reportedly about to increase the cost of car tax by between 10 and 12%.

Speculation in today’s Irish Times has said that if implemented, it would be the biggest once off road tax increase in ten years.

On Wednesday a 7% hike in vehicle registration tax for vehicles over 1900 CC, was announced by the Minister for Finance, Charlie McCreevy. (Source: Irish Examiner)

hallelujajordan

http://www.rte.ie/news/2002/1206/motortax.html

10-12% increase in car tax, effective from January . . . Why was this not announced on Budget Day???

MrPudding

Canada is looking better and better.

Cork

Originally posted by MrPudding
Canada is looking better and better.

I think that more prices will be hiked up in the coming weeks.

Watch out for refuse charges - they will sky rocket.

Is it hard to get visas for Canada?

MrPudding

They work on a points system. If you get the points you have a good chance of getting in. You will need a few grand up front but the figures look good. Example; An average IT job pays arround €35000. An average 5 bedroom house, some come with a pool, cost about €80000. Nice

Grumble,Grumble, moan, moan,thats all I hear....:rolleyes:
Fact: It costs a lot of money to run this country.
Fact: wages and other costs in the road building sector are rising.
Fact: The money has to come from somewhere.

Even poor people are better off now than five years ago, maybe a different government would get a better deal for them who knows?

All this moaning comes from greed, everybody wants more for themselves, without a hint or consideration as to where it's coming from:rolleyes:

Take it off the rich, the business people, the entrepreneurs,the industrialists, I hear said...
And then a proportion of them move elsewhere with their jobs, resulting in higher unemployment, bigger government defecits etc, etc.
It's a fact that the more money you earn , usually you pay more lolly in taxes....hard earned lolly, which is earned in most cases by people who have the skills to deserve that income.

If the Motor tax rise is being ring fenced for road improvements, then I think it's a fair contribution from the road users, assuming better roads mean less damage to our cars.
Short term pain=long term gain, in this case.
mm

DiscoStu

Originally posted by Man
Grumble,Grumble, moan, moan,thats all I hear....:rolleyes:

Even poor people are better off now than five years ago, maybe a different government would get a better deal for them who knows?

All this moaning comes from greed, everybody wants more for themselves, without a hint or consideration as to where it's coming from:rolleyes:

i would say that this moaning come from the fact that the previous/current government right royally ****ed up the public finances. This situation should not have ever have come about but due to their complete disregard for any kind of long term scenario that went beyond their own term in government they spent and spent and spent until the country was almost bled dry.

Why did this 10% increase not happen to be mentioned in the budget? And what little tidbits of extra budget planning are going to slip out next week?

Hang on, what could they have done seriously though, to save money??
McCreevy put millions into a pension fund, which went badly wrong. He kind of had the right idea but was defeated by circumstances.
He's no eejit, indeed pragmatic to an extent.
He knew the story, regarding how impossible it would have been to address the wastage and patronage scattered across various sectors of society, mainly embedded there by Fianna Fáil and to a lesser extent by FG...
But then we returned them and probably will do so again for want of an alternative:rolleyes:

Motor tax rises are actually for the Minister of the environment, probably decided by the cabinet, but not specefic to the budget.

Silly to announce it a day or two afterwards though, leaving it open to accusations of being a stealth rise.
mm

bonkey

Originally posted by DiscoStu
i would say that this moaning come from the fact that the previous/current government right royally ****ed up the public finances. This situation should not have ever have come about but due to their complete disregard for any kind of long term scenario that went beyond their own term in government they spent and spent and spent until the country was almost bled dry.

Sure, and while they were bleeding the country almost dry, almost the entire populace was complaining that the government werent giving enough back to the people who had caused it to happen, and that "now that we had money", wasnt it time that more was spent on X, Y and Z, and so on and so forth.

Every time that someone brought up the "saving for a rainy day" question, there were half a dozen others waiting to step in and point out that Problem X was too urgent to be shelved just because someone wanted to "play safe" and so on.

Face it - people are never happy with what is done, and rarely unhappy enough to actually do anything about it other than grumble amongst themselves.

Celtic Tiger arrives, and people complain - our taxes should be lower, our roads should be better, our hospital service should be better, hell - if money could have done it, people would have asked for our weather to be better.

Now the Celtic Tiger has gone and all we hear is how the government screwed up...not by spending money in the wrong place (as was the previous complaint) but just by having spent it in the first place.

jc

DiscoStu

Originally posted by Man
Hang on, what could they have done seriously though, to save money??

im no economist but when you allow spending to increase by a rate that is faster than the growth of your income money will tend to dry up very very quickly.

He knew the story, regarding how impossible it would have been to address the wastage and patronage scattered across various sectors of society, mainly embedded there by Fianna Fáil and to a lesser extent by FG...

???
Does that kind thinking work for an ostritch(sp)?.

The wastage and inefficency in the public sector has to be addressed. it will not go away so forgetting about it will not make it better.

A prime example of this waste is the road builing projects. on wednesday night i belive it was stated by the rte business reporter that the average cost overrun of a raod building project in ireland was between 30% to 65%. that has to be stopped. another example(stated here in an earlier thread) was the luas bridge forced to be completed early just as an election stunt for FF. how much was wasted in extra man hours to get that monument to berties ego done?

However fixing would be a long term thing, much longer than the lifetime of this goernment and that is not what FF are in power for. they are in power to stay in power and do whatever it takes to keep it that way. all they care about is keeping people blissfully happy and ignorant of what its going on, and by christ didnt they do well.

hallelujajordan

Originally posted by Man
Grumble,Grumble, moan, moan,thats all I hear....:rolleyes:
Fact: It costs a lot of money to run this country.
Fact: wages and other costs in the road building sector are rising.
Fact: The money has to come from somewhere.

FACT : Every month, after I have paid my bills, I have less money left over for me . . . . . the rate at which this is happening is much greater than the rate my salary is increasing (or is ever likely to)

FACT : Every month, I add an extra couple of minutes to my journey time to work 'cos the traffic has gotten that little bit worse.

FACT : We have just had the most successful 5 year period of any European Nation over the last 50 years, yet our infrastructure remains the worst in Western Europe....

FACT : We have a right, nay, a duty to moan and a responsibility to take that moaning to the ballet box. Irish politicians have taken the p1ss for far too long and its time we moaned a little louder..

We suffer not because as you say, it takes a lot of money to run this country, but because our money is being p1ssed up against a wall by years of public sector inefficiency. If Eire Ltd, were a company the CEO would've been sacked ages ago . . .

im no economist but when you allow spending to increase by a rate that is faster than the growth of your income money will tend to dry up very very quickly.

True, but take a look at the underlying reasons for this and don't blame Charlie McCreevy.
The health Service for one thing,eating up huge amounts of money with litle if any return in terms of reduced waiting lists.
Ineed I read now that consultants are blocking the sending of patients overseas as they fear, it will reduce their budgets.
They are refusing to hand over patient files, ie more greed.
No party especially Fianna Fáil has the political backbone to attempt a reform of the health service.
Too many boards, jobs for the boys, patronage etc, etc,...
A practice handy to FG also.

The blame lies with the people that vote for them really, there are or should be alternatives if they got enough support.
and regarding Charlie McCreevy's thinking and:

??? Does that kind thinking work for an ostritch(sp)?.

Well with a hard core of roughly 40% of the voters supporting Fianna Fáil, come hell or high water, could you blame anyone with a liking for politics, even Charlie McCreevy, for joining Fianna Fáil??
Some may understandably believe it is rotten to the core, but as so many are blindly wishing to follow it, then really the only way to have much long term influence politically in this country is by being a member of that party, by virtue of it being in power most of the time.
Mr McCreevy was for a long time an outcast in FF during the Haughey years, but he didn't leave it as to do so would have diminished his influence.
mm

Originally posted by hallelujajordan
FACT : Every month, after I have paid my bills, I have less money left over for me . . . . . the rate at which this is happening is much greater than the rate my salary is increasing (or is ever likely to)

FACT : Every month, I add an extra couple of minutes to my journey time to work 'cos the traffic has gotten that little bit worse.

FACT : We have just had the most successful 5 year period of any European Nation over the last 50 years, yet our infrastructure remains the worst in Western Europe....

FACT : We have a right, nay, a duty to moan and a responsibility to take that moaning to the ballet box. Irish politicians have taken the p1ss for far too long and its time we moaned a little louder..

We suffer not because as you say, it takes a lot of money to run this country, but because our money is being p1ssed up against a wall by years of public sector inefficiency. If Eire Ltd, were a company the CEO would've been sacked ages ago . . .

Your points I agree with, but,People aren't taking these issues to the ballot box are they??
Unless , the 40% or so core FF voters express their dis satisfaction by voting elsewhere,they are the people you have to convince, not me.
and regarding:

FACT : We have just had the most successful 5 year period of any European Nation over the last 50 years, yet our infrastructure remains the worst in Western Europe....

That speaks volumes for , what it costs to run this country, little and all as it is, and it speaks volumes for, how little our two main parties want to reform this,...boils back down to the patronage issue, imho and to a lesser extent the fear that the very reforms that are needed to make things more effecient may be unpopular in the short term with the voters...how Ironic is that:rolleyes:
mm

bonkey

Originally posted by hallelujajordan
FACT : We have just had the most successful 5 year period of any European Nation over the last 50 years, yet our infrastructure remains the worst in Western Europe....

Maybe that because if you do the math, you will discover another couple of bits of information :

FACT : infrastructure is damned expensive to put in place, and maintain.

FACT : economies of scale make it more possible for a larger nation to build a solid infrastructure over time than a smaller one

FACT : Ireland needs to spend an absolutely huge amount of money to allow its infrastructure to stand still because it didnt have the money over the last 50 years to do more than slow the rot in many cases.

We suffer not because as you say, it takes a lot of money to run this country, but because our money is being p1ssed up against a wall by years of public sector inefficiency

You have the figures to show this, or is this just supposition? Have you any idea what percentage of our annual expenditure could actually be recouped through increases in efficiency, or is it just that you see that there is inefficiency and decide that this is the root of all evil?

Sweeping statements like this are misleading. Yes, it is true that there is inefficiency in most areas of our public sector. But how much? How much is this inefficiency costing us? How much would it cost to remove it (i.e. unemployment increases etc)?

And, more importantly....if the government is simply p1ssing our money up a wall, where are all the bright suggestions as to how to tackle the problem???

jc

shotamoose

Originally posted by hallelujajordan

FACT : Every month, I add an extra couple of minutes to my journey time to work 'cos the traffic has gotten that little bit worse.

FACT : We have just had the most successful 5 year period of any European Nation over the last 50 years, yet our infrastructure remains the worst in Western Europe....

If it's the worst it is that way because, as has been pointed out, it has been chronically underfunded for a very long time. Ireland's transport infrastructure requires sustained above-inflation investment if we're ever to really improve it and make everyone's journey easier, safer and faster. This is made all the more pressing by the continuing rise in the amount of cars on the roads. So raising motor tax is pretty sensible, or at least would be if at least some of it went towards improving public transport, thus taking more people out of their cars and improving the traffic flow.

hallelujajordan

Originally posted by shotamoose
if at least some of it went towards improving public transport, thus taking more people out of their cars and improving the traffic flow.

I agree . . . and hiking up the cost of public transport is going to achieve that, isn't it !

bonkey

Originally posted by hallelujajordan
I agree . . . and hiking up the cost of public transport is going to achieve that, isn't it !

Whereas, if they didnt hike up the price, we'd simply have more and more complaints about the vast quantities of money being lost.

AS I keep saying....its a no-win situation.

First its a case of "not enough public transport". Then when money is finally there to be spent its a case of "why wasnt this done 20 years ago, its too little too late".

When losses grow too high its a case of "why do they have to lose so much money", and when prices increase to offset this we get complaints like yours.

I mean - honestly - what would it realistically take to make you happy with the system, other than some miracle fix which you know as well as I is only gonna happen in some alternate reality where the laws of economics dont apply.

jc

Cork

I think that is is fair that the government are hiking up prices at above the rate of inflation when we still have exemptions for our artiests and horsey set?

DiscoStu

Every time that someone brought up the "saving for a rainy day" question, there were half a dozen others waiting to step in and point out that Problem X was too urgent to be shelved just because someone wanted to "play safe" and so on.

if McCreevy was a good finance minister he should be able to see through the "we need 50 million to build a roadway for hedgehogs stretching from cork to letterkenny" rubbish and plan ahead. instead he promised the sun, moon and stars for the election knowing full well that there simply wasnt the money to finance it.
the global downturn has not come about instantly. It was majorly apparent after the burst of the internet and tech bubbles that ireland was going to be hit and hit hard. yet did he do anything to plan ahead? no he still allowed public spending to spiral while Harney and co. were saying everything was fine and dandy. inflation rocketed and for months the government claiming it was simply a short term thing. we still have the highest inflation rate in europe and this budget will do nothing to help the situation.
yet through all this(someone more versed than me can surely point out more mistakes made by him than these few) his arrogance is unmatched. he is yet to admit that the public was mislead by the government during the election campaign despite the "leaked memo" proving so.
the only hope for this country is for the PDs(parasites in my opinion) to pull out of the coalition and force a general election. however the nice fat 12% pay raise awarded to Harney and co. today makes that as unlikely as jeremy beadle and noel edmonds returning to prime time tv.

Sand

Car Tax.... If you want a 2lt Diesel car, expect to be quite a few hundred euro worse off (petrol rise, VRT rise and now car tax rise).

Consider it the cost of polluting and contributing to congestion - or think of it that it will lead to those who are already at breaking point re:the car to finally give in and get the CIE cattle trains, reducing congestion for you.

Sure, and while they were bleeding the country almost dry, almost the entire populace was complaining that the government werent giving enough back to the people who had caused it to happen, and that "now that we had money", wasnt it time that more was spent on X, Y and Z, and so on and so forth.

Ya, I agree with this statement entirely. I reckon if you searched through topics on this very board about 2 years ago or so, maybe even sooner, youd see a whole line of people giving out the same line. The nature of democracy is that you have to keep the mob happy, and Sir Charles might have had the best economic and financial vision/plan in the whole world but he still had to satisfy cabinet colleagues who were screaming for cash so they could satisfy the mob baying for this and that and assorted trivia. FF are very proud of their record of increased spending on the old sweetspots of health, education and social welfare and use it as a pretty effective elction tool to remind the mob why they should vote for them.

Even if you hated FF who exactly would you vote for? Youve only got an option of a socialist dominated government who arent exactly renowned for not spending heavily on the old sweetspots.

Cork

Youve only got an option of a socialist dominated government who arent exactly renowned for not spending heavily on the old sweetspots.

I agree if Labor/Green/FG/Independents got in - we would be in a probably much worse.


At least tax did not go up. At least - If people choose to smoke - they'll pay 50c extra per pack of 20. If people choose to drive a car - they'll have to pay for the up-keep of the roads.

I think that this budget could be much worse. We live in a counttry where people do not object paying fortunes for houses - yet they object to pay an extra 10-12% for motor tax.

Does anybody know - how much will be spent on drink on the leadup to Christmas?

There are many moaners out there. The bleeding heart political partys were defeated in the election.

This budget could have been a little fairer. But really - It was not the hair shirt people were predicting.

bonkey

Originally posted by Cork
I think that is is fair that the government are hiking up prices at above the rate of inflation when we still have exemptions for our artiests and horsey set?

Cork....here's a formal warning about this one.

Either start up a dedicated thread about it, or shut up about it.
I'm fed up with this becoming yet another complaint "du jour" being used to throw blindly at any political discussion.

And the next time you bring it up, I expect you to supply figures as to how much cash such a change would give to the government and so on, because otherwise you're just whining about something you havent even bothered to research.

Gottit?

jc

bonkey

Originally posted by Cork
If people choose to drive a car - they'll have to pay for the up-keep of the roads.

Except that there is absolutely nothing requiring that VRT, road-tax, etc go to paying for the roads or even transport in general.

Its another source of income, thats all. You are being taxed for choosing to drive a car....not necessarily to pay for the roads that you are using...it could be paying for anything.

jc

Cork

Originally posted by bonkey
Except that there is absolutely nothing requiring that VRT, road-tax, etc go to paying for the roads or even transport in general.

Its another source of income, thats all. You are being taxed for choosing to drive a car....not necessarily to pay for the roads that you are using...it could be paying for anything.

jc

I mis- typed regarding my abone comment. There is NO excuse for a government to saction increases above the rate of inflation.

I think it is a fair question on whether people are getting good value for their tax money?

I think that the government will start charging for other services such as sewage and water. But VRT , Vat on Fuel etc should go to paying for roads.

It will be interesting, if the government will now rule out tolling such roads.

Sand

True, but car ownership leads to a lot of related costs, not just providing roads, but also gardai to police them and legal costs from related court cases, teaching kids the safe cross code, direct medical costs and cleanup costs from accidents and pollution costs which affect a broad spectrum of life, along with congestion.

You can pretty much invent any exscuse you need for spending car taxes elsewhere. Even if there was a requirement to use car taxes on roads etc, the government would simply reduce the amount of "non-car" taxes it spends on transport in general and nothing would change overall- the demands of other sectors certainly wouldnt.

I think that the Environment minister minister Martin cullen did suggest that the rise in road tax is to be ring fenced for the roads budget.

Defending the biggest one-off road motor tax rise in 10 years, Environment Minister Martin Cullen promised that the €70 million raised by the increase would be used solely for regional roads funding.

Thats taken from:
http://www.examiner.ie/pport/web/ireland/Full_Story/did-sgVcncGZNNnjY.asp

I wonder though if thats just another promise to be broken?
Although, if the government have say committed another €200 million to the roads, clearly, we know now where they are getting €70 million of that.

Just to address the Horsey thing ( at the risk of a slap from Bonkey:D )

There was an interesting discussion on yesterdays news at one with Pat Rabbitte on the topic of withdrawing their tax exempt status.
He and Joan Burton actually discussed the issue with representatives from the horse breeding sector. Pat Rabbitte said that the people he met with, were so sure that they were going to be taxed after wenesdays budget, that they conceded that they would be willing to make contributions but did not say how much.
He also said it was very difficult to estimate what revenue could be gained there as , the commissioners have never received any returns from the sector, they obviously being exempt, do not have to file them.
When pressed on the sum of money involved,Pat Rabbitte said that when you have famous stallions being charged out at €250,000 per mare they serve, then, it could be up to €200 million.
That, if a correct estimate, alone would be enough to fund this years slender roads programme without any car tax rise.
mm

Cork

Good point. I think that many other sources of tax income need to be looked at. We also need an independent study to look at what roads we need.

I think that the government were pushing for new roads as they could not toll existing routes.

As the tax-payer is now making an increased contribution to the construction of roads - is the concept of tolling ruled out?

Or will we have tolling anyway?

bonkey

Originally posted by Cork
I think that the government were pushing for new roads as they could not toll existing routes.

More like they couldnt realistically upgrade certain roads, or would need new sections anyway as bypasses.

Face it - if the government wanted to introduce tolling on roads they built themselves, they could just as easily do it on existing roads (unless those built with EU Funding had a clause attached to the funding preventing such) as new roads. The public uproar would be the same either way.

As the tax-payer is now making an increased contribution to the construction of roads - is the concept of tolling ruled out?

Or will we have tolling anyway?

If we have trolling...err tolling...its most likely to be because the government cannot spare the cash to pay for roads themselves, and instead "sell" the road to a private concern to build, and then toll.

This is a hard call. On one hand, if the govt. build the road, we will have people inevitably complaining that the road wasnt needed (mostly from those who never/rarely drive the particular route), and that the money could have gone elsewhere.

If the govt. do not build the road, we will hear increasing complaints about congestion, and that all road-building is only done in Dublin, which is obviously unfair despite it having (arguably) the most congested routes in the country.

If they take the third option and sell the rights to a private corp who then get to toll the road, we will hear complaints about how the public is getting screwed on paying massive profits to a company, when had it been kept private it would have been better for all of us.

If they build it and toll it themselves, we will have complaints that the tolling is unfair cause drivers already pay road-tax, VRT, and so on and so forth.

There is no good option - the Irish people will complain no matter what the decision. It just seems impossible for people in this country to grasp the concept that our government has a finite amount of resources, and if they want more than these resources can pay for, there is only one way to get it...charge the people more.

here is NO excuse for a government to saction increases above the rate of inflation.

Rubbish. Of course there is.

Tieing increases/decreases to the rate of inflation would only work if public expenditure (and thus governmental income) remained the same. As salaries and unemployment go up and down, so does the cash that the government receive. Same applies for sales, company profits, etc.

Unlike an empoyee, the government does not receive a fixed income on a monthly basis. It is dependant on a myriad of factors. You are asserting that only one of these factors is of any way important.

Alternately, will you accept the impact to already-underfunded areas (health, education, transport, etc.) in terms of them receiving less cash, because you dont want the government to raise taxes by more than the rate of inflation?

jc

Cork

Alternately, will you accept the impact to already-underfunded areas (health, education, transport, etc.) in terms of them receiving less cash, because you dont want the government to raise taxes by more than the rate of inflation?

There is a lot of wastage in our public services.

No attempt has been made to make them more efficent.

Are Irish taxpayers getting value for money.

I don't believe in having high taxation. But - I believe, we deserve good services for the tax we give to our government.

I think the Irish people deserve more accountability where money goes.

Look at all those health boards - There should be 2 or 3 health boards in the country. Look at all those small hospitals. Do they have knowledge in all medical conditions? These hospitals should be upgraded or shut down.

Before, I get abuse for going off the topic - I believe - tax money needs to be spent wisely. If it needs to be raised - it should be raised equitabally.

(Sorry about the spelling)

Originally posted by Cork
There is a lot of wastage in our public services.

No attempt has been made to make them more efficent.

Are Irish taxpayers getting value for money.

I don't believe in having high taxation. But - I believe, we deserve good services for the tax we give to our government.

I think the Irish people deserve more accountability where money goes.

Look at all those health boards - There should be 2 or 3 health boards in the country. Look at all those small hospitals. Do they have knowledge in all medical conditions? These hospitals should be upgraded or shut down.

Before, I get abuse for going off the topic - I believe - tax money needs to be spent wisely. If it needs to be raised - it should be raised equitabally.

(Sorry about the spelling)

Cork, not wishing to offend you , but....It has been pointed out to you before that a lot of the things you are complaining about , have not and are not being reformed by FF and indeed since they have been in power for most of the countries existance, they put much of the current situation in place.
Do they not listen to their supporters opinions?
Or is it the case as I think, that nothing gets done unless (and this also applies to a lesser degree to FG) some fat cheque is donated by some interes group to the party??
That is in essence what is at the heart of corruption.

Perhaps,state funds for the parties( a ban on fund raising of any type), and constitutional backing for a ban on TD's promoting local issues above national issues is what we want.
mm

Cork

have not and are not being reformed by FF[/QUOTE

they have not been reformed either by FG or Labour.

Reform of public services is not a topic that really has been achieved by any political party.