Ford of Britain chairman Roelent de Waard has called on the government to re-invest some of the revenue it gets from vehicle taxes back into the industry to help develop greener technologies. He also wants the government to offer consumers more incentives to buy environment-friendly cars.
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He said: “There is a great opportunity to boost demand for greener vehicles and this can be done through vehicle excise duty [aka ‘road tax’] and VAT [sales tax] reductions for dedicated incentives. This would be a much better way of doing things rather than just penalising people for buying less environment-friendly cars.” [ A reference to recent government plans to tax high-CO2 vehicles with additional ‘showroom’ purchase taxes and large increases in annual tax – ed]
The US government this week approved a US$25m loan for the automotive industry to develop green technologies, a move welcomed by General Motors, Ford and Chrysler executives at the Paris show.
This contrasted sharply with proposals by the EU to penalise car companies if their average greenhouse gas emissions are not sufficiently reduced by 2012.
De Waard said: “The automotive sector needs to contribute to lower C02 and has a long history of doing so. This should be recognised. Product cycles for 2012 are already set and forcing changes at short notice can lead to consumers buying vehicles that are not fit for purpose.
“It leads to compromises and people being forced into cars that just don’t suit their lifestyles. We would certainly like to see new legislation on C02 phased in over a much longer period.”
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