Dan Boyle (Green Party)

The transfer of taxation arrangements in terms of annual motor tax from an engine capacity to an emissions basis was a Green Party initiative which at the time was greeted with no small degree of cynicism by many in the political system. It has turned out to be an enormous success and the evidence of that success is that 80% of the cars bought since then are in bands A, B and C.

An attempt was made in dishonest political debate to ascribe the lessening of car sales to the introduction of a new taxation system, and that was accompanied by similar changes to vehicle registration tax, but if we consider the position of the three main car companies in the United States, the failure of new car sales is a global phenomenon that has much to do with the type of cars offered to consumers. The old gas guzzling type is a machine that is slowly disappearing from the world stage, something for which we should be grateful. Not only are people being offered alternatives in terms of different fuel types — biodiesel as well as standard petrol — we have also the onset of mass produced electric cars to which Senator O'Toole referred earlier.

The comment about the intentions of the Government in this regard was somewhat unfair. The Government has announced the radical measure that by 2020 10% of all vehicles on the road will be electric vehicles. That means that year on year from now we will have to sell 15,000 new electric cars in a context where currently there are probably fewer than 1,000 electric cars in the country. That is something to which it is worth aspiring. There will be obvious benefits in terms of our collective carbon footprint and transport will be changed.

Senator Norris spoke about the alternative to a tax of this type being a tax directly on petrol and linked to usage. There is no doubt that might seem on the surface to be a fairer tax but it would go against the argument made by Senator Coffey at the start of the debate that this proposed tax, in terms of emissions base, was unfair to people in rural communities. A tax based purely on usage would be very unfair to rural communities because of the distances from many services and large population centres. It was also unfairly stated that the price of petrol here has something to do with the level of taxation on a litre of petrol.

In comparison to other European countries — the United Kingdom, France and Germany — despite the fact that we have VAT and excise duties, taxes on direct uses of petrol are lower in Ireland than in any other European country. We have a capacity in that regard should we need to change it.

The other point regarding dependence on a tax——