HGV Road User Levy Act to be introduced April 2014
After much discussion and debate, the HGV Road User Levy Act became law yesterday. The levy will mean that foreign-registered lorries will have to pay to travel on UK roads. UK vehicles already have to pay to drive in many European countries.
The FTA has issued a press release welcoming the news of the scheme’s arrival.
James Hookham, FTA’s Managing Director of Policy & Communications said:
“FTA has supported the idea of a charge on foreign vehicles for many years as a way of partly addressing the competitive differences between British registered operators and foreign-registered vehicles. There were important conditions attached to our support to avoid additional costs and burdens falling on UK operators, as the charge could not be applied to foreign vehicles alone, and, so far, these have been met.
“The next key event is the Chancellor’s Budget Statement on 20 March when the new reduced Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) rates will be announced. We will be watching to make sure that UK operators are not disadvantaged.”
The levy, applied to lorries weighing more than 12 tonnes using UK roads, is to be introduced in April 2014. The time based charges are £1,000 a year or £10 a day to use our roads. As mentioned when the idea of charging foreign lorries came about, by law, the scheme had to be careful not to discriminate between UK-registered vehicles and those in the EU. The solution is to charge the levy to all lorries across the board. This doesn't however spell disaster for UK operators in terms of added costs. To balance out the increased costs due the levy scheme, they will be compensated through a reduction in vehicle excise duty.
What do you think about the new scheme? It seems fair enough, as it is estimated that over 3,500 overseas-registered trucks enter the country every day, accounting for roughly 69 per cent of cross-Channel road freight. As long as it doesn't impact negatively on our UK driver's, then I think it's about time and a fair scheme.
The FTA has issued a press release welcoming the news of the scheme’s arrival.
James Hookham, FTA’s Managing Director of Policy & Communications said:
“FTA has supported the idea of a charge on foreign vehicles for many years as a way of partly addressing the competitive differences between British registered operators and foreign-registered vehicles. There were important conditions attached to our support to avoid additional costs and burdens falling on UK operators, as the charge could not be applied to foreign vehicles alone, and, so far, these have been met.
“The next key event is the Chancellor’s Budget Statement on 20 March when the new reduced Vehicle Excise Duty (VED) rates will be announced. We will be watching to make sure that UK operators are not disadvantaged.”
The levy, applied to lorries weighing more than 12 tonnes using UK roads, is to be introduced in April 2014. The time based charges are £1,000 a year or £10 a day to use our roads. As mentioned when the idea of charging foreign lorries came about, by law, the scheme had to be careful not to discriminate between UK-registered vehicles and those in the EU. The solution is to charge the levy to all lorries across the board. This doesn't however spell disaster for UK operators in terms of added costs. To balance out the increased costs due the levy scheme, they will be compensated through a reduction in vehicle excise duty.
What do you think about the new scheme? It seems fair enough, as it is estimated that over 3,500 overseas-registered trucks enter the country every day, accounting for roughly 69 per cent of cross-Channel road freight. As long as it doesn't impact negatively on our UK driver's, then I think it's about time and a fair scheme.
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