Road safety experts propose levy on large SUVs in city to curb rising Victorian road deaths

[Franco Cozzo]

Oh my, the voices are starting about putting extra taxes on SUVs and larger vehicles to 'reduce the road toll' in Victoria:

Road safety experts propose levy on large SUVs in city to curb rising Victorian road deaths

Large SUVs reported to increase the risk of serious injury to other road users by a third more than medium SUVs

A levy charged to people who drive large SUVs in the city has been mooted as a possible way to curb Victoria’s “skyrocketing” road deaths since the Covid-19 pandemic.

Road safety experts this week told the Victorian government’s inquiry into road safety for vulnerable road users that fatal accidents had risen amid the “many and lingering” changes to road travel behaviour wrought by the pandemic.

While financial disincentives have been shown to benefit road safety in Europe, Australia must first remove incentives encouraging the purchase of large SUV-type vehicles, Newstead said.

“The principal problem we have in terms of vehicle safety at the moment is our penchant for buying 4X4 utes in general,” he said.

“We need to stop incentivising their purchase – a lot of them are being bought as a business tool and not being used as a business tool.”

Marion Terrill, a transport and cities expert at the Grattan Institute, said Australia’s fringe benefits tax exemptions “incentivise the purchase of larger vehicles”.

She believes charging a fee or levy to drivers of large SUV for safety reasons would be an effective reform.

https://www.theguardian.com/australi...an-road-deaths

The Thailand Special is coming under further and further scrutiny, as well as SUVs:

Tax perks driving surge in number of SUVs and larger vehicles on Australian roads

Calls to tackle rise in SUVs, utes and 4WDs by reducing tax incentives and building narrow lanes and parking spots exclusively for small cars

The surge in popularity of larger vehicles in Australia has been driven by tax perks that incentivise buying SUVs, utes and other 4WDs instead of less-polluting smaller-sized cars and sedans, transport experts argue.

SUVs accounted for more than 50% of new vehicles sold in Australia last year, a share which has almost doubled over the past decade. The uptick has prompted calls to tackle the trend by limiting tax incentives, building bus lane-style narrow lanes and more parking spots exclusively for small cars.

https://www.theguardian.com/australi...ds-experts-say

Sounds a lot like the same rhetoric that was used to turn low level speeding fines into a revenue source, given we've (VIC) got state and a federal government lead by cucks who pander towards the kombucha drinking, rainbow flag waving communists, I think this is probably going to be on the agenda, given these people quoted in these articles have the ear of the state government at the inquiry, as well as having a state government currently trying to recover some funds by cancelling infrastructure projects and events.

Whats your thoughts about the idea of levies and more expensive regos on Thailand Specials and SUVs? Would this effect your decision if you're on the SUV/Thailand Special train?

Or you'd be happy to stay on even if it costs a little more every year, if there's large vehicle levies put on in inner suburban areas?