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Finance Bill

I take the hon. Gentleman's point. I am not an expert, but I understand that there are some relatively large cars coming in at an emissions rate of 130 g or below. In order to drive the motor industry by means of a taxation mechanism and to drive consumer behaviour—to use an appropriate verb—we need to keep the grading under review and push it further in the future. It is no coincidence that the European Union manufacturer with the lowest fleet average—from memory, I believe it is about 136 g per kilometre driven for all the new cars sold last year—is the one that is quite likely to take over Chrysler and Opel-Vauxhall: namely, Fiat. Relative to many other motor manufacturers, Fiat is thriving at the moment. Of course, all these things are relative, but I suspect that has happened because Fiat had the foresight to concentrate on smaller and lower-polluting vehicles. The two do not always go together. It is possible to buy some pretty polluting cars that have small external dimensions, just as it is possible to buy some relatively low-polluting cars that have quite large external dimensions. Turning to table 2, in clause 14, I note an element of retrospection in paragraph (a) relating to higher-polluting cars. For those cars with emissions between, say, 225 g and 250 g, for which the standard rate of vehicle excise duty would be £425 per year, for those registered before 23 March 2006 that rate will be £235. Such cars would now be three years old, but given the number of years for which society has imposed tax penalties for more polluting vehicles, I welcome and am content with that relatively minor level of retrospection. Similarly, for those cars registered before the 23 March 2006 cut-off date that produce more than 255 g in emissions, the standard rate of VED will be £245 per year rather than £435.