Thursday, December 23, 2010

Leaf it out

As you may or may not be aware, Portugal has a few financial problems. So now would be the perfect time for the Prime Minister to do something really stupid.

Like this for example,
The Prime Minister of Portugal, Jose Socrates, has become the first head of state in the world to adopt an all-electric vehicle for official matters. On Wednesday, Portugal received delivery of the first 10 Nissan Leaf EVs to be offered in Europe, as recognition of the country's pioneering work in the electric mobility field with the MOBI.E Programme. One of those cars landing in the hands of Mr. Socrates, who will now travel exclusively by Electric Car (it was not disclosed if the Leaf would be the only EV in the fleet) for his official travels around the capital city of Portugal, Lisbon.


Now in order to allow this great plan to happen,
(1) EVs are fully exempt from both the Vehicle Tax due upon purchase (Imposto Sobre Veículos) and the annual Circulation Tax (Imposto Único de Circulação); (2) Personal Income Tax provides an allowance of EUR 803 upon the purchase of EVs; (3) EVs are fully exempt from the 5%-10% company car tax rates which are part of the Corporation Income Tax; (4) The Budget Law provides for an increase of the depreciation costs related to the purchase of EVs for the purpose of Corporation Income Tax; (5) the first 5,000 EVs to be sold in Portugal will receive a 5,000€ incentive fund, and the Cash-for-Clunkers program grants an additional 1,500€ fund if a internal combustion engine vehicle built before 2000 is delivered when acquiring the new EV; (6) The Portuguese State did also commit to play a pedagogic role and defined that EVs will have a 20% share of the annual renewal of public car fleet, starting in 2011.

So of course it isn't costing the taxpayer a bean. After all it had better not as the country is broke.


2 comments:

Tim Worstall said...

The vehicle tax is pretty fierce here. Certainly can go into the €10,000 and up range for a large engine (V6 and up).

That's a big, big, saving here.

Gawain Towler said...

So it is going to cost the exchequer then, thus the taxpayer quite a few beans

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