Much furore surrounds the loss of the 10% tax band but hidden in Alistair Darling's budget was another blow that will hit some poorer families much harder — the backdating of draconian VED rises for cars registered between 2001 and 2006, bought when nobody knew that 225g/km would be an important threshold.
 
ABD chairman Brian Gregory explains:

"Recent budgets have featured rises in vehicle excise duty for less efficient vehicles but these have always been restricted to new vehicles to discourage purchase and have not been retrospective. In the 2008 budget these taxes were not only raised and new banding introduced but by backdating the increases to cover vehicles registered since 2001 Alistair Darling has at a stroke punished those who cannot afford newer, more efficient cars."

ABD spokesman Nigel Humphries said:

"This impacts hardest on poorer families who need larger cars. Such drivers may not even realise the huge rises on older Mondeos, Lagunas, Vectras and Galaxies even with middle range engines until VED renewal time. Even some smaller cars such as Astras and Focuses are hit if they are unlucky enough to have an engine in a higher CO2 band. Such families face a double hit as their cars will plummet in value due to the tax changes. Already the trade guides are predicting large drops. The arrogance of Darling is astonishing. When questioned in a radio interview following the budget he suggested that those affected needn't pay higher VED as they could buy new cars. Just how are they supposed to do that when food, council tax and mortgages are all up way above 'inflation'?"

The ABD calls for MPs to reject the backdating of these new charges.
 
The organisation has called for the scrapping of VED and a revenue neutral amount put on fuel tax. Fuel tax is the only fair tax as it depends upon usage and efficiency rather than taxing vehicles regardless of mileage. If the government wishes to reduce CO2 output then taxing use of fuel is clearly the most effective, fairest and simplest method.