excuses excuses.
The 'demise of the disc' excuse is rubbish. An A4 paper reminder is sent out three weeks before VED expires. One good bit of gov IT is that you can successfully pay what is owed with two minutes online ...
One bad thing is that some of us (yes I am one) have zero rated vehicles - how the hell is that economic? Make everyone pay at least a sensible base fee - say £20 - to cover at least the admin of the system. At present, every zero-rated reminder COSTS the system money.
Otherwise, as someone else said, stuff the entire cost on the fuel (that includes electricity - raise the VAT to say 9% and catch electric bikes too ...) then if you use it you pay it. In addition, if they have to be refueled, foreign registered vehicles also pay ... The advantage to the Government is that the cost of admin falls through the floor and far fewer administrators are required at DVLA and ... oops, just seen the flaw in my argument ...
Biting the hand that feeds IT
