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We have a new Labour government and with it, motorists will want to know what this means for the future of car ownership and driving costs.
What should motorists hitting the road expect under a Kier Starmer-led government once the dust settles?
We’ve rounded up all the ways a Labour government will affect drivers, from reaffirming the 2030 ban on new petrol and diesel car sales to raising fuel taxes.
How the Labour Party’s election victory will affect you The motorist
Will there be an increase in fuel prices under a Labour government?
Sir Keir Starmer has refused to rule out a fuel duty rise altogether.
After being frozen for 14 consecutive years, the Labour leader has been reluctant to say he will continue this decade-and-a-half-long trend.
Britons face some of the highest fuel taxes in Europe: a 20 percent VAT is added to the total price including tax. Since 2011, VAT has been frozen at 59.95 pence per litre.
A further “temporary” 5p cut in fuel duty, which was first introduced in March 2022 by then-chancellor Rishi Sunak in an attempt to counteract the surge in pump prices triggered by the outbreak of war in Ukraine, is also in place until March 2025.
Starmer said he had supported a freeze “every time it was raised” but that “fuel duty will have to be decided on a budget-by-budget basis” and he had not categorically ruled out a fuel duty increase.
During the Sky News leader’s debate, Starmer avoided directly answering whether a Labour government would increase fuel duty.
When pressed a second time on the fuel tax, he again cited his record on the issue.
Starmer said he had supported the freeze “every time it was raised” but that “fuel taxes will have to be decided on a budget-by-budget basis”.
On the eve of the election, Shadow Secretary of State for Transport Louise Hague said: Express car:On fuel taxes, we want lower taxes for working people, and that is why we have always campaigned against fuel tax increases in this Parliament.
“Nothing in our plans requires us to raise additional money beyond the measures already announced.”
Hague also said Labour would explore options to address how fundamentally unfair it is that falls in crude oil prices are not passed on as savings to drivers.
Under the outgoing Conservative government’s plans, the 5p fuel tax will end in March 2025 and then rise in line with Retail Price Index (RPI) inflation from April 2025 and every year thereafter.
The same thing happened in the previous decade, but the various Finance Ministers confirmed freezes.
A driver saves around £50 a year with the fuel tax cut maintained, with total savings of around £250 since it was first introduced, according to the Treasury.
Labour has always been clear that it will reset the 2030 date for phasing out new petrol and diesel cars.
When will you have to switch to an electric vehicle?
Labour has always been clear that it will reinstate the 2030 date for phasing out new petrol and diesel cars, which it says will help provide certainty for manufacturers after the Conservatives pushed it back to 2035.
Motorists are concerned that switching to electric vehicles will be unaffordable.
New electric vehicles tend to be significantly more expensive than new petrol and diesel cars, and Auto Trader recently reported that a lack of cheap used EVs is holding back the switch.
However, Labour told Auto Express: “Electric cars are already cheaper to run and will soon be cheaper to make than petrol cars. Further delays mean higher costs for drivers, billions of dollars in lost investment and more jobs moving overseas.”
New, cheaper electric vehicles are appearing on the market, such as the Dacia Spring and the Citroën e-C3, which will be launched this year. The Spring will cost from just £14,995 and the e-C3 from £21,990.
And the AA Used Car Index has just found that average prices for the UK’s most popular used electric and hybrid vehicles fell by almost a fifth (19 per cent) in the three months to June, compared with the same period last year.
However, Labour has not offered any direct incentives to help people budget for an electric vehicle, instead leaving that task to market forces and offering improved charging points as an incentive.
Will the shift to electric vehicles be supported by cheaper charging?
The Labour Party has promised to expand the charging network with a series of improvements.
The deal will remove barriers to the rollout of charging points, such as height and data access restrictions. The £950m Rapid Charging Fund will also be released.
It remains to be seen whether Labour will reduce VAT on public charging from 20 per cent to 5 per cent if the party gets to 10 Downing Street (which would align VAT with charging at home and remove this burden inequality), but that would bring further savings to EV drivers.
To encourage and assist the uptake of electric vehicles, Labour will remove barriers to the deployment of charging points, such as height restrictions and data access restrictions.
Potholes: Will the roads be fixed?
In January, This is Money reported that by 2023, vehicle damage caused by potholes on Britain’s roads would cost a staggering £474 million.
Labour estimates put the average cost of repairs at £250.
To tackle the problem, Labour says it will “maintain and renew our road network” by fixing an extra million potholes across England every year of the next parliamentary term, and has promised to end the “patch-up” approach to repairs.
Labour plans to invest an additional £320m over five years (funded by the postponement of the planned A27 Arundel bypass), adding to the £8.3bn already pledged by the Conservatives.
Labour plans to invest an additional £320m over five years (funded by the deferral of the A27 Arundel bypass), adding to the £8.3bn already pledged by the Conservatives.
Will ULEZ be expanded to get more drivers paying?
Labour is unlikely to expand low or ultra-low emission zones. ULEZs cost £12.50 a day and cover all London boroughs.
Neither of these were mentioned in the Labour manifesto and there were no plans announced during the campaign.
There was also no mention of congestion charging, but London’s Labour mayor Sadiq Khan will make electric vehicles pay a £15 congestion charge from 25 December 2025.
Labour has said it will “further support drivers by tackling the rising cost of car insurance” but did not go into further detail in its manifesto.
Car insurance: will it finally be affordable again?
Long-term drivers are now paying an exorbitant £635 for cover, a record and up from £627 in the last three months of 2023, the Association of British Insurers (ABI) said.
Labour has said it will “further support drivers by tackling the rising cost of car insurance” but did not go into further detail in its manifesto.
At last year’s Labour Party conference, Shadow Transport Secretary Louise Haigh said the Financial Conduct Authority and the Competition and Markets Authority would be ordered to launch formal investigations into skyrocketing car insurance prices.
Haigh confirmed that the 14-day free cancellation period for car insurance will be extended and unfair pricing based on postcode will be investigated.
Labour also said the plan to fix the potholes would save drivers “hundreds of pounds in repair bills and lower insurance premiums”.
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