§ 32. Mr. ChaytorTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what financial incentives he has made available for the development of alternative fuels for motor vehicles. [68433]
§ John HealeyThe Government has introduced a wide range of incentives for the development and use of alternative fuels for motor vehicles, ranging from fuel468W duty incentives for alternative fuels to the tax credit for general research and development. These measures include:
company cars using alternative fuels and technologies, such as road fuel gases, receive discounts on their company car tax. This is expressed as a discount calculated on a percentage of the car's list price;alternative fuelled cars first registered from March 2001 attract up to a £10 discount per year on their rate of vehicle excise duty;Budget 2002 announced a 20p per litre duty differential between biodiesel and ultra low sulphur diesel;the duty on road fuel gases is set at 9p per kilogramme;the Government has granted fuel duty exemptions to pilot projects for research into hydrogen, biogas and methanol under the Green Fuel Challenge and has also invited bids for more duty exemptions or reductions in more pilot projects;R and D tax credits have been introduced for small companies in 2000 and extended to all companies in 2002. These credits reduce the after-tax cost of R and D, including R and D directed towards new alternative fuel technologies; andthe Department for Transport has allocated £10 million this year to each of the Powershift and CleanUp programmes it administers. The Powershift programme offers grants for the conversion of existing vehicles to road fuel gases and electricity and the CleanUp programme offers grants to purchase new vehicles fuelled by road fuel gases and electricity.