verytalldave
MB Enthusiast
The effects will be more far reaching than many have yet realised IMO. London is a big chunk of the UK car market. Big petrol engined cars that will now be very hard to sell in London will be shifted elsewhere in the UK. The extra supply will depress prices. So the effects will ripple out. Depreciation on big petrols is already huge but will no doubt be even huger.
While the very rich may be prepared to pay the £25 per day -at least to begin with- and may still go on buying new large Band G cars, the depreciation will eventually impinge even on them. Secondhand buyers of large petrols will be harder and harder to find. The congestion charge, the higher VED (and more of that to come), petrol at over £1 a litre, and social disapproval will gradually lead to a strong demise in the sale of Band G cars IMO.
Good news for diesels. For example even an S class 320cdi is only in Band F.
And the new BMW X5 is only Band F in diesel form. Time Merc did something about the Band G diesel ML.
I anticipated this very scenario last August which is why I bought a C200K. The next model up the chain (the C230K) slipped into band G.
So, as you say, it IS having an effect. Jaguars and the like I feel will drop in value like lead ballons, as will many, MANY other makes and models.
How one man can have such a devasting and catastophic effect is beyond reason and sense.