Skip's right... pay per mile with a variable rate according to the bhp of the vehicle, with an additional higher inner city congestion rate per mile as a further disincentive to unnecessary journeys.
Agreed, though not sure about the bhp aspect, I suppose you could use per kWh for electric cars.
Or a multiplier based on the weight of the vehicle or more problematically the new price of a vehicle. The weight would probably be fairer to give an incentive for manufacturers to build lighter less damaging vehicles.
The way in which people approach cars and car "ownership" is changing. People are becoming more used to leasing or at least never owning cars and paying a monthly fee as driven by the god awful value (imho) pcps. This will persist into electric vehicles and or electric vehicle battery packs. I suspect that these will start to come with price per mile components, already many deals have a price per mile over a certain amount.
Black box insurance has been around for a while now and now you have insurance you can buy for an annual fee + a price per mile. Intended for low milage users.
I think of we built the rules and regs around motor vehicles now we'd do thing differently. MoTs every 10k miles or 12 months, insurance per mile with cards/disks, "road tax" replaced by a per mile basis.
Motoring is a political hot potato, Brits are very attached to the motorcar and have a weird relationship with cars personifying them (I've washed and valeted my car to treat her somo she'llpass the MOT - mine gets that after the MOT donors not wasted if it gets scrapped. I have been known to present a car with a known fault to MOT to make sure there are no other faults and I'm not wasting money fixing the one I know about).
The very vocal influencial baby boomer generation and their immediate generational neighbours. They've been brought up with the car as a God given right, as an extension big their personality and taken for granted. I include my father in this who drives the 200yrds to my aunt's and half mile to the local shops despite being retired and by his own admission bored. He looks at a bus or a train with scorn despite having a brief flirtation his bus pass. No amount of explaining the train is faster, cheaper and gets you to city centre will alter his preoccupation and desire to fill the car with fuel, drive and pay (and moan about doing so) to park. He's an intelligent man, he must understand but he insists on taking the tin box.
Interestingly my mother doesn't drive she does walk to the shops, and to work but increasingly dad insists on driving her everywhere. She pulls her face at the prospect of public transport. We was staying in Penrith prior to lockdown 1 and I invited her up for a few days. This would have meant her getting on a train at Bolton Station and Getting off the same train an hour later in Penrith.
She point blank refused and wanted me to drive down to come and get her then drive back. She's tight as cramp but doesn't see the costs of driving. It's just a cost she thinks must be swallowed.
I doubt we'll ever get this generation out of their cars or away from their obsession or short minded relationship with the car. It seems these are the same people kicking up about the cyclelanes the council has proposed or installed locally.
I do see some change going on with younger generations being less reliant on the car and more willing to accept alternatives.