GREEN MEANS GO
GREATER MANCHESTER LAUNCHES £2M GRANT SCHEME TO HELP PH DRIVERS GO GREEN
The Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) is introducing a new financial support package to help local private hire drivers upgrade to cleaner, lower-emission vehicles.
Under the newly approved Private Hire Vehicle Support Fund, eligible drivers can apply for grants of up to £2,500 to replace their older cars. The initiative, which is expected to officially launch this September, marks a major shift by regional leaders who decided in late June to ditch a previously considered loan model in favour of an entirely grants-based system. The total cost of the grant-only scheme is expected to reach a maximum of £1.98m across the
city region. While this is slightly higher than the £1.85m maximum estimated for the hybrid loan and grant model, an official report revealed the switch was made to avoid complex risks. The report noted that “having considered the risks associated with the loan component, it is recom- mended that the previously agreed PHV Support Fund is revised by removing the loan element and moving to a grant-only model.” This change helps the authority avoid administrative costs and bad debt write-offs associated with managing loans. Local leaders have strongly backed the move as a fairer way to tackle air pollution. Bolton South and
Walkden MP Yasmin Qureshi said: “After the last Tory government tried to impose a charging Clean Air Zone on Greater Manchester, the GMCA with Andy Burnham as Mayor, found another way by showing an investment led approach, focused on lowering emissions with a publicly controlled bus network and supporting our local taxi drivers, could achieve better results.” She added that the grant scheme “supports local drivers and ensures that more drivers are licensed here in Bolton and other local towns where we have stricter oversight,” concluding that investing in the future is far better “than taxing hard working people for driving as part of their job.”
GOVERNMENT CONFIRMS THE TERMS OF ITS NEW ELECTRIC VEHICLE EXCISE DUTY (eVED) SCHEME
l Pay-per-mile scheme will START 1st April 2028
l Applies to electric cars, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and hydrogen fuel cell cars
l 3p per mile for EVs, 1.5p per mile for plug-in hybrids
From launch, EVs and hydrogen fuel cell cars will pay three pence per mile, while PHEVs will pay a lower rate of 1.5 pence per mile as those drivers also pay fuel duty. However, the eVED rate
will
increase every year in line with the consumer price index. Legislators say that an EV driver covering 8,000 miles per year will pay £240 in eVED, while a petrol or diesel car driver would pay £480 annually in fuel duty alone. But
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high mileage drivers are going to get hit hard by the changes. Cover 20,000 miles in your electric car, for example, and you’ll need to fork out £600. And that’s in addition to the flat £200 VED rate EV drivers currently pay to keep their cars on the road. Patrick Gallagher, CEO at Addison Lee, said: “Confirmation that eVED will proceed from April 2028 as a pay-per-mile charge on EVs/PHEVs is a blow to our industry, at a time when operators need support, not new charges. “Taxi/PH drivers deliver essential, high-mileage, door-to-door trans- port services and play a critical role within the wider public transport system. A uniform pay-per-mile
charge that doesn’t differentiate between private and commercial use risks placing a disprop- ortionate burden on our sector. “Addison Lee estimates this levy would cost EV drivers on our fleet up to £840 a year, and plug-in hybrid drivers £420 – on top of the £4,700 a year removing London’s congestion charge exemption already adds to EV running costs. “We’re also concerned about cross- border hiring, where drivers from outside stringent areas, running ICE vehicles, undercut those of us who’ve invested in cleaner fleets to meet higher standards. “The last thing operators need is more
costs, complexity, administrative burden. AUGUST 2026 PHTM and
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