Luxury cars removed from the motability scheme

[AutumnLeavesandKnittedJumpers]

https://news.sky.com/story/luxury-cars-removed-from-motability-scheme-ahead-of-budget-13475029

too little too late. As a full time worker I can’t afford to run a car, let alone a luxury car. Motability should be a standard car - available in automatic and manual, an option for wheelchair users, and that’s it.

I'll reply as a marker that it won't be taken down.

So who should be entitled to benefits? Parents who use Child Benefit for extra-curricular activities? Well they can get in the bin, it should only be spent on gruel. Elderly people with a private pension and a house worth £1million? They shouldn’t be getting a state pension, they should be forced to downsize and live in a dog crate.

Not everyone who gets a car on Motability can drive.

I am classed as disabled. I have a blue badge, I don't get PIP. I pay a small fortune to lease a vehicle that I can drive.

If I did eventually get PIP, I would use their scheme. I would not expect a high end car, I need an automatic due to my disability (it is a mobility disability), other than that I would not care.

If a car is needed, the standard model is fine. If you can afford the top up, then you dont need the subsidy. The luxury cars are sometimes driven by relatives who acess the scheme but the intended recipient gets an occasional lift. Car dealers apply very light checks. Definitely one to cut

the people arguing this are missing the point of motability cars.. that they're accessible, suitable for the persons disability and fitted with any of the upgrades and adjustments and aids needed for that person to drive.

the type of vehicle needs to be suitable to fit those aids/adjustments/wheelchairs in.

@SerendipityJane
Only yesterday I reported some really vile comments about PIP claimants and @MNHQ left them to stand

I massively disagree with this. Why shouldn't disabled people be able to pay for a more expensive car if they want one and can afford it? The amount of pip going towards the car didn't change.

Seems discriminatory to me.

(No skin in the game, I don't receive pip and have a cheap ass second hand car).

Ok, a few points of fact.

if you are a wheelchair user and you require adaptations to a car there are very, very few places where you can buy a car and get it adapted. It’s basically not possible.

you pretty much have to go through motability. Because they deal with the majority of the business in adapting cars they have processes in place and are used to it.

when I wanted a wheelchair hoist installed in my existing car it was a bloody nightmare trying to find someone to do it. We gave up in the end.

also, for wheelchair accessible vehicles the minimum upfront payment (which you do not get back) is for a Citroen berlingo of 4095.

so you need to pay 4k upfront just for the cheapest possible wav (wheelchair accessible vehicles).

you’ve therefore got to have access to savings at a very minimum to afford a wav. Lots of disabled people can’t.

it’s also worth noting that the nhs pretty much does not provide disabled people with wheelchairs anymore and that motability can also be used to lease a wheelchair. I know many people in that situation who lease a wheelchair because the nhs don’t provide them anymore and therefore they can’t have a car.

if you are poor and disabled it’s a straight choice between wheelchair and car.

So my paraplegic friend doesn’t need PIP because he can afford the advance payment? Okay, can you show me all these WAVs without an advance payment?

Ignoring the glaringly obvious that being a parent is a choice unlike being disabled-

Child benefit isn’t means tested but there are income clawbacks. If one parent earns over £60k then all of it needs to be repaid, effectively cancelling it out.

If any parent could claim child benefit regardless of income/savings, and a portion of that child benefit could be put towards a scheme that enabled parents to rent luxury homes via advanced payments (and tax breaks) you might have a point.

Shall we talk about the injustice of also having to pay a huge advance payment in order to get a wheelchair accessible vehicle, when in reality, if an ordinary hatchback would have done then there might have been no advance payment at all. We didn't choose to have a WAV for the fun of it. It was a necessity that we paid handsomely for. We'd have much rather had the 'luxury' of choosing a normal vehicle. But all you who things disabled people are benefits scroungers don't want to talk about that.

Also, God forbid that a hardworking disabled person on PIP shouldn't get to choose to have something nice.
I feel sure you'd all change your minds if it was you are a family member who became disabled.

So why does he need a luxury car?

I’m not a bot😁but can we please see a Russian version?

Why would anyone choose to lease a hugely expensive luxury vehicle in the first place, if it's just a lease and they don't get to keep it?

Why? Is her credit history poor?

You can lease a Yaris for £180 a month. That's cheaper than Motability.

A friend of mine has a Motability Kia. It's big - they paid to upgrade it because they have a labrador and a preschooler. She can't really do anything with her preschooler anymore, or her lab, because she's got a brain tumour that doesn't allow it. You can only really tell if you look at her closely and see that her skull is a strange shape from where she had brain surgery, to remove the last tumour, and now there's another one.

She is, currently, allowed to drive. She is more confident doing so in a car with the warnings/sensors/screens that the Kia has. She has been medically assessed and found fit to drive, and it seems insane to suggest she shouldn't be able to... She can't walk any distance anymore, really, due to tiredness from the meds, so if she isn't allowed to drive, she'd be housebound.

She's always said she that she feels incredibly judged. I can absolutely see why having seen this thread.

Surely you can see one standard cheap car wouldn't work for all situations.

In what way do you believe a WAV is a luxury?

Yes they are! As a driving instructor I am aware of many pupils who have mobility cars before the pupil has even passed their test and ALL, yes ALL of the ones I know about have a motability car due to anxiety! I’ve even had a sister of one of these pupils saying their sister doesn’t have anxiety but their mum worked hard for years as the child was growing to convince the authorities she had it

Seems fair to restrict, but based on practicality, I know someone who got their mid life crisis tiny 2 seater convertible on the scheme and their non driver spouse was permanently in a massive wheelchair and never even sat in it! They got an ancient work horse as a ‘run around’ to fit the wheelchair in. This shouldn’t be allowed imo.

Subsidised, but they are paying the difference between "basic" and "luxury" so whats the problem? Your mum being financially shafted paying £500 a month for a Yaris is completely irrelevant

Fair enough, but then remove the VAT exemption on the difference between the price of the basic car and the high end car. They may be paying the deposit out of their own money for the high end car, but it's still subsidised by the taxpayer because of the VAT exemption!

I went to school with someone with brittle bones, he was always in a wheelchair. He started getting interested in computers in the 80s, started a company and had been very successful.
He’s always had a very nice adapted car. Why shouldn’t he. All the shit he’s been through and will go through that gives him pleasure in life, why should he drive a bog standard car.

And it is difficult to get those adjustments done privately. My parents in law have found this, they actually wanted to keep the car they already owned.
I guess there should be a separate benefit to adapt a private car.

But regardless this is an unpleasant thread and I suspect full of untruths.I'm still shaking my head at the £500 leasing fee for a Yaris, I can only suspect that is actually finance not leasing, in which case the car will be owned at the end of the term, unlike a mobility car.

@Badbadbunny
Which grants and incentives does Motability receive?

As PP have said, the allowance costs the taxpayers the same regardless of the type of vehicle. What seems to be the problem is that people are upset that disabled people don't look sufficiently ill and 'umble.

Anyway, I'm sitting here with a big box of 🍿 waiting for the full list of what is and isn't a "luxury car" to be established. Lee Anderson has already had his say. Will there be the mobile equivalent of the bedroom tax, if people who don't have three children get a five-seat car?