Electric vehicles were sold to London drivers as the sensible way to beat the city’s road charges: cleaner, cheaper to run, and – crucially – exempt from the Congestion Charge. As of Friday 2 January 2026, the U-turn is finally complete. Many have suspected for years, but it’s now reality: it was never about going “green” at all.
What Changed in London
The daily Congestion Charge for all vehicles has risen. EVs have been awarded a temporary discount, but the price for green vehicles will soon rise again. Transport for London (TfL) tells the public it’s about modernisation. EV uptake has surged (rightly so, in their eyes) which creates more congestion, whereas the original exemption was to – apparently – reduce city centre traffic. What we’re really seeing, however, is a population pushed towards costly vehicle upgrades in the name of cleaner, cheaper driving, only to have the rules reversed and any incentive for EV ownership removed.
From 2 January, London’s Cleaner Vehicle Discount is no longer a 100% free pass. It’s now a tiered discount system available only for EVs – and only if they’re using Auto Pay. It will now cost £90 per week to drive an electric car in the city centre – until 2026, it’s been free of charge.
They Waited for Everyone to Go Electric – Then Changed the Rules
TfL’s rationale says too many exemptions leads to too many vehicles. In its press release confirming the changes, TfL said EV registrations tied to the discount had risen sixfold from 20,000 to almost 120,000. It warned that without this U-turn, the city would see more than 2,000 extra daily vehicles driving in the city centre on an average weekday, undermining congestion reduction.
What, exactly, did they think would happen? They financially incentivised drivers living in a critically expensive city to swap their vehicle for one with a lower running cost (in the name of the environment). Now, only after they’ve made the switch, the rules have changed again.
With so many making the move from petrol or diesel power to electric, the policy has conveniently pivoted. Overnight, EV incentives have been removed, and the city’s income increased. The system has gained exceptional pricing power over a population it tricked into going green.
It Won’t Stop Here
Firstly, this is not the only price increase EV drivers will see. The discount applied to electric vehicles will shrink over time, dropping from a 25% saving to just 12.5% for car drivers, and from 50% to 25% saving for vans and HGVs.
TfL has also changed the “rules of the road” for future Congestion Charge increases. The updated mayoral guidance creates a pathway for the charge to be increased in line with Tube fares without any consultation. So, while it just became more expensive to drive regardless of vehicle, future hikes will be even easier.
The “Environment” Generates a Lot of Cash
Even supporters of clean-air zones tend to understate the scale of the revenue generated by the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) and similar models around the country. Between 29 August 2023 and 26 April 2025, ULEZ raked in £394 million, confirmed by the London Assembly.
In total, London’s road pricing schemes – ULEZ and the Congestion Zone together – generated £923 million in gross service income in fiscal 2025.
I have previously covered the various active schemes around the country. Feel free to read here: Driving Out The Poor: Are UK Emissions Zones A Scam?
The True Cost of Going Electric: Behind the Scam
The Congestion Charge is not the only feeling that people are being conned by green energy incentives. The operating costs of EVs has also shot up since initial adoption.
When electric vehicles were first aggressively promoted a decade ago, charging costs were a major selling point. In 2014-2016, UK domestic electricity prices averaged approximately 12p per kWh, while many early public chargers – especially those installed by councils, supermarkets and employers – were free to use as a direct effort to encourage adoption.
At that time, charging an EV with a 24kWh battery (common in the popular Nissan Leaf) would cost £3-4 at home and provide 100 miles of range. Public charging was £0. So, for early adopters, running costs were dramatically lower than petrol or diesel – approx. 2p per mile for EVs vs 15p per mile for combustion engines.
Fast forward to today, and public charging has jumped up to 70-80p per kWh. It was free a decade ago – and so was driving in central London. Now, a modern 60-70kWh EV battery costs about £55 to charge, delivering a per-mile cost that often exceeds petrol, especially for motorway driving.
In addition, public charging is taxed at 20% VAT. Home charging is 5%. This disparity needs to be highlighted because of the extra expense placed on those living in flats or without a driveway to charge at home. Reports estimate that this generates an extra £85 million per year in VAT alone due to people needing to charge from public outlets.
The Electric Vehicle Illusion Worked Perfectly
Remember when exemptions were used explicitly to alter driving behaviour and vehicle choice? Going electric meant that you drove for free. The rapid rise in EV ownership shows this worked – whether driven by financial logic or environmental concern. Marketing was heavily focused on running costs with electricity being cheaper than petrol, home charging being affordable, and public chargers provided as a convenience rather than a premium service.
Public charging prices have spiked over the past two years with rapid chargers costing more per mile than most petrol vehicles. Peak pricing, connection fees, and subscription models have crept in quietly too.
The promise was lower total cost of ownership, and less strain on the environment. The reality is rising fixed and variable costs, layered on top of taxes that EV drivers were explicitly told they would avoid.
And now, with the increase in Congestion Charge – which TfL says is because so many people have adopted EVs that they need to restrict them – it begs the question: what did they expect? Drivers were incentivised to swap their combustion engines for electric, but still needed to drive, so it became a 1:1 trade. How, then, was congestion ever going to reduce? It looks like the illusion worked perfectly, and drivers have been successfully tricked into adopting EVs – more expensive, easier to monitor, and with less control over running costs.
It Goes Far Beyond London
This pattern is not unique to London. We see similar dynamics around Europe too.
In Norway, EV incentives are being rolled back as adoption exceeds targets. German subsidies have been cut amid budget strain. Cities across the EU in general are exploring road-pricing schemes that no longer distinguish between fuel source in cars. Once the majority goes electric, the tax base will be rebuilt. Fuel duty can be replaced by road pricing instead. EVs, then, were never going to be permanently exempt.
And this is without talking about the scrappage scheme or the remarkably un-green way of building the batteries…
Final Thought
The real lesson from London is not only that environmental policy is a scam. The most telling part is how once behaviour changes, governments never relinquish the leverage they gain. Electric vehicles have solved a political problem while creating an even better one: a cleaner city and a more reliable revenue stream.
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Sounds to me like the U.K. could use their own “revolution”.
Problem Reaction Solution Hegelian Dialectic
It seems like 5 minutes ago they played the same game with diesel vehicles – that was the warm up rehersal, to see if the sheep would obey.