Spain promised Europe a tax reform in exchange for continuing to receive European funds. The Government already has all the measures included in this reform ready and presented it yesterday afternoon in Congress. Among other things, it includes a diesel price rise.
What the Executive proposes is increase the tax burden on diesel to equate it to that of gasoline, so that a liter of diesel will be almost 10 cents more expensive than now and will cost more or less the same as a liter of 95 gasoline.
A tax change that all diesel car users will notice, but not transporters
One of the advantages that diesel cars have had over gasoline cars is that filling their tank was cheaper because diesel costs less than gasoline. You can see it at any gas station: today, in Spain the average price of a liter of 95 unleaded gasoline is 1.51 euros, while the average price of a liter of diesel is 1.39 euros.
Well, you have to get used to the idea that this is going to change because the Government intends to raise the price of diesel to equal that of gasoline. This measure is part of the tax reform that the Executive presented yesterday in Parliament, a reform that Spain promised to Brussels in exchange for continuing to receive European funds.
The reform includes dozens of changes at the tax level that will affect us in multiple ways, but there is one measure that drivers will especially notice, at least a good part of it because it will directly affect the price of diesel.
The Government’s idea is to increase the price of diesel with a increase in your tax to equate it to the price of gasoline. With this measure, the hydrocarbon tax on automotive diesel would increase by 9.37 cents per liter, so that the general rate for this fuel would go from the current 0.307 euros per liter to 0.40069 euros. The increase would not affect transporters.
This tax is called Special Tax on Hydrocarbons or IEH. It is a national tax that has been in force since 2019 and taxes fuels in two sections (general and special) which are applied to every thousand liters of the fuel in question.
As the Government measure contemplates an increase in the general section, the special section should continue to be added, which is set at 0.072 euros, for both diesel and gasoline. Adding the general section (0.40069 euros per liter) and the special section (0.072 euros per liter), with this proposal from the Executive, the total IEH that diesel would pay would be 0.47269 euros per liter. And to the Special Tax on Hydrocarbons we would also have to add the IVAwhich is 0.295 euros per liter in the case of Diesel A.
Of course, as part of this measure, it is also planned that the general IEH rate paid for diesel will have a “reduction” in exceptional conditions: it would become 0.35 euros per liter in the event that the price of diesel exceeds 2 euros per liter for two months and, in addition, the average price of a barrel of Brent rises from one month to the next in that same two-month period.
For the tax reform proposed by the Government to go ahead, it needs to be approved in Parliament. If the green light is received, the diesel tax increase would become effective as of April 1, 2025 and that would be when we would pay more for it than now, ending in one fell swoop one of the advantages that diesel cars continue to have over gasoline cars.
Source: www.motorpasion.com
