PN Will Pay You €10,000 If You Give Up Your Car And Go Carless For Five Years
A future Nationalist government will pay drivers €10,000 if they sell their car and go carless for the next five years.
This innovative promise, included in the PN manifesto, is intended to reduce cars off the road and address Malta’s notorious traffic congestion problems.
“A €10,000 grant will be given, spread over five years, to encourage more people to get rid of their old cars on condition that they don’t acquire another vehicle during that period,” the proposal reads.
A similar proposal, cheekily dubbed ‘Vexit’, was mooted by consultant Lewis Holland back in 2019.
Rather than giving drivers who sell their car a grant, Holland had proposed the government purchase their cars at market value and give them a lifetime pass for free public transport as well as credits in alternative transport.
However, public transport is set to become free for everyone in Malta by October anyway, so the ‘carrot’ to convince people to give up their cars would have required some rethinking anyway.
Other PN proposals aimed at combatting traffic include setting up a trackless tram, building a network of underground tunnels, investing in a system that will inform drivers in advance of traffic accidents, launching a national programme to encourage bicycle use, and “incentivising” people to use public transport.
An earlier version of the article said the grant being proposed is of €15,000; it is actually a grant of €10,000
Would this scheme entice you to give up your car?
READ NEXT: Gap Between PL And PN Between 23,000 And 45,000 Votes As Three Surveys Give Different Results
