In different countries, including Lithuania, some vehicles are subject to road tax.
For example, Lithuanian highways have a toll system applied to passenger (categories M2 and M3) and cargo (categories N1, N2, N3) vehicles.
However, in other European countries, such as Poland, Slovakia or Hungary, car drivers also have to pay for the use of some motorways.
One of the main goals of collecting such a fee is to help drivers to finance road maintenance and further road renovations.
Will there be a new tax for drivers?
In Lithuania, at least for the time being, car owners can drive freely on any road – they will not be asked to pay for it.
However, the idea expressed last year to apply a tax to drivers of all vehicles (including M1 category cars) seems not to have been forgotten.
Kazys Starkevičius, chairman of the Economic Committee, says that Lithuania needs a new, unified road tax system.
“Part of the political opponents keep saying that funds for road maintenance or construction are collected through excise taxes. On the other hand, when the budget is approved, several hundred million euros are allocated to road management.
At the recent meeting of the Economic Committee of the Seimas, there was also a proposal to exempt light trucks from road tax. However, we calculated that it would cost 15 million. euros. When you ask where we will get this money from, they start talking about excise tax. But you don’t have to be populists. It is necessary to think about a new system that would be sustainable and would not have to go to withdraw money from the budget at every moment.
When we have a clear and transparent tax system, where the money will all go to the road fund, then we will have roads like in Poland,” the politician commented to the tv3.lt news portal.
According to the politician, although it is not realistic that new decisions related to the new road tax procedure would be made in this term of the Seimas, the changes are necessary.
“There is no need to be populists. It doesn’t matter that the election is coming up. You need to have a clear opinion yourself, and not show that we will take money from somewhere for the construction and maintenance of roads. It is a tragedy that a road fund was not created”, K. Starkevičius pointed out.
The tax could be avoided
According to K. Starkevičius, the new road tax system could be applied only to newly built roads. And drivers, who, according to him, would not want to pay for a good quality road, could choose alternative routes, that is, roads built in the past.
“Whoever wanted to reach their destination faster, they could take the toll road.” Several things need to be distinguished – there may be toll roads, there may be concession roads, whatever will be done. And those public roads that could be nearby. But the tax would apply to new roads, not old ones, nobody is going to put that tax on old roads here.
<...> If that road were newly built, I hope that the Ministry of Transport, “Via Lietuva” will organize a suitable tender so that an electronic system is installed and drivers do not have to buy some vignettes there. And now those vignettes are from the 20th, not the 21st century,” said the member of the Seimas.
Additional burden for residents?
Professor Vytautas Snieška of the Faculty of Economics and Business of the Kaunas University of Technology assessed the current practices of different states regarding road taxation.
According to him, the road tax for heavy vehicles is indeed necessary, and Lithuania is ahead of other countries, one of them being the United Kingdom, in terms of the amount of tax currently set.
“There is no doubt that it is necessary to tax heavy freight transport, which severely destroys roads, especially in countries with a lot of transit traffic flows, and therefore also in Lithuania, where, by the way, there is one of the highest such taxes – 0.442 EUR/km, while in the United Kingdom it is only 0.002 EUR/km”, said the professor.
It is true that the opinion regarding the determination of a certain road tax for passenger cars is also different in different states.
“The additional taxation of private cars is very different. Taxation for the payback period of roads, bridges, and tunnels built with private funds is widely used, which is canceled after the concession period ends.
In some countries, taxes for driving on roads built with state funds have been abolished, because citizens have already paid the income taxes from which those roads are built and repaired, by the way, just like in Lithuania. Fuel excise tax is collected in Lithuania, which, as was declared, is also used for road construction, repair and modernization,” explained V. Snieška.
However, the economist considers that if the road tax in Lithuania were also applied to passenger cars, it would be more like an additional burden on the population.
“Politicians are very fond of creating new taxes, because additional money is always in short supply, and the necessary people can be employed in the institutions created for their administration.
But then it is necessary to name it like this: “we want to impose an additional burden on the residents”, although such a confession should not be expected”, commented V. Snieška.
Vidas Žuraulis, a professor at the Department of Automotive Engineering at Vilnius Tech, told the tv3.lt news portal a little earlier that he did not think that a tax on passenger car drivers would be a solution to the long-standing condition of poor quality roads.
“Passenger cars also contribute to the degradation of road conditions, but to a much lesser extent than freight cars, so I don’t think that a new tax for drivers of passenger cars is the most fair,” the interviewer thought.
The roads are getting worse, but there is no discussion
At that time, the representatives of the Ministry of Transport commented to the news portal tv3.lt that discussions on possible changes to the tax procedure for road use are not considered.
“In 2023 After the Seimas adopted the Law on Amendments to the Road Maintenance and Development Program Funding Law, it is possible to tax not only main roads, but also rural and district roads.
However, there are currently no discussions regarding the extension of road taxation to light vehicles”, said representatives of the ministry in a comment sent to the news portal tv3.lt.
According to the Ministry, 19 highways with a total length of about 1.7 thousand have already been tolled in the Lithuanian road network. kilometers.
In addition, it is planned to build an almost 7-kilometer southern Klaipėda bypass, a 9-kilometer long Zarasai bypass and a 16-kilometer Kaunas bypass, for which drivers would have to pay, as is planned.
The Minister of Transport, Marius Skuodis, has also said that the use of the public-private sector partnership (PPSP) model is being considered for the development of the State road network.
“I have repeatedly stated that the existing road funding is not sufficient for all the necessary road infrastructure projects, so we are constantly looking for opportunities to attract new sources of funding. Although financing from the budget is usually cheaper, if such opportunities are not available, we see public-private partnership as one of the alternative ways to ensure the implementation of specific road infrastructure projects of national importance.
According to this model, some road infrastructure development projects in neighboring countries are successfully implemented, for example, the Kekava bypass was built in Latvia last year,” says Minister of Communications Marius Skuodis.
In the opinion of the Ministry of Transport, the construction of Kaunas Western Bypass (about 16 km long), Klaipėda South Bypass (about 6.8 km long), Zarasai City Bypass (about 9.34 km long), regional road No. 130 could become projects implemented in this way. Reconstruction of the Kaunas–Prienai–Alytus section from 11.6 to 31.1 km.
From 2024 changes to the road user tax (e-vignettes) applied in Lithuania entered into force on January 1. The main change: the number of vehicle axles and the level of emissions (Euro class) are evaluated during the calculation of the road user tax.
The new road tax will be applied to passenger (categories M2 and M3) and cargo (categories N1, N2, N3) vehicles, as before. This category is specified in the vehicle registration certificate.
After the Seimas adopted the “green” fuel excise package in May, from 2025 the diesel excise will be equal to that of gasoline, and from 2026 it will exceed the gasoline excise. In this way, the authorities aim to promote the choice of less polluting fuel.
According to the calculations of the Ministry of Environment, a liter of diesel at gas stations will become more expensive by 4-6 cents annually as a result, and the carbon dioxide (CO2) component introduced into motor fuels from 2025 will increase their price by another 3 cents annually.
At that time, the newly introduced excise duty on liquefied petroleum gas from January amounts to 368 euros per ton (including VAT), and after the introduction of the CO2 component next year, the excise duty will reach 405 euros, and in 2030 – 590 euros.
