A columnist has complete freedom. Always

I don't know how it actually works, but apparently it is. So if you call something 'column', you are as free as a bird to express your opinion. In some countries, such a person may be imprisoned for a while. That is not the case here. After all, we live in a COOL !!! country. It feels good to use that freedom claim only once. The text is entirely on my account as a freelancer and classic enthusiast. The opinion and vision of the editor-in-chief has not been asked in this regard. The text is my response to a reader's response. Because a serious action deserves a serious answer. Of course, that reader started his 'letter' correctly and neatly called his name, but we are a bit careful about naming names: We at AMK act as if privacy is still an acquired right.

Dear editor

Please have a small reaction to the article 'Oldtimers as company car'.

Will we not cut our fingers again by stimulating this? Several years ago, Mercedes, BMWs and Volkswagens were imported en masse. These cars were used daily, while the policy was taken out as a hobby insurance to be able to get to work cheaply. What happened then? A layman could see it coming from afar: the government saw that the tax exemption was being 'abused'. Now it is the turn of the freelancers. (Nothing wrong with freelancers only if old timers are used every day).

The result is a new tax measure for old-timers with the result that cars with 25 years and less than 40 years old had to pay an amount in tax again. Protest rides etc.

If we promote this again with old-timers, the entire exemption may soon be abolished. It is all so sensitive to our "environmental friends", who do not miss an opportunity to take a look at oldtimers…. Aren't we being a bit stupid by arranging cheap transport for profit in a devious way and with that, the real old-timer owners who barely reach their maximum insurance kilometers will soon be embarking on new tax measures? Or that all old-timer commercial vehicles are excluded from exemptions, because the government has no nuances, there is advertising on it or a van? Then it is seen as an active utility vehicle. While there are many of these cars that are lovingly and protected stored away from the elements.

Fortunately, some insurers have become stricter in the provision of vintage car insurance. This has also caused premiums to increase in recent years (for certain categories). Or 'throw' them out of the old-timer insurance into the regular full-rate insurance (but yes, that is of course not the intention).

And count them with the normal car park and not as an old-timer, so that there is no distorted (negative) image with the old-timers.

I may be completely wrong, but here's what I think ... Usually we wake up when it's too late!

Yours faithfully,

Tjeerd from Oentskerk (Frl)

Reader Tjeerd has a point

We think the great danger is not from left-wing tree huggers, but from our neo-liberal R government. (short for Rijksoverheid). And our considerations in which we try to combine the pleasant with the pleasant, including fossil fuels, are of course doomed. Because in the context of neo-liberal thinking, the reverse Robin Hood Syndrome applies. Here is stolen from the poor and the loot goes to the rich. Schiphol and Botlek can continue to grow without limits. And there is not even excise duty on jet fuel. When I drive past Schiphol on a somewhat foggy morning, I taste the stiff kerosene vapor on my teeth. A hare hunter at Schiphol chuckled, "If I hit one, it will explode."

But as an R government, it's easier to take away dimes from small folks than to get a banknote from a fellow neo-liberal. I don't even place a value judgment on that. It is just a mild observation.

Okay. There is a chance that there are people who only see the benefits of having a classic or young timer. But there are also benefit and tax frauds. The latter is of course a somewhat painful example, but still. There are countless examples of improper use. Something can be done about that.

Now as classic enthusiasts we can keep low under the radar

For self-protection we could even stop making classic magazines, banning Ilja Gort with his Peugeot 504 and Nico Aaldering. But that is reacting out of fear. And fear rules this country too much given the hoarding of toilet paper, milk chocolate and Bastogne cakes.

But do we want to live in fear? Living in 'what if?' scenarios?

I enjoy my passion as long as I can. For the R-government - which currently has some other things at its head - we are a small group that has too few tractors to occupy Malieveld. So we are easy prey. But hopefully we will be too unimportant again in the near future to be picked as low-hanging fruit. And I know a self-employed person who also values ​​his Volvo 740 on emotional grounds. Maybe it is all still not too bad.