Or unless the neighboring countries follow suit.

Currently, there's a vehicle registration tax in the Netherlands when you first purchase a vehicle. Smaller vehicles and electric vehicles have a much lower tax to encourage cars that pollute less and put less strain on the roads.

When you go to another country to buy a vehicle, you still have to bring it back into the Netherlands and register it. So you'll just end up paying the tax anyways.

I would expect that if the Netherlands does end up going through with this proposal, Dutch residents would be unable to register imported vehicles unless they were electric vehicles.

Personally, I think just taxing fuel-burning vehicles with very high taxes would achieve a similar goal with less fuss. People would buy electric vehicles because they're cheaper rather than due to the cars just not being available. A small number of people who really want gasoline cars can still do so, but they're going to have to pay a lot for the privilege.

But it still is incorrect, the Dutch Labour Party is proposing the ban, they are not representative for the Dutch people. Which during the last elections was about 25% of the votes, now more like 10%. There is still a lot of resistance also within our government and political parties. With these proposals a lot of people are quite positive when they are proposed, but down the line they get voted down.

The case against the Dutch government from Urgenda [1] shows how hard it is to get change going.

[1] http://www.urgenda.nl/en/climate-case/