£1.5bn package announced to help Britain switch to electric vehicles
https://news.sky.com/story/1-5bn-package-announced-to-help-britain-switch-to-electric-vehicles-13474203
Posted by topotaul
£1.5bn package announced to help Britain switch to electric vehicles
https://news.sky.com/story/1-5bn-package-announced-to-help-britain-switch-to-electric-vehicles-13474203
Posted by topotaul
23 Comments
Then they’ll be taxed heavily and you’ll need a mandatory government app to drive then.
1.5b package and £1 increase in charging cost lmao im sure everyone is thrilled to switch, electric car tax scrapped as well, another thrilling reason to switch
Can’t even find parking within 50m of my house so… Start there government.
Nearly 4K towards a car but reintroducing the 1K cap for the cycle to work scheme.
If the government wants to be improving sustainable and clean transport it seems they’re overlooking a significant sector of it.
*During the budget next week, the Labour Party is expected to announce a further £1.3bn for the Electric Car Grant, along with £200m to speed up the rollout of thousands of charge points across the UK, bringing the total investment to £1.5bn.*
*As it announced its latest plans, the government said the proposed funding would also help local authorities ramp up charging infrastructure on local streets so it is easier for everyone to get access to reliable charging.*
Extracts from the Sky report above, which is almost identical to what the BBC is reporting – [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c39pk873wlwo](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c39pk873wlwo)
Is there going to be anything in the Budget on Wednesday that has not either been already semi-officially announced like this, or at least been tested out in the press by kite-flying? Is it just the exact combination of all these things that we find out on Wednesday?
The announcement to scrap two-child benefit cap will only be a surprise if it doesn’t happen.
Good news, but personally would just put £1.5bn into EV charging. Cars being released now are already pretty cheap (BYD, new Renaults) and the main barrier is people having access to a charger. Make them omnipresent (and ideally multi use too so you can do bidirectional charging to buildings, or plug in other utility vehicles) and you’re golden.
Damn, I already got one.
But also have ofgem raise the price cap of electricity due to infrastructure costs while making gas even cheaper per kWh, introduce VED for electric cars, at a higher rate than some petrol and diesel cars, then talk about taxing electric cars per mile to make up for lost fuel duty. Mixed messages from the government with this
I’m not convinced this is actually necessary.
EV adoption is already rising each year, largely due to improving technology and consumer interest. The issue is that the government has imposed annual Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) targets, which manufacturers have to meet or face financial penalties. These targets feel arbitrary*, and they add yet another layer of regulation and bureaucracy, despite the government’s stated aim of reducing red tape, which they don’t seem to be achieving.
We already have mechanisms like Vehicle Excise Duty that could be used more effectively to encourage a shift toward lower-emission vehicles, rather than introducing an entirely separate compliance system.
There’s more information here:
https://www.rac.co.uk/drive/electric-cars/choosing/road-to-electric/
*Arbitrary – yes I know it’s part of the wider emissions reductions and net zero initiative but that shouldn’t be what mandates government policy or funding priorities. We need to be more lax on the target more generally.
I think we are past the point of needing to incentivise EV purchases. Vast majority of people know that EV is going to be their next car or one after, to the point it’s not even thought about anymore.
Charge point incentives sure.
Just in time to start taxing them per mile traveled.
Normal people on modest incomes don’t buy new cars, how does this help ordinary people?
I mean wages have hardly moved in 20 years and if I wanted to buy a fairly ordinary EV I’d probably be paying more than I did for my first flat and it would be a depreciating asset.
while also taxing based on mileage and also increasing the cost of electricity
Always said I will buy an EV when the maths add up. I don’t need government help, just the market to mature and costs to come down. The government are now apparently introducing a pay per mile scheme for EVs which will push the maths even further out.
Given my current car is now 9 years old it’s looking increasingly likely that my next car will be diesel. Current plan is to see what the market is like in 2028, but I may be able to hold out until 2030.
A lot of the country simply can’t move to a fully electric vehicle. The infrastructure just isn’t there, the range and charging times are still ridiculous. That’s before we get to the millions of people who don’t have a driveway and have to dangle a wire out of their front window.
When I can get 400 miles out of a charge, it takes a few minutes to recharge and I can set off knowing I’ll be able to get a recharge where I’m going, I’m in. Until then, I’m not going to actively reduce my options.
The maximum discount available for cars assessed as Band 1 is £3,750.
The eligible vehicles are:
Citroën ë-C5 Aircross Long Range
Ford E-Tourneo Courier
Ford Puma Gen-E
Nissan LEAF
Isn’t time to stop giving help to affluent households to buy expensive new cars.
How about some help for low to middle income households to move into 2nd hand EV’s?
Nice let’s also kill the mechanic jobs while we at it and give u a shitter car in return
Let’s call it what it is, a subsidy for the automotive industry.
The biggest blockers to actually getting people on these things are the charging infrastructure and the ‘disappearing range’ during colder months.
They’re taxing EVs with one hand and administering a scheme to promote them with the other… government efficiency at is finest.
Amazing some people still don’t understand the UK doesn’t have the infrastructure to support everyone driving an EV. Govt included.
So our taxes are going to subsidise people who can afford to spend *at least* £30k on a new car, and those are the Chinese ones, to the tune of £3,750. Absolutely fucking disgusting. £1.3 billion on a technology which seems to be unreliable, isn’t available to everybody, is way too expensive if you can’t charge at home, and which is flooding our market with cheap Chinese crap which is contributing to the decline of the British car industry.
I’m old. I’ve been interested in environmental matters since I was a kid in the 70’s. I’ve supported every environmental step ever taken, and rank climate change as the major threat to the planet. But this half baked badly conceived push to electric cars is just insane.
What would really help is mandating vehicle to grid (V2G) capability on all new EVs. This will allow us to solve the evening peak demand issue.
If 1 car can output 7kW for 2 hours, it should be more than enough to smooth out the peak load for 2 households. Then recharge using an EV tariff like Octopus go or even better the intelligent go.