Electric Vehicles: North West

(asked on 21st June 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to improve electric vehicle infrastructure in the North West.


Answered by
Trudy Harrison Portrait
Trudy Harrison
This question was answered on 27th June 2022

Government has committed over £1.6 billion to support charging infrastructure at homes, on the street, in workplaces, destinations and along major roads. We have published a landmark electric vehicle (EV) infrastructure strategy setting out our plans to accelerate the rollout of a world-class charging network across the UK. Our strategy sets out our vision and commitments to make EV charging cheaper and more convenient than refuelling at a petrol station.

In addition, we have announced new regulations for public chargepoints to improve confidence in the charging network and make the user experience truly seamless. Drivers will benefit from simplified payment methods as well as the ability to compare prices and access real-time information about chargepoints. We will ensure there is a 99% reliability rate at rapid chargepoints. We will be introducing payment roaming to support the electrification of fleets. Chargepoints will need to have open data so that they are easy to find using maps and apps. We will lay legislation later this year.

To ensure that the transition to electric vehicles takes place in every part of the country, we are pledging at least £500m to support local chargepoint provision. As part of this, the Local EV Infrastructure (LEVI) fund will provide approximately £400m of capital and £50m of resource funding to support local authorities to work with industry and transform the availability of charging for drivers without off-street parking. We have launched a £10 million pilot as a springboard for the development of the full fund.

This year, £20 million is available through the on-street residential chargepoint scheme to all UK local authorities to provide public chargepoints to their residents without access to private parking.

Local authorities have a key role to play as they are best placed to consider local needs. We encourage local authorities to apply for funding to provide chargers for their residents.

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