Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what funding has been allocated to the West Midlands Combined Authority for the expansion of electric vehicle charging infrastructure; and over what time period that funding has been allocated.

In 2016 we announced an improved offer making available £4.5m to 2020 to Local Authorities wishing to install recharging infrastructure in residential areas for drivers of electric cars that lack offstreet parking through our On-street Residential Chargepoint Scheme. 28 Local Authorities have applied to the scheme to date including Coventry City Council who have been awarded £300,000 to install 90 chargepoints. Additionally, as part of OLEV’s £20m Taxi Infrastructure Competition, Coventry, Wolverhampton and Birmingham were between them awarded over £4.5m in 2017 to help deliver charging infrastructure dedicated to ultra-low emission taxis. The Midlands was one of the eight ‘Plugged-in Places’ projects and received over £2.5m from the Office for Low Emission Vehicles. Between December 2010 and 2013, the project helped develop a regional network of more than 850 electric vehicle Charging Points across both the East and West Midlands. The total funding amount awarded across the East and West Midlands for these schemes is £7.3 million.