Electric Vehicles

(asked on 2nd July 2019) - View Source

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department has taken to support electric vehicles in (a) becoming competitive without financial incentives or subsidies for their purchase and (b) reaching price parity with non-electric vehicles.


Answered by
Michael Ellis Portrait
Michael Ellis
This question was answered on 9th July 2019

We are investing nearly £1.5bn‎ between April 2015 and March 2021, with grants available for plug in cars, vans, lorries, buses, taxis and motorcycles, and schemes to support chargepoint infrastructure at homes, workplaces and on residential streets. These subsidies are designed to support the early market and achieve a competitive, self-sustaining market.

The £400m public-private Charging Infrastructure Investment Fund will add thousands more public chargepoints. The Automated and Electric Vehicles Act gives Government new powers to regulate the chargepoint market and improve the experience for consumers. We have supported the installation of more than 20,000 public chargepoints, including over 2,000 rapid chargepoints. The UK’s network is already one of the largest networks in Europe and the Road to Zero strategy includes new commitments to massively expand electric and low emission vehicle infrastructure across the country. The Government has also put in place a favourable tax regime that rewards the cleanest, zero emission vehicles.

The Government has awarded over £300m in grants via Innovate UK into ultra low emission technologies. Part of this is the Faraday battery challenge, designed to ensure research and innovation takes centre stage in the Industrial Strategy and to reduce the cost of new technologies.

The Government has also put in place a favourable tax regime that rewards the cleanest, zero emission vehicles. Go Ultra Low is a joint Government-Industry funded campaign which aims to inform vehicle purchasers about the operational savings from driving electric vehicles and to dispel widespread myths.

We anticipate that electric vehicles will achieve price parity with their petrol and diesel counterparts in the mid-2020s. We will review progress by 2025. Against a rapidly evolving international context, we will seek to maintain the UK’s leadership position and meet our ambitions, and will consider what interventions are required if not enough progress is being made.

Reticulating Splines