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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what recent estimate he has made of the number of jobs that (a) have been or (b) will be retained as a result of (i) UK private, (ii) Government and (iii) inward investment as part of the Government’s plans to accelerate the shift to zero emissions vehicles between November 2020 and November 2030.

The automotive sector is an important part of the Government’s plans for green growth, levelling up across our country and driving emissions to net zero by 2050.

The Government is committed to growing the 149,000 jobs in the automotive sector across the UK. Accelerating the transition to zero emission vehicles is estimated to support around 40,000 new jobs by 2030.

As part of the Government’s Net Zero Strategy, we are allocating a further £350 million for the Automotive Transformation Fund, as part of our £1 billion commitment to build an internationally competitive electric vehicle supply chain including gigafactories. This is in addition to the £500m of funding announced as part of the 10 Point Plan.

Recent investment announcements by Nissan, Stellantis and Ford will support thousands of highly skilled, green jobs in the UK, and many more across the supply chain.