Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the number of electric car charging points in each county in England and Wales; and what plans they have to increase the number of such charging points.

Highways England has reviewed chargepoint provision within 20 miles of the strategic road network across relevant counties in England to determine the gaps in charge point availability and to identify locations of potential sites for new charge points to meet their commitment that motorists will be no more than 20 miles from a charge point on 95% of the strategic road network. Highways England has so far given grants to 5 local authorities (Mid Suffolk, Ryedale, South Somerset, Worthing and Shropshire) to deliver 19 chargepoints and is working with BP Chargemaster and Swarco to deliver a further 59, which will all be installed by Spring 2020.

The UK now has over 17,000 publicly accessible chargepoints, including more than 1,700 rapid devices – one of the largest networks in Europe. Our vision is to have one of the best infrastructure networks in the world for electric vehicles, and we want chargepoints to be accessible, affordable and secure. In addition to the Highways England funding, the Government provides grants to fund chargepoints at homes, workplaces and on residential streets. These measures, along with the £400m public-private Charging Infrastructure Investment Fund, will see thousands more chargepoints installed across the UK.