MPs calls on government to take measures to encourage electric vehicle usage

Speech to be made by Nick Fletcher MP tomorrow, April 21, in Westminster Hall on the promotion of electric vehicle usage.

Thank you, Chairman, and may I thank the minister for taking the time to come and listen to this debate.

Let me begin.

Can you hear that? (pause)

Let me try again, can you hear that? (pause)

No, you won’t, because that’s the sound of an electric vehicle.

Quiet isn’t it? Now breathe in through your nose, come on everyone - a really big sniff.

Can you smell anything?

No. Again, there’s nothing to smell. No nasty gases polluting the air we breathe, no noise polluting the sound of birds singing.

OK you get the picture maybe a little dramatic but nonetheless all very true.

And that is our future and it is not far away. In fact if the minister and the Government really want to, they can bring this vehicle revolution here within the next 5 years.

Now there is a stumbling block – well, it’s a few blocks that make a wall. But there is really only one wall now.

You see, as time has moved on, so have the cars. Even as little as five years ago electric cars were being produced, but they were very expensive. And many joining this debate may think that this is still the case. And I am not going to tell you they are cheap but apparently the cost that makes a car affordable these days is around £36000 and thankfully, that is where we are today.

Now this is the lower end of the market yes, and £36000 is still a large amount of money, but compared with a diesel or petrol vehicle it is similar.

And as many people buy these vehicles on PCP, so the actual capital cost is never actually paid for in a lump sum. More as a deposit and a monthly figure which usually covers the depreciation. Electric cars are tending to hold their money very well so the monthly payments should at least be as competitive, if not better.

Electric cars are also phenomenally cheaper to run too. The average cost of a 100-mile journey in a diesel is £12 and in an electric vehicle it is £7. Servicing costs are also much lower. With far few moving parts there is a lot less to go wrong. Most fully electric vehicles have less than 20 moving parts.

Wherever you get moving parts you, you get wear through friction. This usually means maintenance or failure, so it obviously does go the fewer moving parts the better. They brake through regeneration too, so brake pad wear is minimal and with no exhaust, no oil to change, no filters. You get the picture. So, if cost is not holding us back, what is?

Is it distance? Again, this used to be so. But most electric vehicles do much over 200 miles and although this can drop in the winter months as batteries and occupants have to be kept warm, most vehicles will easily do 130 miles. And with the average journey in the UK being less than 10 miles, range is not the big issue anymore.

Now I want to take a minute to help everyone re charging your EV. You see electric vehicles are not like petrol or diesel. In a petrol or diesel you would quite happily drive around with less than half a tank and you definitely wouldn’t fill up every day. Yet with an EV if you can, you should.

Of course, there are two main reasons for this. Firstly, unlike with a petrol or diesel car, when your car is parked, your EV will lose charge. The reason being is that the batteries look after themselves with a slight amount of warmth and there are lots of electronics that are always using power, so you invariably lose around 1% a day.

Secondly if you have to make an emergency journey, or take a day out, unless you are fully charged – you’re not going. I think it was Elon Musk who said ABC – “always be charging”. Now this is OK if you have a home charge unit, but if not, we need multiple fast charging everywhere.

Which leads me on to one of the four main stumbling blocks that are limiting the number of people who are using electric vehicles.

This of course, is the lack of rapid charging points in the UK, which is even more of an issue in South Yorkshire, and it is an issue that I hope the minister here today can help with.

You see, if plenty of rapid charging points were available, the range of a vehicle would not matter as much. I don’t think there are many places where we are more than 10 miles from a petrol station, so we rarely worry about filling up. But that is sadly, not the case with charging points.

Secondly, no one wants to wait 3 to 4 hours for their car to be charged so the charging points need to be at least 60kw or preferably 120kw.

Thirdly, I should mention the reliability of points, and this is so important. Turning up to an EV station with a unit damaged or faulty is not fun. And unlike running out of fuel, you can’t call dad - like I know my daughter would for a gallon of petrol. An electric vehicle just doesn’t work like that. You run out of charge and you are stuck, so charging points must be made reliable.

Finally, the payment system for the charge points needs to be contactless. You need to be able to drive up, plug in, and when ready, pay and drive away. Contactless payment must be the way and the Government should work with stakeholders to ensure that contactless facility are fitted to all new and existing charging points.

So those are the four stumbling blocks – the wall which is getting in the way of increased electric vehicle usage. The lack of charging points, the size of points, the unreliability of charging points and the lack of contactless facilities.

So how can we overcome this wall? Well let me start by saying that we are trying - that is for sure. And the announcement of no more internal combustion engines to be registered after 2030 has definitely made the industry sit up and look at this more seriously.

We are currently installing many charging parts points, but we need many more rapid units now. How can we do this? I believe we need to remove some of the existing incentives we see in the automobile sector and re-invest the monies to EV charge point infrastructure.

Currently, we are discounting cars and discounting the cost of chargers at home. And we are also discounting VED and company car tax.

Yet the cost of the cars is falling and will do so even more so as the big auto companies such as VW, BMW, Ford come on board and start producing more and more of their own electric vehicles.

Currently, the voucher scheme for home charging is over complicated and does not really offer any huge savings to the end customer.

Furthermore, as electric vehicles are becoming cheaper and cheaper to run, tax incentives will soon not be needed.

I believe, therefore, that if these monies were redirected to further charging infrastructure projects, then the automotive industry, which contributes to much of our greenhouse gas emissions, could really lead the way to our net zero target.

Yet while I think the Government should change course slightly, I would also like to thank ministers for what they have done so far, and what they have already set out to.

It should go on record that the Government is investing £1.3 Billion - and £950m of this is going directly into rapid charging projects. I know from my many meetings with stakeholders that this investment is more than welcome.

The Government is further investing £90m into local EV charging schemes, which local councils can apply for. The financing scheme is also of massive help and I would hope that many business utilise this.

I know that currently, some may say that battery technology will get better, while others will stress that while it will take time to get the charging points installed, they will come along eventually. But I cannot stress how important it is that ministers do not adopt this attitude and instead move much more quickly on this.

Why? Well because it is obvious that fewer consumers are buying electric vehicles due to this already mentioned anxiety on the distance between charge points. This “range anxiety” is what is really stopping people buying these fantastic vehicles.

The answer to such anxiety is high powered rapid charging stations everywhere.

A 300-mile range vehicle with a high-powered charging can take as little as 20 mins to give in excess of 150 miles charge. That is 75 miles in less than 10 minutes.

So that is obviously what we need. EV charging points being installed in the same frequency as petrol stations. Well-lit and ideally under cover. A perfect example of this Gridserve in Essex. Their charging forecourt is, clean and safe and has a lounge - not that you would really need one - shopping and a Costa Coffee. It has easy payment methods too.

I do really think the existing forecourt operators need to be taking this revolution serious and with Government backing in the initial stage, this could be great for the customer and also profitable enough for the private sector to get involved and really push this forward.

So to conclude, I believe that the Government should take the following action:

Taper off grants for home charging grant scheme by the end of the year, and do the same with electric car grants. Furthermore, we should look at company car tax benefits and VED benefits being slowly removed.

And with the savings made on removing these incentives, we should redirect the monies into furthering the rapid charging network, so range anxiety is a thing of the past.

There should also be fines for companies who poorly maintain their charging points, and contactless payment must be mandatory.

If we do this, the take up of these vehicles will huge.

Finally, however, I do want to mention one final issue which I hope to raise a debate on later in the year. And this is artificial intelligence. You see, with these electric vehicles the public is also seeing the power of AI. I am, of course, talking of self-driving cars.

This is the first real step into a future none of us really understand. So I make one further ask, will the minister raise the effects of AI with all her colleagues as a matter of urgency? As I believe that although there will be many benefits with AI over the years to come, unless it is regulated now, the positives may be far outweighed by the negatives that AI has on society

One final time can you hear that?

(pause)

No? that’s an electric vehicle.

Thank you