Electric car sales in UK flatline, prompting calls for VAT cut (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 10 months ago by GreyShuck@feddit.uk to c/unitedkingdom@feddit.uk

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The number of new cars registered in the UK has jumped by nearly 18% but electric vehicle demand is flatlining, prompting the industry to call for a VAT cut to stimulate sales.

Annual figures released by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) on Friday show 1.9m new cars were registered last year, well up on the previous year’s figure of 1.6m and the highest level since the 2.3m registrations of 2019.

The increase is a boost for the automotive industry after the pandemic led to supply chain problems and a shortage of vital computer chips that slowed production.

Across the year, 315,000 new battery electric vehicles were sold. That was 50,000 more than 2022, but the number being bought as a share of total registrations failed to grow as expected. They represented just 16.5% of the total, slightly down on last year’s 16.6%.

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[-] TedZanzibar@feddit.uk 1 points 10 months ago

I didn't say you're wrong, I said you're not wrong. My point was that it's easy for us who are already used to home charging to preach about how cheap and easy it is, but it flies over the heads of the average joe who seem to only think about it in terms of the public infrastructure - like petrol stations.

Hence, ignoring or downplaying the price of public charging because, in reality, it's a rare occurrence to actually need them does nothing to convince non-EV drivers to switch.

That was what I was getting at, but ultimately we're in agreement. If you're able to charge at home it's super cheap and super convenient, but the cost of public charging needs to come down drastically if we're going to convince ICE drivers to make the switch.

[-] jabjoe@feddit.uk 1 points 10 months ago

Argh, sorry. Some how missed the not.

I think we are saying same. Maybe EV ads should talk home charging. Frankly, right now, it's a bit questionable if you go EV without it. Though I met one guy charging at a public charger, who lives in flats and has very high milage. What he does is use a local Tesla charger bank over night at a low rate. But that doesn't scale of course.

this post was submitted on 05 Jan 2024

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