THE Government should act “urgently” to accelerate the UK’s transition to electric vehicles, the Bishop of Oxford, Dr Steven Croft, has told the House of Lords.
Dr Croft is a member of the Environment and Climate Change Committee (ECC), whose report, published in February under the previous government, which he described as a “tremendous learning curve. Each issue had multiple questions and problems associated with it and needed complex solutions.”
Speaking in a take-note debate on electric vehicles (EV) on Wednesday, he said: “The effects of climate change across the world are accelerating . . . often affecting those who have least, who are least resilient, and whose emissions in the present and in the past have been lowest across the world.”
Passenger cars accounted for more than half the surface transport emissions in the UK, he said — a point made by Baroness Parminter (Liberal Democrat), chair of the ECC, who brought the debate. These emissions contributed to the almost 30,000 deaths from air pollution every year, she said.
Moving the British public away from petrol and diesel would require planning, co-ordination, and “an awful lot of leadership from the Government. . . Now is the time to make those strides to bring people with us in the EV transition that is so necessary.
“EVs are still not affordable enough for all people who need to have a car. . . Having VAT at a differential rate if you do not have the advantage of owning your own home and your own parking space is not fair.”
She also criticised those newspapers that were “showing their fossil-fuel-soaked colours” in running “blatant campaigns of misinformation”, she said. “We need our Government to face down people who do not believe in net-zero.”
Dr Croft acknowledged the Labour manifesto commitment to accelerating the roll-out of charging points; restoring the phase-out date of 2030 for new cars with internal-combustion engines; and supporting buyers of secondhand electric cars by standardising information.
While he sought a response on when these would be implemented, he also said that “the steps are not enough by themselves.”
The Government should also ensure a fair transition to electric vehicles. “Forty per cent of the country will not have access to a home charging point,” he said. “There is at present no viable solution to ensure parity, and I agree that our committee was not able to offer one, but it will need some radical and imaginative thinking. How will the Government address this key question of fairness?”
Describing the transition to EVs as “a potential revolution in our road transport, our economy, and public health over the next decade”, he asked how the Government would “lead and encourage the transition through better communication and co-ordination across government”.
Responding to the debate, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour) endorsed several other speakers’ view that consumer confidence was critical to success.
“The Government needs to do more to convey a positive vision of EVs and to counter misinformation about the technology. Growing confidence is clearly a role I believe government has to take, and this is one that we readily accept,” he said.
He reiterated the Government’s “firm intention” to phase out the sale of new cars powered solely by a internal-combustion engine by 2030, and assured the Lords of its commitment to working closely with investors “to build a globally competitive EV and battery supply chain in the UK”.
