Ford boss: UK incentives needed to boost uptake of EVs for net zero
The automotive industry “urgently” needs government-backed incentives to improve customer uptake of electric vehicles (EVs) or the UK faces missing its net zero targets, the boss of Ford UK has said.
Speaking the morning after the government announced a consultation into its EVs sales targets for automakers, Lisa Brankin said the move was welcome but that it needed to be carried out quickly.
“The first thing I would say is that the government has listened,” she told the BBC’s Today programme. “We have been talking to them since they came into power about our concerns around the [zero emissions vehicle mandate]…
“I think the really important thing is that the consultation is fast and that the government acts quickly as a result of it.
“And the one thing we really need is government-backed incentives to urgently boost the uptake of EVs. Because without demand, the mandate just doesn’t work.”
Ford UK’s intervention comes just a day after Vauxhall-owner Stellantis announced it was closing its flagship UK manufacturing plant in Luton, putting over 1,100 jobs at risk.
The Dutch automaker, which also makes Peugot and Alfa Romeo cars, decision followed a warning it made in the summer that it would have to stop production in the UK were demand for its electric vehicles not to increase.
Last night, business secretary Jonthan Reynolds announced at an industry dinner that the government would launch a consultation on the zero emissions vehicle mandate.
Under the policy, introduced earlier this year under the previous government, 22 per cent of car sales that carmakers generate must come from EVs, otherwise they face hefty fines. Under the current policy, that figure would rise up to 80 per cent by 2030.
Brankin branded the need for government incentives to help stimulate interest in EVs, as “really urgent”, and asked if the alternative to government incentives was scrapping the ZEV mandate, Ford UK’s Brakin said: “I guess yes it is. But the government’s reaffirmed their commitment to their 2035 and 2050 CO2 commitments, and transport is a major contributor to that. So I don’t think the two sit very easily together… which is why we’ve invested really significantly in the production and development of EVs.”