Electric vehicles

This week, writing in the Daily Mail, Matt Ridley produced a devastating takedown of the government’s 2030 ban on the sale of new conventionally powered cars. He plans to pre-empt the ban himself by buying a brand-new petrol car in 2029. Innovation happens gradually and delivers its benefits unevenly – therefore it is stupid to impose it on everyone all at once  I thought he was right about almost everything, except perhaps that final prediction. He’s right to be sceptical about the environmental benefits of electric cars – especially in countries such as China (and, to a lesser extent, Germany) where electricity is largely generated from the filthier forms of

A couple of years ago I thought seriously about buying an electric car. Not a hybrid, but the full monty. There was one in particular I liked the look of and I even contacted a dealership to ask whether they’d accept my diesel-powered VW Touran in part-exchange. The answer was yes, but it was still eye-wateringly expensive. Was it worth it? I tried to persuade myself it would be, given the savings on fuel costs, the waiving of the congestion charge, etc. Boy, am I glad I dodged that bullet. Scarcely a day passes without a new horror story about electric vehicles in the press. Over the past week alone,

Hello, and welcome to episode one of What’s in My Frunk?, the first in an occasional Spectator series of news and advice for the electronic motorist. In this edition we’ll be discussing one of the unexpected benefits of owning an electric car. The space under the bonnet vacated by the engine often provides a small but usable secondary storage area. This is the ‘frunk’, a portmanteau word combining ‘front’ and the American word ‘trunk’. Now that even Land Rover Defenders have carpeted boots, your frunk is great for transporting anything wet or dirty – wellingtons, charging cables, takeaways or body parts from your last hit. My Mustang Mach-E even has

Sturgeon’s single issue Sir: Nicola Sturgeon needs to be careful what she wishes for. Declaring that the next general election will be concerned solely with the issue of Scottish independence is, as you say, ‘a constitutional absurdity’ (‘Sturgeon’s bluff’, 2 July). Heads of government who stipulate single-issue elections are on a hiding to nothing, and rightly so. Theresa May’s ‘Brexit’ election in 2017 turned out badly for her, although at least she kept her job (just). Ted Heath wasn’t so lucky in 1974 (‘Who rules Britain?’), ditto Churchill in 1945 (‘Who won the war?’) or Stanley Baldwin in 1923 (‘Free trade or protection?’). Even the 2019 election was about more

Oxford Street is ‘a dinosaur district destined for extinction’, says Marks & Spencer boss Stuart Machin – whose plan to replace its ‘flagship’ Marble Arch store with a new ten-storey retail and office block has been referred to a public inquiry by Michael Gove as Housing Secretary, despite winning approval from Westminster council. Machin points out that his real flagship nowadays is M&S’s website, which accounts for a third of the group’s clothing and home sales, while much of its pre-second-world-war store estate stands in sad need of repurposing or right-sizing. And he’s not wrong about the decline of what used to be Britain’s premier shopping boulevard – with its

The Department for Transport recently ended a £1,500 subsidy towards the price of new, lower-priced electric cars one year earlier than planned. To their credit, there are better ways to promote electric-car use – for instance by encouraging the installation of public charging stations. As it is, the spread of rapid-charging stations in the UK is bizarrely uneven. Some parts of the country are well served, but there are unexpected black spots. Oddly, trendy places where people talk endlessly about sustainability – such as Oxford, Cambridge and Brighton – are hopeless for rapid charging points, while less fanciful places like Thurrock, Milton Keynes and Newport are awash with them. If

We’re closing the year by republishing our ten most popular articles in 2021. Here’s number two: Jonathan Miller writing in April about the woes of owning a battery-powered vehicle.  I bought an electric car and wish I hadn’t. It seemed a good idea at the time, albeit a costly way of proclaiming my environmental virtuousness. The car cost €44,000, less a €6,000 subsidy courtesy of French taxpayers, the overwhelming majority poorer than me. Fellow villagers are driving those 20-year-old diesel vans that look like garden sheds on wheels. I order the car in May 2018. It’s promised in April 2019. ‘No later,’ promises the salesman at the local Hyundai dealer.