A week into the election campaign and we await the first real promise - however much of a pinch of salt it should be taken with - to be made for what the automotive industry can expect from a new government after the general election on July 4. My stalking of Google News headlines hasn’t turned up anything more than a Liberal Democrat candidate being “incensed” by an “electioneering” pledge from the Tory-run Kent County Council for a ‘Pothole Blitz’ over the summer.
The banning of the sale of internal combustion engined cars in 2035 is a bit more than the tip of the iceberg, yet it’s the perfect illustration of the point. Take the right or wrong out of it, and just look at the decision making to get to where we are now. In 2017, it was announced that internal combustion engined vehicles would be banned in 2040 by the government as part of its net zero target in 2050. Three years later, this became 2035 and later in the same year it was down to 2030.