That new electric car. Marvellous. Sepulchrally quiet around town, goes like a bat out of hell, runs on cheap juice ... it could turn me into a golf-club bore overnight. Except that, like so many others, I haven’t bought one.
It seems from the latest figures that the inexorable march of these vehicles is not quite so inexorable after all. Their share of new-car sales is falling, along with the second-hand values which are so important for the cost of
financing a purchase. Insurance costs have shot up. Manufacturers are cutting production targets.
All this is despite a full house of subsidies. While the tax on company cars has been progressively cranked up, the incentives for corporate EVs are almost irresistible. Your top-of-the-range executive Merc can cost as much as £40,000 a year as a benefit-in-kind. Choose an EV and the bill is just £320.
It is hardly surprising, then, that
three-quarters of EVs sold are company cars. Another slice of sales are as urban runabouts. Leave the Range Rover in the garage when you pop into town, and gather further subsidies. Did you know that electric cars do not cause congestion? Sometimes, they don’t
even take up a parking space. It’s a modern miracle.
Despite these inducements, we don’t really like them. EVs are more expensive to buy, and the question of whether they are worth it in the long run is as hard to answer as that of their lifetime CO2 cost. The Guardian recently had a good go (and found the green answer you might expect), but the answer essentially depends on the assumptions you make regarding the price of exotic raw materials and electricity, technological advances and replacing the £38bn a year in tax that conventional vehicles generate. Heavier EVs will also increase the cost of road maintenance. This does not even begin to address the question of who is in charge of your new car. Its sat-nav knows where you are, and soon you may have to answer tricky questions before the engine will start, as the car checks that you’re not drunk or drugged. Breaking the new 20mph speed limit in Wales? Your car will know...
We have so convinced ourselves that
they are virtuous vehicles (even if they come from China, built with coal-fired electricity) that the latest easing of the rules to allow a few more years of making conventional cars caused no end of a fuss. As the subsidies disappear, to be replaced by the tax currently paid by owners of petrol vehicles, today’s buyers may wonder whether they are being taken for a ride.
