You WILL buy an electric car!

[Dextrous63]

I don't doubt how useless ev's would be in many settings.  However, for townies such as myself they would make sense were it not for the prohibitive cost of them coupled with the terrible second hand trade in values.  If some bright spark could square that little peg in terms of renewal and running costs, then by all means I'd give it a go.

As an example, we currently pay a grand total of (purchase/loan, insurance, petrol) pcm circa £450 for our Aygo X, which we upgrade every 3ish years with little inflationary increase.   We rarely do long haul trips.  If getting an ev, coupled with the occasional hiring of an ICE vehicle came into this order of financial magnitude, then we'd happily consider the change z

To date, nobody has come close to achieving this, and I'll be damned if I'm expected to leap on an e-bike @ £ absurd per hour without better lighting, increase of police presence, subsidised clothing  given the wayward extremes of uk weather etc..

[klondike]

My son had daily long trips to work in a gas guzzler. It made sense to him too when he got it because he was able to charge at home.

That car was no good for holidays and the like, had annoying things go wrong with it that took months to fix and every so often failed to charge overnight which it was supposed to do automatically. He alsp ran a diesel car.

He swapped to the plug in hybrid which failed from day one and now has a hybrid. He still runs two cars. Three actually as he has built a camper from a secondhand diesel transit.

Electric cars are fine if you run a diesel too and don't mind the staggering depreciation which will soon be appearing in the lease prices now the lease companies have been so badly stung.

There is no way at all that diesel vans van be replaced by electric by businesses other that as a BS green marketing expense for part of their fleet. I find it highly amusing to see diesel RAC and AA vans boasting that they can charge electrics. That's something else about them - they mostly can't be fixed at the roadside and can't just be towed.

[Ashy]

Older cars used to have starting handles which worked when all else failed. It wouldn't work on an EV, but they could have a pair of cranks like a bath chair.

[JBR]

Most of us, I suspect, buy a car either petrol or diesel engined, and expect it to run reliably for several years.
After that, when it is becoming older and is beginning to require attention more often, we sell it perhaps in part exchange for a new, or newer, car and continue as before.

Those people who have fallen for the recent marketing ploys of electric cars probably have to pay more than for an ICE car.  After a few years, when they are thinking of renewing, they are likely to be rather surprised at its loss of value.  In addition to having realised its short range and the time taken (and the cost) to recharge, the penny is likely to have dropped!

The government attempted to make them more attractive by making 'road tax' free, at least for a short time, but I believe that has now been discontinued.  Everything points to 'the death of the EV' in the near future.  Those companies which have been providing them for their staff and others, will also see the future I think.
I also wonder just how much effect they have had on this so-called 'climate change', along with those windmills and solar panels.

[klondike]

On the road tax issue most of the usable electric cars (those that are more than short range town cars) fall into the luxury bracket and cost a lot of road tax. I got the numbers from Google...

Currently, the Expensive Car Supplement (ECS) hits all vehicles – including electric ones from April 2025 – that cost over £40,000, adding an extra £425 annually in VED from the second to the sixth year of ownership. From year two, EV owners will pay the standard annual VED rate of £195 annually on top of this.

As I understand it that £40,000 is the manufacturer's list price not the heavily discounted price that they have to drop to to get sold at all nowadays.

[Michael Rolls]

hopefully - wretched things - but with idiot politicians .....