By Paul Homewood
h/t Ian Magness
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Car makers have slashed their forecast for electric car sales this year amid an ongoing slowdown in demand.
The Society for Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) now predicts electric vehicles (EVs) will account for 18.5pc of the new car market in 2024, down from an earlier prediction of 19.8pc.
EV registrations surged higher in July but sales to private consumers continued to slump.
In figures published on Monday, the SMMT also revised down its forecast for the 2024 new car market as a whole, from 1.984m vehicle sales to 1.968m.
Within that estimate, the projected number of EV sales has fallen from roughly 393,000 vehicles to 364,000.
Mike Hawes, chief executive of the SMMT, said the figures still represented annual growth but warned that weakening demand for EVs among private consumers – despite heavy discounting by car makers – remained the industry’s “overriding concern”.
Car makers have been given legally-binding targets in Britain to ramp up sales of EVs, but several have called for the tough rules to be matched with financial incentives for consumers amid slower-than-expected demand.
Mr Hawes said: “More people than ever are buying and driving EVs but we still need the pace of change to quicken, or else the UK’s climate change ambitions are threatened and manufacturers’ ability to hit regulated EV targets is at risk.
“Achieving market transition at the pace demanded requires greater support for consumers and action on incentives and infrastructure is needed now.”
Apparently Mike Hawes considers his main role as fighting climate change, not looking after the interests of his members, or the motor industry as a whole.
Even the new forecast of 18.5% EV sales is highly unlikely to be achieved. Seven months in and YTD sales still only stand at 16.8%.
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.https://www.smmt.co.uk/vehicle-data/car-registrations/
Hawes’ solution is always the same – more taxpayer subsidies to be thrown down the drain. Why does he not get a grip, stand up and demand that Starmer drops all EV targets and allows drivers to buy what they want?
The problem of hitting EV mandated targets is even more intractable than it seems. Again we see that very few private buyers want one. Whereas they account for 38% of all car sales, private purchases only stand at 19.4% of EVs:
