‘Electric cars no kinder to environment than the one you already drive’

Trevor, a seasoned London black cab driver told me on the morning of last week’s three byelections even before the results were announced, the Uxbridge numbers will dictate next year’s General Election. His sage-like insight is built on the firm belief that the silent majority have had enough with the explosion of anti-driver edicts and taxes, all driven by the clueless big parties, hell bent on a costly journey to Net Zero. Uxbridge proved one thing above all, that our politicos should listen to the electorate. Labour overturned a 20,000-vote Conservative majority in Selby and Ainsty, with the Liberal Democrats smashing the Tories in the previously safe seat of Somerton and Frome. These results were widely predicted, purely because the Conservative Government is detested for what they have done or more to the point, not done with the economy, immigration, crime and Covid. But in one fluke result the Conservatives held on to Boris’s Uxbridge and South Ruislip seat scraping in by just 495 votes. The biggest wake up call to all the big political Parties took place in Mayor Sadiq Khan’s backyard. ‘The EV luvvies continue to bleat that we misunderstand their expensive heavyweight toys’ (Image: Getty) There was only one issue in town. ULEZ! The head-in-the-sand Labour leader vacillated on this issue during campaigning and now all the big parties find themselves stuck in an idealistic nowhere land of whether their policies will, in fact, save the planet. A question Sunak, Starmer and the Lycra-set cannot answer, still preferring to pursue baseless and ignorant policies that will destroy the economy just to be seen as global climate change heroes. I have spoken with a dozen or so senior MPs before and after Uxbridge’s seismic result that has hurt Labour big time. We have heard that a bunch of Tory MPs have approached the Prime Minister to drop the eco policies and focus on tax cuts and lessening the cost-of-living crisis. Even a couple of Labour MPs told me the same story and to dump climate change hysteria to help voters not the WEF. One Tory backbencher said, Howard everything you at FairFuelUK has campaigned for and against has come to fruition. We have to listen and recognise our immediate priority is to scrap the 2030 ban on the sales of new diesel and petrol cars. A new report , just published, I supported with the fully common sensed Alliance of British Drivers and the Motorcycle Action Group looks objectively at electric vehicles’ green credentials when compared to fossil-fuelled cars. This landmark research has shown that from cradle to grave, battery-powered electric vehicles have little – or indeed no CO² advantage – over petrol and diesel vehicles. The report considers the resourcing of raw materials used for the manufacture, utilisation and final disposal of both vehicle fuel types, including emissions from the production of both electricity and fossil fuels. Manufacturing a ‘pure’ battery-powered vehicle creates more CO² than an equivalent fossil-fuelled car, in some cases up to 74 percent more. EVs demonstrate little or no CO² advantage over internal combustion engine vehicles unless they are resourced, constructed, utilised, and disposed of using the ‘cleanest’ possible power sources. This means nuclear power is the only possible option. Battery technology has reached a level of maturity and that we now have diminishing returns: nothing else in the Periodic Table, a tabular array of the chemical elements organized by atomic number, can improve on lithium even though solid-state batteries have promised improved power density. Occasionally we see publicity about alternative chemical formulation of batteries in the hope that better sources of battery power will be discovered. Sadiq Khan (Image: Getty) But a review has shown that, for example, sodium-based batteries are likely to be three times heavier and bulkier rendering them unusable for transport purposes. Fossil-fuelled vehicles have an excellent record and are easier to recycle – in fact, as much as 95 percent of the whole vehicle’s materials can be re-used⁴. The ‘conventional’ elements of an electric vehicle can be recycled as much as any other vehicle but the battery is exceptionally difficult to deconstruct. This means the vast majority of ‘spent’ batteries are sent to landfill sites, frequently in developing countries who are least able to decontaminate and dismantle them. These angelic EVs are showered with taxpayer subsidies too, free of fuel duty and the promise that they will have no competition from 2030. Tata is to invest over £4bn into a factory making EV batteries in Somerset, but guess what, undisclosed tax breaks and inducements offered by the Government, perhaps as high as £500m, are reported to have sealed the deal. Expanding the National Grid to supply the probable fleet of battery-powered electric vehicles will also have to be subsidised by inflated household electricity bills or from general taxation. As I mentioned many times too, the costs of the 2030 ban on petrol and diesel cars are five times the benefits; even after using the government’s own valuations of the alleged unproven environmental benefits. The EV luvvies continue to bleat that we misunderstand their expensive heavyweight toys and are calling for even more tax breaks, such as VAT exemption at rapid public charging points. Of course, if you can find one that is working and not beset with long queues. Sorry guys, all the evidence, unlike the emotive tosh from the just stop oil amoebae, the facts are unequivocal. EVs are not that green and cannot ever replace more practical existing internal combustion vehicles. Labour should have smashed Boris’s old seat. I told you Sir Keir, supporting ULEZ will cost you dear. And by god it did. And that’s what all myopic senior Labour and Conservative politicians must grasp before it is too late. Scrap the 2030 ban now! Rishi, Keir, looking good on the world stage of a costly net zero fantasy will not be supported by the electorate or benefit our pockets. Uxbridge has shown you that your eco-political pipedreams are destined to push your traditional voters even further away from any of you getting back into power. Honestly supporting Trevor the cabbie and UK’s 37m drivers with sensible road user plans and taxes will get you securely elected. Oh, and make sure you keep well away from any big brother pay-per-mile aspirations. That would keep you on the opposition benches for a decade. I am the only London Mayoral Candidate that will ditch all ULEZ not only the Extension. Now that is being decisive, something Labour and the Tories avoid doing like the plague. Howard Cox is the founder of FairFuelUK and Reform UK London Mayoral Candidate.