Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill — House of Commons, 2017-10-23
Topic: Transportation
Cheryl Elise Kendall Gillan (Conservative, Centre-right): It is a pleasure to follow the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman, the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull East (Karl Turner), particularly as he supports this Bill, as I do; indeed, I say to my right hon. Friend the Minister that I greatly welcome the introduction of this Bill, which, as I pointed out in one of my interventions, is timely The Opposition Front-Bench spokesman talked about the official figures for the ranges of various cars, so he will be interested to know that when I was reading Next Green Car, I saw that the new Renault Zoe Z.E. 40 has an official range of 250 miles. It seems to me that almost on a weekly basis new vehicles are coming on to the market with that range extended, which is so important for electric vehicle users who suffer from range anxiety; I gather that that is a new form of anxiety which we can all suffer from if we get an electric car It is a great pleasure, too, to be taking part in a transport debate in which I am not discussing High Speed 2. This will come as a bit of a shock to some of my fans, but I have to say that I am more excited about electric vehicles and automated vehicles than about HS2. That is enough about HS2, however—except to suggest that perhaps the track could be used to run automated vehicles along, rather than the antiquated technology the Department for Transport appears to be ordering So often legislation and Governments are behind the curve when it comes to technology and science. In the ’90s, when I was first elected to this House, we were discussing the human genome project to a greater degree, and the legislation and regulations seemed to be far behind the science and technology at that time. So, unlike the Opposition Front-Bench spokesman, I do not think this Bill can be introduced and put through its stages soon enough, because it covers one of the foundations of this new technology We are behind countries such as Norway, where more than 5% of the passenger cars now sold are plug-ins. The Bill, which covers the insurance position on automated vehicles and electric vehicle charging, is setting the framework for some of the most significant advances since the internal combustion engine made an appearance, which in fact halted the progress of the electric vehicle the first time around I do not know how many people appreciate that electric vehicles are in fact far from new: wider public ownership of them is new, but the first practical production electric car was built in London in 1884 by Thomas Parker. I have seen a picture of it; it looks a bit like a pram on wheels, and I would not recommend it to anybody. Interestingly, electric vehicles did come into use commercially, particularly in a small fleet of 12 cabs in New York as far back as 1897. The advent of the internal combustion engine provided the advantage of longer range and quicker refuelling. The rapid development of the infrastructure for petrol vehicles meant that electric vehicles took—forgive the pun—a back seat. There is a lesson to be learned from the death of the electric vehicle the first time round and the rapid introduction of the infrastructure for petrol vehicles.