Vertu Motors CEO Robert Forrester has hit out at the government’s approach to the automotive sector ahead of the Budget this afternoon.
Speaking on LBC’s Nick Ferrari show, he said the government was intent on hitting the sector with higher taxes and a flawed ZEV mandate, which he said was skewing the market and reducing investment.
Forrester told Ferrari: “The Budget is an important Budget because we have to get the economy back to economic growth.
“The automotive sector is primed for it. The government does appear quite set on stifling it with increased taxes. There has been more speculation over the past few days about pay-as-you-go taxes being extended from electric vehicles to petrol and diesel vehicles.
“We have got to get a stable economy. We have got to make sure that people can make a profit and invest in training and young people’s jobs. At the moment, the government is not really getting that message, whether it is electric vehicle mandates or the national minimum wage.
“The government has set targets for battery electric vehicles, not hybrids, requiring us to reach a 33% mix by 2026 and 80% by 2030.
“If you miss the target, the manufacturer gets charged £12,000 per car. When you speak to people outside the industry, they just shake their heads.
“This has cost billions in terms of the discounts manufacturers have had to offer to get anywhere near the targets. And let’s be honest, they have not got anywhere near the targets.
“We are currently at 25%, not 33%. This is a dampener on the ability to invest in manufacturing and the overall profitability of automotive.
“The government, over many years, has been putting in place measures that make motoring more expensive and less convenient.”
