The Government must reintroduce grants and assistance to help customers and the sector deal with the move to electric cars and the banning of the sale of traditional petrol and diesel vehicles, the chief of Northern Ireland’s largest motor sales business has said.
While a date of 2035 had been set by the last Conservative government to ban new combustion engine sales, Labour has pledged to bring that forward to 2030.
All eyes are now on the future and the electric vehicle (EV) market for the motoring industry.
“The Government needs to come to the party with grants,” Jeff McCartney, group operations director of Charles Hurst, told Ulster Business.
“If they are really serious about it, they need to. We had a grant [system] for the vehicle, which was up to £5,000 but we’ve seen that erode over time.
“While electric is doing the mix which it needs to in Northern Ireland – about 16% in the UK and 14% here – it needs to be 22%,” Mr McCartney says.
That’s centred around the Government’s EV mandate. It means manufacturers must now up their EV production to 22% of their fleet, otherwise they face hefty fines.
“[Production of vehicles] will go up. [They] need to go up in retail,” he says.
Read the full interview in the Top 100 edition of Ulster Business, which is out now