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Air quality taxation: going beyond London
Attendees discussed whether localised congestion charging or taxation based on air quality was likely to establish itself in metropolitan areas outside of London.
KeeResources' Mark Jowsey said: "I'm surprised we haven't seen emission-based congestion charging in other large metropolitan areas. Anything that penalised business is considered counterproductive. We haven't seen the progression I would have expected."
Healthcare at Home's Georgina Smith, added: "Boris [Johnson] is talking about London but the rest of the country is being missed out," while the EST's Caroline Watson said: "London had strong leadership with Ken [Livingstone] and Boris.
In London, Ken said the money was going to be pumped back into public transport. He got opposition [to the Congestion Charge] but he did it anyway. It's like the smoking ban again - no one wanted it but then it came in and everyone loved it."
Jowsey continued: "There are other air quality benefits in general. Setting policies should be a nationwide thing based on Government direction."
Incentives for used electric vehicles and the leader of the technology pack
BusinessCar editor Paul Barker asked attendees about the kinds of incentives that could be implemented and what might work well for getting second-hand electric vehicles off the ground.
KeeResources' Mark Jowsey said the biggest problem lay with used car dealers: "The big concern is the perception from dealers. How fast can they sell and move the vehicles on? I think you could find enough interested people."
Rupert Pontin of Glass's remained sceptical: "There is minimal demand for a second-hand electric vehicle. A six-year old car with batteries - they're not covered after eight years. In two years you're going to have to pay £8000 to replace that."
Arval's Mike Waters said the list price was a huge barrier to buyers and that whole-life costs needed to be considered: "From a fleet perspective, we will talk to fleets on a whole-life cost basis. Often they don't look at that - they just look at the ticket price."
Hyundai's Martin Wilson said there was concern about which new technology to back, and whether some would be left behind, leaving fleets with redundant tech. "The other issue is that things are moving on so quick," he said. "What technology is going to come out on top? We'd like to see a consistent message from Government because we just don't know whether some technologies are going to be dropped or if others are going to die out."
ITM's Charles Purkess contended that it's not wrong to group new technologies together in this respect: "Don't lump battery EVs in one pot and hydrogen fuel cells in another. There's too much polarity in terms of what's gone on in the past five years. You need to look at new technologies side by side. You need to look at the duty cycles and the operational benefits for fleets.
"We mustn't get into buying up one specific technology, and keep a broad mind. If policy could do that then it would be a big win."
Healthcare at Home's fleet administrator Georgina Smith said leasing was a much more viable option for electric vehicles, as a business could allow the leasing company to worry about the residual value.
"We're looking at Alphabet's Alpha City electric pool car scheme. It's great for us because you can let somebody else take the residual value risk," she explained.
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Business Car Magazine © 2020 | Business Car is part of NS Media Group.
