GB News guests debate using electric cars
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The head of Octopus Energy’s Electric Vehicle arm has called on the Government to rollout out “ambitious” policies similar to the ones adopted by the US. Last August, the US passed President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which provided massive boosts to companies looking to develop renewable energy and build electric vehicles in the country. With the massive tax incentives offered by the US, experts have warned that companies in the UK and Europe could soon move over to North America, putting the continent at a disadvantage.
According to the Rystad Energy consultancy, the impact on the battery and electric vehicle sector is the biggest points of contention between the US and Europe.
This is because the Inflation Reduction Act allocated $23billion (£19billion) to transport initiatives, with tax incentives of up to $7,500 (£6,232) per vehicle on offer for cars whose batteries were either made or assembled in North America.
Speaking to Express.co.uk, Fiona Howarth, the CEO of Octopus Electric Vehicles said that in order to boos the UK’s electric vehicle industry, the Government would need to build a “confident and ambitious ZEV mandate that provides certainty to the market”, adding “I think that’s due soon.”
She said: “But in addition to that, on the industrial side, I think stimulating the UK manufacturing will have a long term impact.
“And actually, we can look to say the Inflation Reduction Act that the US has just brought out is very confident ambitious outcome output-driven policy.
“For battery making, they are paying for subsidy basically every single kilowatt-hour of battery that is made in the US. So there’s a very confident and clear simple policy that incentivizes local battery manufacturing.”
She added that the US legislation offers the UK a “blueprint for how to do it, although the UK may choose to do it in different ways. It’s already having clear impacts in terms of car manufacturers that are now moving to the US and setting up manufacturing there.
“And it’s had a very notable impact where already we’re seeing some of the car manufacturers that new ones that were based in the UK, are sadly losing jobs now the UK moving to North America.”
The US’s ambitious legislation has left the UK fuming, with the UK’s then-International Trade Secretary Kemi Badenoch writing urgently to her US counterpart in a bid to see off a trade war.
Ms Badenoch is furious that President Biden’s controversial Inflation Reduction Act will in effect ban UK-made green technology cars from the US market by allowing massive subsidies for the struggling American sector and setting up crippling tariffs.
Ms Badenoch’s letter to her US counterpart Katherine Tai late last year was set against a hostile view of Brexit Britain by the Biden administration.
Already Britain has shelved UK/US trade talks because Mr Biden and senior Democrats including outgoing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi attempted to use them to try to force Britain to hand over control of Northern Ireland to the EU.
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But the Inflation Reduction Act and assault on UK car manufacturing have opened a potential new chapter in trade hostility from the Biden administration.
Ms Badenoch underlined British concerns about the US Inflation Reduction Act, which would effectively block British green car firms out of the American market due to massive domestic subsidies and foreign import restrictions.
She demanded that the US provides carve-outs for Britain, in the new law, which is still to be implemented. She also warned that the protectionism brought into counter China risks attacking UK/ US trade relations.
In the letter, Ms Badenoch also warned that the new law would “harm multiple economies across the world and impact global supply chains in batteries, electric vehicles and wider renewables.”
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