241 - The EVA England Update Episode

Gary:

Hi, I'm Gary, and this is episode 241 of EV Musings, a podcast about renewables, electric vehicles, and things that are interesting to electric vehicle owners. On the show today, we'll be looking again at EVA England. Welcome back to season 13 of the podcast.

metime around the end of June: 2025

I've got an update on the EV situation in Northern Ireland. We're going to have a look at the new electric cars available if you're wanting to buy. We'll be talking about charging speeds and why they're never what you think.

I'll be looking at plug and charge, discussing battery swapping, and hopefully we'll spend a week with someone who doesn't have a home charger just to see what it's really like living in that situation. And this season, we're going to have a mid-season roundtable as well as a season-ending one. So on with the episode.

Our main topic of discussion today is EVA England. If you're a regular listener to this podcast, you'll know that we like EVA England here. We've had members of that organisation on several times, most recently in season 11 when CEO James Court came on to talk about education and EVA England's role in that.

That's episode 216. Well, James has moved on from EVA England to help Octopus Electric Vehicles in their work, and EVA England have brought in a new CEO in his place.

Vicky E:

Well, thanks very much for having me on, Gary.

I'm Vicky Edmonds. I'm the new chief executive of EVA England, which is an independent body that represents the voice of the current electric driver and also future prospective electric drivers. I've been in the transport decarb world for nearly 10 years now, leading policies mostly in government, but also advising on electric driving policy for other organisations, and a board director of EVA England for a couple of years.

Gary:

So it's great to have the opportunity to step in and lead the organisation as it goes into its next phase. Now, I know you used to work or with OSEV, but what's your background? How did you get into the electric vehicle side of things?

Vicky E:

So I think my interest in climate change came from when I was a young girl, and I actually started out as a scientist. So I was a zoologist before I became a policymaker. So I sort of went through university, PhD, and then I jumped into the civil service because I wanted to make a real...

Started out doing a number of jobs in transport, but it was really trying to move myself towards transport emissions reduction through those jobs that I was really aiming at. And about 10 years ago, I was promoted to the senior civil service and I started doing kind of Department of Transport's wider environment strategy. So looking at air quality emissions as well as greenhouse gas emissions and how transport needed to play its role in meeting our carbon budgets.

And then the opportunity to become a joint head of the Office for Low Emission Vehicles as it was then came up. And I job shared with Natasha Robinson, who many of your listeners probably know as well, for a few years. And we were very much in the kind of early adopter phase of electrification.

of change. And that's where: 2030

It's where some of the big funds that are out there came from, and it's where the new ZEV mandate came from as well. So it was an exciting time to be head of OLEV. Then I stepped out and I did some kind of EV policy advice for various people and then ended up with EVA England.

And as an EV driver myself, I think this is a brilliant role for me to bring that policy experience together with my passion for driving these cars out on the road. And we all love our cars, but it's also great to be able to start to address some of the niggles that we all have as drivers out on the network.

Gary:

It's interesting, given the fact that we're, or I'm, 240 episodes into here.

I've never actually had anybody from OLEV or OSEV actually on to talk about the work that they do. So I might speak to you afterwards and see whether you can hook me up with somebody there so we can chat. Now, you said you're not completely new to EVA England because you have been a board member.

What did that actually entail?

Vicky E:

So the board of directors, I guess as with any organisation, we would meet quarterly to support my predecessor, James, on the direction and strategy of the organisation and make sure that we were representing the membership and that we were doing the projects that drivers really felt we should be doing. My particular role on the board was the policy and strategy side.

So coming out of government and having that experience at how to make EV policy and how to make it work was the role that I played on the board. But the board is more diverse than that. And we have people with finance backgrounds, data backgrounds, engineering backgrounds, energy backgrounds.

So the board itself is a really useful source of experience for myself and for James.

Gary:

I always think James has been on the show several times before. He had a heavy focus on the policy side of things.

He was always in discussion with Parliament and some of the MPs there. He was very active in that aspect. Now, you also have that background.

Is that a focus with which you're going to continue or are you going to try and sort of widen the scope of what it is you individually do?

Vicky E:

I mean, I think that's still a really important part of what we do. So when I pitch EV England to people, I say, you know, first of all, we're independent.

So we're independent of the auto sector and the big charge point companies. So we are the only organisation that represent independently the voice of the electric driver. But also, we're able to bring that voice to the centre of policy and decision making within government.

But as you sort of rightly said, also widen that within industry. So making sure that we are holding industry to account for the decisions it's making. Because government's role is going to start stepping back.

So they're regulators and they concede funding, but they ultimately will be there monitoring compliance of the regulations, but the market will eventually take over. And so it's the market that we also need to be talking to and making sure that the products that they develop work for people, that people want to buy the cars that they're developing and designing, that they work properly with charge points, that the charge points are accessible to all users, including vulnerable users and users with disabilities. So I think there is perhaps a bit more of a focus towards the industry and partnering with some of the other trade bodies and making sure that we're working with them and bringing the driver's voice to the work that they're doing.

So I think that's the direction I'd like to take the organisation in, whilst also maintaining that relationship with government and parliament. So yes, we continue our meetings with members of parliament, we continue our meetings with government. We will be responding to the government's consultation at the moment on the zero emission vehicle mandate.

But we're responding very much from a government's ideas on how to reduce costs of the transition. We need to make sure the cost of the drivers are taken account when it comes to that. And that this is an opportunity to perhaps tackle some of the ongoing challenges that are out there on the network for drivers.

And there's also some planning work going on as well in government, which we'll be looking to get involved in.

Gary:

I want to come back and talk about the zero emission vehicle mandate in a few seconds. But generally, if we look at the parliament side of it, the governance side of it, what are the policy focus areas for EVA England over the next 12 months?

Vicky E:

Well, so having been a government, so I think their job at the moment is to keep the ZEV mandate and get it going and get it bedded in. And I think there's an awful lot of focus on that because there's been an awful lot of noise around it. So I think that's their role, that overarching strategic regulation that is driving the market in a particular direction and kind of providing certainty for investors and for the market.

But then they also need to have the space to unpick and tackle some of the now niggles that are out there. So this is a developing and emerging sector. And the more cars that are out there, the more charge points, the more problems we're sort of encountering out on the network.

Some of them have been around for a while, but some are starting to really come to the fore. So if I could sort of pick kind of the sort of top three from my head at the moment, it's the cost of charging, the charging divide between those who have driveways and those who don't. And there's a lot of, there's been a lot of work done on that recently.

And how do you narrow that cost gap? And some of the work government is doing is already helping with that. So cost payment solutions, but how do we get that really up and running?

Are we doing enough on workplace charging? So I think that's becoming a really major issue out there. Then you've got access to charging.

So the work that government's pushing forward on the power standard, which helps with access for disabled users, but also signage. You know, it's sometimes quite hard to find a charge point when you get there, people don't understand the numbers that they're seeing and how to operate it. They're not always in safe locations, especially if you're a, especially as a woman driver, kind of rocking up to a charge point late at night, very poorly lit in the back of a pub, not what you necessarily want to be doing.

So I think there's an awful lot of kind of, we're sort of getting through the early adoption phase and into mass market where some of these kind of other problems now need to be addressed. And I think that's where we'll be focusing our efforts with government and they are working on it. They are sort of tackling each of these issues, but how do we help them prioritise which ones are really causing, still being barriers to uptake out in the market?

Because if you can solve them and a driver chooses to buy these cars, then you don't necessarily need to worry about there's a mandate targets, you know, get people to buy them, reassure them that they're good things to buy and that they work. And the ZEV mandate looks after itself. 100%.

Gary:

Let me just loop back a little bit and talk about the price of charging. It's a number of, I'm not going to say a number of levers, but obviously the key thing that people are going to look at first off is can we levelise the VAT between home charging and public charging? And that will go a little bit of the way.

I know I've spoken with some of the charge point operators and they've talked about a lot of the additional charges that have been levied on them by the DNOs, things like extremely high standard charges and capacity charges. And they're obviously lobbying parliament to try and get those changed. But I think the overall question I want to ask is we're never going to have parity between home charging and public charging.

It's just not going to happen. But what do you think is an acceptable differential?

Vicky E:

I think that's a really difficult question to answer actually, because it very much depends on I think individuals' personal cost of living and finances.

So what's acceptable to one person is not going to be acceptable to another. I think the role has to be to try to narrow the gap as much as possible. I think ultimately it's residential charging that is the issue.

So if I'm driving on holiday and I have to stop at a 150 kilowatt charger and there's an awful lot of power going to my car at a high rate and I'm kind of en route charging as we used to call it, I might be kind of weathered the slightly higher cost because it's a more powerful charge point. It's more convenient for me. But if I'm parking outside my house and I'm plugging in overnight and it's trickling in at kind of seven kilowatts, that's not fair to ask me to pay the same price that you would pay as a consumer, because that's absolutely necessary for me to be able to use my car.

And so I think it's how do you help residents I think is really the key here. And so obviously we've talked about cross-pavement. I would hope that there would be some smart technologies coming that would help where cross-pavement solutions aren't viable.

Is there a way to link particular charge points to your home tariff through some kind of smart system? I know we've been talking about this for years. It sort of floats around, but there must be a way with smart technology to help do that.

Are there preferential rates for residents? I think really got to try to tackle the residential question and perhaps shift the focus a bit away from, oh, it's the whole of the public network, because it's not the whole of the public network. It's about those people who need to charge their car because that's what they have to use every day and they don't have a driveway and they can't access cross-pavement because that's not the way that their infrastructure and their street works.

I know back in the day, and I know this has been floated again because Stonehaven did a report on this for London recently, but we did used to think about magnetic pads, wireless charging. I mean, that's a huge cost to an authority to rip up your road infrastructure and put an entirely new kind of energy infrastructure down. But I do think it's going to be an ongoing problem for a couple of years because I'm not sure we have the technologies yet other than cross-pavement to tackle it, which is why I have in my head, are we making enough of workplace charging?

So workplace charging should conceivably be done at a lower price rate. Are we pushing it enough? Is it the standard?

Is it the norm for people to, when they have to drive their car to it, to be able to plug in? And I think that's something we need to look at a bit more closely. I'm not sure anyone is at the moment.

So within EVA England, I think that would be a bit of a focus for us.

Gary:

100%. I mean, I'm very much of the opinion that AC charging as a whole, whether it's workplace charging or pavement charging, is kind of the secret sauce to getting EV adoption more widespread than it is because your car spends 85, 90, 95% of its time stationary and that's when it should be charging.

And the other interesting aspect of that is people talk about, well, public charge is too expensive. It's way too expensive. And I say, yeah, it is.

But do you, as an EV driver, search for the cheapest places? And they kind of go, well, no, I go for the one that's more convenient. And it's interesting because if you look at that map survey results, the top three most used charge point operators in the UK are BP Pulse, Instavolt and GridServe.

Three of the most expensive charge point operators out there. So at the moment, people are very much favoring convenience over price. But obviously, as we go into mass adoption, that's going to change.

But I think the target that everyone, the government needs to be focusing on is not necessarily what's the differential between home charging and public charging. It's, can we get public charging down to below the price of petrol or diesel? Because that's kind of a, it's like a Rubicon.

If we can get it down below that, and we can keep it down below that, that takes away a huge number of arguments that a lot of the people on the fence are going, well, you know, if I'm charging in public, it's cost more than petrol and diesel. If we can remove that argument, I think it's going to be good for everybody.

Vicky E:

Indeed. Yeah. Yeah. And that's a really good way of looking at it.

Yeah. Really good way of looking at it.

Gary:

Talk to me a little bit about the ZEV mandate, Zero Emission Vehicle Mandate, because you and I were part of a, you were part of it, I was attending part of a discussion earlier on this week where we, you had a guest on and for the life of me, I cannot remember his name, but he talked in detail about what the ZEV mandate is. And I know I learned a lot about that because my understanding of not necessarily the mandate, but the consultation around the mandate is very much focused on a different area. to what I was aware of.

Can you talk to that a little bit, please?

Vicky E:

Yeah, so I think it's Andy Eastlake, who's one of our members, but he is a transport and energy engineer. And I think, and James Vickery, who was sort of the head of kind of the CO2 regulations in OSEV was there as well.

Yeah, so I think what Andy spelled out is, I think there's this misconception in the media that the ZEV mandate is all about reversing these targets. And some of that is driven by some of the discussions in the media before Christmas. But what the consultation has clearly said is, we're not talking about changing the overarching targets of the ZEV mandate.

There are sort of two points around that. One is, we're talking about easing the cost of transition to the industry. So is there something we can do with the flexibilities that are in the first couple of years where auto manufacturers can trade between, you know, types of vehicle and types of credit?

's that question that between: 2030

So that five year period, what cars are to be included in that? And that those are the two sort of the technical questions that are in the ZEV mandate. And then the part that we in EVA are focused on, there is a question in there around, they call it demand side measures, but it's actually measures that ease the cost of transition to the consumer.

And that is because at the moment, manufacturers are providing those measures because the old plug-in car grant no longer exists. So they're discounting the cost of the cars and, you know, the discussion in the press is that that's proving to be unaffordable. And obviously that's going to be the case for a couple of years.

So is there anything more government can do to ease those costs? And that's about the consumer feeling able to afford the cars and then afford ownership of the car. So that's where we're going to focus in on, okay, well, what measures could we ask for that ease those costs?

So the cost of purchase. So there are some taxation measures that we might look at and some spend measures, but also the cost of ownership, which is the charging cost that we've discussed. Is there anything more that government can do to bring those costs of ownership down slightly for the consumer?

And so those are the two areas that we're going to focus on as part of the ZEC mandate. And I say one last thing, it's quite rare for government to put these open questions into a consultation that's so far down the line, where you're talking about a specific instrument and you're in the middle of a policy that's been going on for decades, and you've taken away some of those demand measures because you thought the market was doing well. The market's not doing as well as you thought.

So now you're having to rethink. And so it's quite a rare situation to be in and a good opportunity for us to push some of the things that some of our members and other drivers out there that are really niggling at them when it comes to the costs.

Gary:

ecause when I got my first EV: 2018

And of course, they've seen the sales of electric vehicles, I won't say plummet, but they've dropped considerably as a result of that. Would reinstating a plug-in car grant be something that A, the government would consider and B, EVA England would try and push for?

Vicky E:

So I won't speak for government. I think that would be for them. So I mean, I'm not sure that it would be a priority measure to push for because I'm not sure that government would respond to it. So the plug-in car grant in the UK, every time it got cut, and it was cut progressively over time, sales were not impacted.

rhetoric of rowing back from: 2035

Although I'm sure there are many in the industry who would disagree with that view. So I personally think it's quite hard. The plug-in car grants, they are uncapped.

So their demand-led grant, if you buy a car, you have to have one. It was never designed to be an ongoing sustainable sort of measure. It was always there to sort of kickstart the market.

And it was around for a very long time. Tax measures are generally more sustainable. Now, obviously, we had a good tax measure in the form of vehicle excise duty, and government sort of judged that actually the tipping point and the fact that we're going to start to raise revenue from these cars is coming.

But there are other taxation measures that we might look at. So, for example, in EVA, we'll look at the luxury car supplement, because there was a message in the autumn statement that said that they would be willing to look at the thresholds for that for EVs. So that's something that we will be wanting to discuss.

And then ongoing discussions around reduction of VAT, which sort of comes up again as a couple of taxation measures. And then for us, actually, when we run our surveys, the two things that make the most difference to people when they're buying a car at the moment, a salary sacrifice and the benefit-in-kind tax. So again, those are two really important measures that we will be pushing and making sure, can we push them harder?

Is there anything more that we can do around those? And those are the things that we will be discussing with our members over the next couple of weeks.

Gary:

Let me just pull back or push back on the vehicle excise duty. I did a whole episode on this last season, link in the show notes. But the issue, I don't have a problem paying vehicle excise duty. I've been driving for [mumbles] odd years and I paid VED every year apart from the last six. So reinstating that, not an issue. My issue is in year two, I will be paying exactly the same as a V8 Range Rover that's getting 15 miles to the gallon. That doesn't seem right.

Vicky E:

I want to speak to that for a second for me, please. It doesn't. I have some sympathy with the argument that, as you've said, road users need to pay their way.

And I also have sympathy with the argument that it seems odd to do that at a time when sales have softened. So I think that sort of light for light comparison is coming at a quite difficult time. When the reinstatement of vehicle excise duty, if that's what we want to call it for electric cars, was first signalled, the market was in a different place and sales were booming and they were going on a steeper trajectory than they are now.

So I think, yes, it does seem the right thing to do to have a look at that. But my reservation is that if the treasury had to choose between one another, would they really take that seriously or would they prefer to look at some of these other tax measures, which might be able to kind of help kind of reset that balance over the next couple of years? So I think from my point of view, we need, you know, EVA is a small organisation.

We need to try to focus in on where we think the door is slightly open and where we think we're going to have the most impact. And so whilst we will want to comment on vehicle excise duty, my gut is that we will have more impact if we do a bit more work and discussion around the kind of luxury car tax, benefit in kind, salary sacrifice, sort of how can we stretch those measures. and you know, enter the conversation on that.

Gary:

Okay, fair enough. Let's talk a little bit about EVA England itself. Now one issue I know a lot of people have with EVA England is, because it's a membership organisation, what does membership get me?

Now I've had this conversation several times with Warren the Chairman and James when he was in your role. Talk to me a little bit about why listeners should be looking to join EVA England and what the value is of that membership, please.

Vicky E:

Yes, so I say there are two strands to membership with us, one of which I think is more valuable to our members in the few discussions I've had with them so far in the couple of weeks I've been in the job.

So I think that the more valuable one is that we have those links into government, we have the links into industry, we sit on several kind of policy level working groups with various others in the sector to try to really make a difference and we bring the driver's voice to the table in all of those discussions. So we are the route into making change for drivers. So if you're a member of EVA then we will be representing you in those conversations and we'll be able to talk to you and make sure that we understand the experiences that you've had and make sure they are represented.

And the second strand of our membership is obviously the deals that we have with some of our kind of formal partners, discounts for members, which we are in the process of kind of rejuvenating at the moment, so keep an eye on the website if you're interested in those deals. But I have to say in the few discussions I've had, it's that former one, that ability to bring our voice into some really important conversations that are going on right now across government and the industry that's more valuable to our membership. And just being part of that driver's community, being able to connect with other drivers, to share experiences, having someone you can go to to say, look, this isn't working for me, how do I get this done?

We can also raise those concerns with MPs, especially if they're local issues in particular constituency areas so that they can help us resolve some of those problems. So it's having that kind of community and that ability to seek help and get advice as well that I think is more valuable.

Gary:

So what are you doing specifically to get that message out and to increase the membership of EVA England?

Vicky E:

So, I mean, it's a really good question. It's when I'm grappling with myself at the moment. So I think the first thing is trying to get EVA England brand out there as a really good organisation to be a part of.

So some of that is making use of our existing members. So we're holding some membership events at the moment around the ZEV mandate, but we're also putting a call out for members who have expertise in particular areas to help us in certain projects. Also, for those, as I say, when we go to meet with MPs, we'll ask members in those areas if they have anything we'd like to raise with them.

So sort of trying to activate the current membership and get them excited about being a part of EVA and feeling part of that community. And they can also help make that difference. And then sort of using that to increase our brand and increase our kind of credibility out there.

And then I think we're also considering whether there are any kind of partnerships that we might do with people when it comes to, so we've also already got our kind of discounts, but is there anyone else who wants to be partnered with us, partner with us on particular pieces of work or because they'd like to provide discounts to our members. So trying to kind of increase our brand recognition through that. And the other thing I think is just, as I say, getting our voice out there, just making sure that people understand who we are and what we do.

We already have those good links into government and into industry, which will continue, but being seen to be doing stuff through those links will also help. So for example, if we put a proposal into the Zev Mandate consultation, if that work is taken forward, then obviously that's really great for us as an organisation that this recommendation that we have made is being done. So just showing people that, you know, this is what we're saying to government and actually they are taking account of it.

And we have made a difference here as well. So I think those are my sort of three prongs at the moment.

Gary:

Fair enough. Let's talk a little bit about you as an individual. What do you say your strengths are? I mean, if I look at James, he was good at speaking to politicians, pushing a specific agenda. Warren, for example, very good at networking, building consensus. Where do you feel you sit in there? What are your strengths?

Vicky E:

I think I'm very different to both of them, which I'm quite happy to admit. I say one is being a woman. I always say I've always felt it's always slightly harder when you're a woman to get your voice heard.

But I think I would say I'm more of a thought leader, I think is how I would pitch myself in the sort of in the corporate speech. So, you know, I've come out of government. I've been in government for nearly 20 years.

I've led very large teams inside government and very large policy areas. So that ability to understand how to manage that world and to manage development of a policy and to think about how to have an impact is just a strength simply partly because of how experienced I have been at it. And I think the other strength I have is the collaborative side.

I'm always very keen to partner and collaborate with people and make sure that we jointly work on projects. A lot of organisations at the moment in the EV sector are similar to ours, quite tight on resource. You know, it's really helpful if we can lean on each other, if we can work together, if we're working towards the same outcome, joining forces is always a better way to make change than trying to work in your different silos and saying the same thing.

So increasing our collaborations and partnerships is also another strength that I have.

Gary:

Sort of pursuant to that, talk to me a little bit about what you're looking to do to work with some of the other electric vehicle associations across Great Britain. I've come off a discussion this morning with Mark McCall from EVA Northern Ireland, and he was talking about some of the work that they're doing there. Are you looking at working with them, collaborating with them, for example?

Vicky E:

I'd like to, definitely. So I think we're trying to get sort of all EVA call together to discuss our different work streams and how we can work together.

I think the first point is obviously the ZEV mandate. Parts of the consultation are devolved and parts are kind of encompassing together. So we will work together on how we put together an outcome on that.

And yes, as with all the other associations, I'm always very, very keen to work with other EV organisations. I'd say actually that I'm a member of the Women Drive Electric Facebook group, which is a really valuable source of information and had a question on there the other day about a member who is based up in Scotland, didn't know about EVA Scotland. So there is a bit of kind of learning and knowledge sharing that we can all do across the sort of the four organisations about how we work best, four or five organisations, how we work best together to get our thoughts out there and make sure people know about us and what we do.

So yes, very keen to work with them.

Gary:

Big fan of George and Michelle from the Women Drive Electric Facebook group. They're doing some fantastic work there.

Vicky E:

I think it's great. They are. They are.

Gary:

One of my sort of big bug bears, I focus on two things on this podcast, education and trying to get rid of misinformation. I think misinformation is a huge issue when it comes to EVs. There simply isn't enough nationwide messaging to counter some of the tropes that all the anti-EV folks start spouting off, you know: "EVs spontaneously burst into flames". "The batteries are so expensive to replace and yet they're cheap enough to throw into landfill after three years." Talk to me a little bit about the EVA England approach to misinformation, how you're trying to deal with it.

Vicky E:

So at the moment, we're quite keen to get some blogs going on our website to try to unpick some of that and to bust some myths.

So we've put one up. We've put a couple up recently. Actually, I wrote one on the ZEV mandate a couple of like a long time ago when I was still a board director trying to help people understand that this is what the ZEV mandate actually is and this is the the consultation isn't going to be about taking it away.

We've done one on vehicle excise duty. So where there are particular announcements or particular measures or particular issues, then we try to put a blog up to try to clarify it for our members and the wider public. So we get a lot of traffic to the website from the wider driving community and I think we are a helpful source of information and an independent source of information so when people have a question they come to us and they email in and they let us know you know what's going on on the network and some of the issues they're having which is invaluable and then we can put it on the list of things that we we will need to we will need to do something about just to clarify it for people. So obviously we've done the sort of taxation side I think on our list at the moment are things around tires, safety, signage, the consumer charge point regulations and what they actually mean for people so there's we're stacking up quite a list of things people have come to us about insurance is on the list as well so we've got we've got a long list and as I say we've put a call out to our members at the Town Hall and we'll revisit that for people who have expertise in particular areas and might like to help us kind of write some of these blogs particularly if you work in insurance or you're an engineer a vehicle engineer or you know about the skill sector so there's there's an awful lot we can do to draw members to make sure those blogs are really credible and really useful to people.

I think the other thing we'd like to do is unpick some of the guidance that's out there so I specifically am honing in on cross-pavement at the moment because there is guidance on how to install a cross-pavement solution but it is really difficult to understand if you're a resident if you're a driver so it's I think if you're a local authority and a kind of and a charge point provider then you understand it and you've kind of worked in it and you've worked towards it but actually if you're a resident trying to unpick your role in this and what you have to do is really really difficult so sort of putting out some explanatory sort of roadmaps and toolkits on how to how to work your way through some of these problems as a new driver is also on our list of things that we'd like to do I'd say the list is quite long I've sort of two and a half two and a half weeks into the job so three weeks into the job so so whilst

I have a really long wish list we will try to roll it out as quickly as we can but yes I say to everyone I talk to look if you have an issue that you'd like us to dig into that you'd like us to clarify that you'd like us to explain then come to us and let us know so you know the email address is on the website kind of write in to us and we can have a conversation about it or or we can we can provide some advice

Gary:

Because the irony is that list isn't going to get any shorter longer longer longer but that's the nature of the beast isn't it one of the things that EVA England produced last year was the EV drivers manifesto which was meant as a way of helping with the the new government that came in I ran with everybody that I spoke to last last season for the podcast I asked the same question to them and it kind of links in with the manifesto and I want to ask you the same question now and see what your reply is what is the one thing the new government could do to increase the uptake of electric vehicles in the UK

Vicky E:

Just reduce the upfront cost of the vehicle somehow which is based on our latest survey evidence actually from the flash survey that we've just run on the on the ZEV mandate

Gary:

That is fascinating because I had 15 or 20 people 15 people they all gave different answers I grouped them together into different sector we had talks about infrastructure talks about misinformation nobody mentioned anything about reducing the price of the actual cars themselves it was interesting first time I've heard that but okay fair enough do you remember the old public service information you know 'Charlie says don't talk to strangers' 'Clunk-click every trip' and you know all that sort of stuff we need a government-funded public service announcement that covers a lot of these bits of misinformation so that people can look and go actually I can do long-distance journeys in an electric car oh the batteries do last more than three years oh they don't go into landfill when they've finished oh the infrastructure is a lot better than people say it is something like that I think is it we need something that gets this out to a much bigger audience like the old PSA's used to be

Vicky E:

I absolutely yeah I absolutely agree I so I mean back in the days when I was head of head of a love we had the guilt you know campaign which was really successful in doing that but mostly that was about encouraging uptake and making people realize that these were normal cars and they worked for you and we had we had a sort of a go-to one-stop-shop website which kind of all the latest kind of products were on including energy tariffs charge point providers as well as the cars themselves and then we also did paid for advertising we ran TV ads radio ads but I think as time goes on that gets less and less sustainable because there are you know more than a hundred products out there now and many more charge point products than there were back at the time so you know there had to be a kind of it has to be a consideration of what's a sustainable way to do that and to have that kind of trusted source of information but I I sort of feel like there's quite a few of us in the industry who can take that burden on and you know as you said you know we we will produce blogs on kind of explanatory pieces of guidance on various issues where you know perhaps it's not clear the challenge is how does that then get taken forward who goes and bust that out of the EV echo chamber that we all seem to be in so I've always I've long kind of worried that we all talk to each other and that we never seem to quite bust out into the sort of mainstream kind of consumer market and how do we do that and how do we make that jump because as you say you know when it comes to clickbait then some of the sort of main to the papers that then they're not going to focus in on them amazing things about TVs or do a particularly factual kind of recount of it they're going to want to find the problems and where the story is which is which is quite different so that has always been a perpetual worry of mine that we're all talking to each other all the time and it's really hard to get out and actually when we did the survey for the ZEV mandate we tried really hard to reach non-EV drivers and I've always long felt that schools is the way to get that message out because the school gate has a complete difference of opinion when it comes to electrification and you have people who are really anti it through to people who are really pro and just to try to break through to some kind of forums were actually you know it's not top of their priority list so why would they be thinking about this but to get to those people and to start talking to them which is something that I think one of the things that we're considering with the EVA is whether we can do any sort of partnering around that with some of our members or partners who sort of have those relationships which is slightly wider and more outward-facing.

Gary:

I know we will have burst out of the EV bubble, the EV echo chamber when there's a 32nd public service announcement in the middle advert of Coronation Street. That's a very good barometer. It's going to cost a lot of money, I know from experience.

I want to start wrapping up now, is there anything that you want the listeners to know about either yourself or EVA England that we haven't specifically covered in our discussion?

Vicky E:

I mean it might be worth touching on who I am as a driver which we sort of haven't put a bit of color around it so I mean obviously I live quite rurally so I don't live in, I used to live in London and we got our first EV, the i3, when we lived in London and we did not have off-street parking and we could never park outside our house so cross pavement would not have worked for us. It was a bun fight to even get a parking space where we lived so there would have had to have been a different solution for us and we used to use destination charges at the time which were quite adequate because when you live in London you don't use your car that much.

We moved out of London six years ago, obviously brought the i3 with us and at that point obviously needed two cars and i3, we have one of the first generations so it only has a 70 mile range and I probably drive between 50 and 100 miles a day here just on school runs and various other after-school activities or if I have to just go down to the doctors it's a 10-minute drive so vets is a 15-minute drive so it's a lot of miles. that we stack up a day. So the i3 is great for one journey here but we needed a second car because both of us were going to the station or places at different times and so we got a Polestar 2 which is a very nice car and very different to the i3.

What's really nice about having those two completely different cars is they are completely different so if you want to do a short journey where you know the parking is going to be really tight or you're going to have to turn in a really tight space the i3 is brilliant and it charges very quickly because it has such a small battery. If you're going on a long journey and you're going on the big roads and you want sort of steady cruising then the Polestar is great as well but it's been a real test I'd say of the cars living out here. First of the charging infrastructure because we live rurally it's just harder to get a charge point and secondly the road surface out here is difficult so the roads are backcountry roads, they're potholy, they're muddy, tyre wear is interesting so it's just been a real learning journey for us about these two types of car but I think it brings like a massive wealth of experience to the role that I'm doing now because I'm not speaking anymore just as a policy expert who lived in London and used her car you know every so often but we've really tested these two cars and we've really pushed them to their limits and I think it really helps when you're thinking about the challenges that are coming in the sector also what it's like to be a driver out there using these cars in the real world so yeah it's just it's been really useful.

Gary:

ut that's what it was back in: 2018

Vicky E:

Yeah really nice car to drive

Gary:

I think that's a very good place to bring it to an end. Vicky Edmonds thank you very much for your time

Vicky E:

Thank you Gary it's been a pleasure.

Gary:

ZEV mandate the government's: 2030

It's time for a cool EV or renewable thing for you listeners. Water wheels are making a comeback as a sustainable energy source in various places including Kashmir and Northern Ireland these machines can provide reliable zero carbon electricity helping communities become energy independent experts believe that using more water wheels could support efforts to decarbonize energy systems and improve resilience against power outages water wheels have been around for thousands of years formerly used to drive mechanical processes such as milling or hammering they were a crucial component in the industrial revolution and today water wheels connect to generators and can produce zero carbon electricity as they spin stick them on a river or a waterfall and you've got pretty much 24 /7 free energy which is excellent

I hope you enjoyed listening to today’s show.

It was put together this week with the help of Vicky Edmonds

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Thanks as always to my co founder Simone. You know with the rise of fascism across the globe, the increasing strength of far right organisations, and the massive political upheavals that are currently going on, I wondered if Simon had any thoughts about how that will affect the rise of personal electric vehicles such as his electric unicycle. he told me he's content just to upgrade as necessary and spend his time at weekends putting on the miles. I asked him if he thought the Prime Minister should make it legeal to ride these things on the road. he told me

Vicky:

So, you know I won't speak for government, I think that would be for them.

Gary:

Thanks for listening. Bye!