Just 42 public EV charge points were installed by the UK’s nine Metro Mayors in 2021, leaving a £250m annual budget untouched.  

Novuna warns that the lack of investment in charging infrastructure leaves the UK at risk of failing to fulfil its 2030 ICE ban

That’s according to new research from Novuna Vehicle Solutions, which warns that the lack of investment in charging infrastructure leaves the UK at risk of failing to fulfil its 2030 ICE ban.  

The nine Metro Mayor positions, created as part of the Government’s devolution agenda, are held by directly elected leaders of the UK’s major city regions, each of whom has access to a relative share of a £7.45bn capital investment fund over a 30-year period. This equates to £250m for each calendar year. 

These budgets are in addition to a £6.8bn City Region Sustainable Transport Settlement, which allows the Metro Mayors (with the exception of North of Tyne) to bid to fund initiatives that work towards decarbonising transport, in line with national priorities.  

But a Freedom of Information (FOI) requests submitted by Novuna to the Metro Mayors’ offices in April 2022 have revealed that just 98 charge points were installed by four authorities last year, of which only 42 were explicitly made available for public use. 

And only four of the nine combined authorities installed new charge points last year, while just two were responsible for the new public chargers: the West of England (29) and Greater Manchester (13).   

That’s despite the Government’s pledge to increase the UK’s EV charge points 10-fold by 2030 – equating to 300,000 chargers – under the recently revealed Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Strategy.  

EV charge points installed in each Metro Mayor City Region in 2021:

Furthermore, scrutiny of the official Statement of Accounts of the Metro Mayors and their Combined Authorities, as well as the FOI requests, revealed that none of the 98 chargers installed across the regions used the significant capital investment fund, despite it being in place for several years.   

There was just one exception; Dan Norris, Metro Mayor of West of England explained that his office is currently developing a £5m package of EV investment proposals using the West of England Investment Fund, with delivery expected by 2023.   

Jon Lawes, managing director, Novuna Vehicle Solutions, said that investment in EV infrastructure was a vital part of the Metro Mayor mandate to boost the economic development of the UK’s biggest city regions.   

“We need to pivot from planning mode and start putting shovels in the ground,” he outlined. “The money is available; what’s required now is the political muscle to deliver critical infrastructure, especially for the 40% of households that can’t install a private charger. With a quarter of all new sales now being battery-powered, the last thing we want is this exponential growth in drivers making the transition to EV’s to be compromised because our local authorities have taken their eye off the ball.”  

Novuna added that the “lack of tangible action” was at odds with other public and private sector initiatives to support the UK’s EV transition – including fast-rising use of salary sacrifice schemes as a cost-effective route to EV take-up.