Tag Archives: Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders

EVs in the UK in May

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Yes, more are being bought. By fleets. . .

By Gary S. Vasilash

Although the number of vehicles sold in a given month in the UK isn’t particularly large, from a percentage standpoint there are undoubtedly some people at US OEMs who wish they’d have the kind of EV registration numbers that exist in the UK:

According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), in May EVs have 17.6% of the market.

While the whole market was up 1.7% in May, SMMT figures show that EV sales were up 6.2%. Clearly, EVs in the UK are doing rather well.

Do British consumers know something that American consumers don’t?

Well, maybe not.

Turns out that consumer retail EV sales were actually down 2%.

The uptick in the EV market came from fleets.

In the UK there is something called the “Vehicle Emissions Trading Scheme” that mandates zero-emissions vehicles represent 22% of a manufacturers’ annual sales.

Apparently there are incentives available to businesses for getting EVs that are not open to consumers. The SMMT believes that it is necessary for “the next government to provide consumers with meaningful purchase incentives.”

Conservative leader Rishi Sunak, current UK prime minister, will square off against Labour leader Keir Starmer on July 4.

Mike Hawes, SMMT Chief Executive:

“As Britain prepares for next month’s general election, the new car market continues to hold steady as large fleets sustain growth, offsetting weakened private retail demand. Consumers enjoy a plethora of new electric models and some very attractive offers, but manufacturers can’t sustain this scale of support on their own indefinitely. Their success so far should be a signpost for the next government that a faster and fairer transition requires carrots, not just sticks.”

While of the subject of incentives and such, it should be noted that in May plug-in hybrids were up 31.5% are regular hybrids up 9.6%, both handily outperforming EVs.

And while the May ’24 market share for plug-ins is 8% and hybrids 13.2%, each below the EV’s 17.6%, combined they represent 21.2% of the market.

Evidently consumers aren’t against reduced emissions but are in favor (favour?) of the convenience and range provided by hybrids.

UK Invests in Green Manufacturing

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By Gary S. Vasilash

The UK government has announced a £4.5 billion investment in “strategic manufacturing sectors.” The auto industry will be getting the greatest part of the spend, which will be rolled out over five years, staring in 2025.

Auto gets >£2 billion.

The focus of all of the funding is environmentally oriented, as in zero-emissions vehicles.

While manufacturing isn’t given a whole lot of attention by people who aren’t in some way involved in manufacturing, in the UK it makes up 43% of all exports and employs 2.6 million people. In terms of economic output (as measured by percentage of gross value added), it is third in the UK, following real estate and retail and wholesale.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt, said:

“Britain is now the 8th largest manufacturer in the world, recently overtaking France. To build on this success, we are targeting funding to support the sectors where the UK is or could be world-leading.”

While part of this might be sticking it to France, it is clear that there is an understanding that investing in making stuff is important to the economy in the UK.

According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), a trade organization, eight out of 10 cars manufactured in the UK are exported—so if it wants to continue to have that happen, then the manufacturers located in the UK are going to have to produce the types of vehicles that are in demand, which is increasingly (though certainly not entirely) electric.

And getting the wherewithal to produce electric vehicles takes big money, whether measured in pounds or dollars.

About the British Car Build in July

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Things are not going as planned. . .

By Gary S. Vasilash

According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), the British automotive trade association, this past July the UK vehicle production number was 53,438.

In July 2020—when the pandemic was still shockingly smacking every economy everywhere—the number of vehicles produced was 85,696.

Which means that production has declined 37.6%.

Now maybe it was just something to do with the month of July.

SMMT points to the shortage of chips. The contact tracing system that is in place in the UK (leading to many people getting alerts on their phones about contact, something called the “pingdemic”), and some companies just shutting down for a break to accommodate supply change changes.

The good news in all of this is that the production numbers year-to-date in 2021 are 18.3% higher than they were in 2020.

That said, it is clear that there are still challenges being faced in the UK auto industry, which, according to the SMMT, accounts for 12.8% of all UK exports and directly employs some 168,00 people.

Which means it is non-trivially important to the overall UK economy.