Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Kit Malthouse and Alan Brown

Tuesday 14th March 2017 Public Bill Committees

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Q Earlier, in the discussion with Rob, there was discussion about phraseology—about large fuel retailers or just retailers—and an issue with forecourts. I want to clarify something. I am not sure if forecourts are mentioned in the Bill, so is that a red herring? Is it not going to be up to the retailers to site the charging points where they are most convenient?

Following on from the previous question, if you are not blocking the forecourt, a rapid charger may take 30 minutes, but is that not an opportunity for sales if it is the shops that make all the money? I would have thought that for somebody who is travelling, if it is an intermediate store, it would be an ideal opportunity to park and charge their car, go into the shop, buy a newspaper or a magazine and a few snacks, sit in their car, then move on. Is there not a business opportunity there?

Edward Woodall: Yes, there is. As we said in our submission, only 11% of sites have seating areas for customers, so there might not be the capacity to manage all that. Equally, how big is a forecourt site? Think about your local forecourt site—how many cars can it fit? For some of these electric vehicle charging areas, they will not consider it unless it is an acre or an acre-and-a-half-sized site.

Teresa Sayers: Certainly, the charging sites would have to be on the periphery of a forecourt. The current configuration of estates has very limited space to accommodate any parked vehicles. As was previously mentioned, the business model is a very high throughput of vehicles. The maximum duration on the forecourt is usually below five minutes—they fill up, pay and leave. It is just not built and configured to have additional cars there for a very long period of time.

[Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)]

Q I want to ask about brevity. Mr Woodall, I have to confess that I cannot ever remember spending more than five or 10 minutes in a convenience store—presumably, that is why they are called convenience stores, because it is convenient and quick—so I cannot quite see the model of me pulling up in my electric car, plugging in for the half an hour or even 15 minutes, and spending that time in the convenience store, particularly when the number of spaces will necessarily be limited. There will not be 15 or 20 spaces; you might perhaps have two, which might therefore be full the whole time. Do your members really see this as a big business opportunity or is there a Government subsidy available so you might as well take it?

Edward Woodall: I agree with all those points. I think it is difficult in our format of retail to deliver electric charging, given that both on forecourts and in convenience stores, there is large throughput and we are usually in areas of small parades where there are limited parking spaces, or they are on forecourts that are likewise limited for parking space.