Commercial Vehicles: Safety

Lord Deben Excerpts

Wednesday 19th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

To the serious point that the noble Lord raises, the Government are continuing to modernise the requirements for vehicles on British roads and are continuing to insist on the trajectory to zero-emission vehicles, for obvious reasons. In fact, contrary to the implication of what he says, that was started by the previous Government. On a more jocular note, neither the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, nor I need to add to the traffic around Parliament Square, particularly in the past few days.

[Lord Deben (Con)]

The targets having been set up by the previous Government, the present Government should stick to them and give British motor manufacturers certainty about what is going to happen, rather than uncertainty of the kind that has recently been stirred up.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

We very much welcome the noble Lord’s support in this. It is inevitable that the motor manufacturing industry moves on. Contrary to a lot of the noise, there is great evidence that the translation to zero-emission vehicles and electric vehicles is proceeding. Beneath all that noise, it is quite clear that electric vehicles are catching on and that the manufacturing market needs to carry on in that direction. My own experience of introducing hybrid and electric vehicles is that the one thing that really makes a difference is the continuing purchase in larger and larger numbers, which encourages manufacturers to make the right thing at a lower cost and be successful.