Matt Rodda
Main Page: Matt Rodda (Labour - Reading Central)(1 year, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text
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Graham Stuart
In the net zero strategy it was announced that there would be £350 million of funding for the automotive transformation fund, in addition to the £500 million announced as part of the 10-point plan.
Matt Rodda (Reading East) (Lab)
This is clearly deeply disappointing news, both for the workforce and the wider UK economy. As we heard earlier, the electrification of vehicles is slipping backwards under this Government’s watch. Will the Minister update the House on what action he will now take to try to improve this very worrying situation?
Graham Stuart
In terms of vehicles on the road, as one of my hon. Friends mentioned, we are actually seeing record sales. We are seeing that transformation going ahead. [Interruption.] As the shadow Secretary of State rightly says from a sedentary position, we want to make them here—that is a shared aspiration. Today is not good news, but I make no apology for, with conditions, making that offer to Britishvolt because we wanted to help it. We did thorough due diligence and we wanted it to succeed, but it was unable to do so. If we want an enterprise economy, we will have failures as well as successes. We cannot have some kind of monolithic approach. We must keep going to deliver the industry we want, so that we can have the outcomes the hon. Gentleman and I desire.