lol-lol

But particularly in certain manufacturers. We know many Stellantis and VW factories are having shutdown periods. Judging by Renault sales and how difficult it has been to get some models and versions and their sales figures it is not so much for this particular marque.

The SMMT is just a trade body, no political axe to help government. I think we miss the point with much of their data and some of it is interesting. Sadly much of it one has to pay for over and above the those big headline data ie 10 ten selling models and PowerPoint like slides of break down of registrations by fuel type. Some of the motoring press clearly but the data and make some good points. Here was a Auto-express article of a few days ago..... Important points are ICE cars still populate the top ten and The Chinese are coming https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/news/368223/renault-5-outsells-tesla-model-y-both-are-beaten-jaecoo-7 Renault’s retro hatchback topped the EV sales charts in October, but even it couldn’t come close to internal-combustion alternatives from China By:Tom Jervis 5 Nov 2025 Retro charm has beaten futuristic minimalism, after the Renault 5 outsold the Tesla Model Y in October. However, both EV titans were overtaken by a petrol-powered and punchily priced newcomer from China, suggesting value for money remains more of a priority for British buyers than lower carbon emissions. In October, the UK’s best-selling electric car was the quirky Renault 5 hatchback, with the French firm’s managing director, Adam Wood, describing it as “a game-changer, desirable for being as fun to look at as it is to drive, and as appealing to the head as much as to the heart. It is not just a best-selling electric car: it is a car that buyers are flocking to irrespective of its powertrain.” Best-selling cars 2025: the year's 10 most popular models Such bumper sales mean that almost half (49 per cent) of Renault’s UK sales last month were fully electric, with one in four of all new cars registered in October – regardless of brand – being zero emissions. Even so, this still wasn’t enough to bump the Renault, or any other EVs for that matter, into the top 10 sellers list; the best-selling car overall in October was (surprise, surprise) the Ford Puma. Perhaps most interesting, however, was that China's Jaecoo 7 was the nation’s sixth-best seller, with just over 2,600 examples registered last month alone. In fact, so far in 2025 Jaecoo has outsold the likes of Citroen and Lexus, while compatriot BYD has registered more new vehicles than Dacia, Cupra or MINI.

Don't know what the Worcester wally, not me but Geoff Buys Cars, is alluding at but here is the SMMT Oct 25 data but he cannot seem to understand the simple numbers..... Petrol down, Diesel fizzling out, BEV well up, PHEV up, mild hybrids up a bit. Personally been really hard to get hold of an R5 as they are in such high demand, almost no discount. The numbers don't lie still bit to go to run at the 28% BEV but we are waiting a bunch of new EVs in 2026.

Why, for what purpose?

Don't thing so. It is just like fitting an air con unit. Screw it to the wall, plug it in, use some hosing to access external airspace. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Heat Geeks reckon latest tech is vastly reducing water tank size needs according to the Just Have a Think guy. Not had a chance to thermodynamically assess and get third opinions on this. Your home setup sound well optimal for high and low ambient temperatures, storing cheap lecky and generating your own for home and EV. Model set up. Like me I expect you wish 3 phase was more readily available. If I could charge the cars at 11 or 22 kw that would be great.

In better news it is looking like the Somerset EV battery factory is less than a year away. Due to make half a million batteries a tear, employ thousands of people and help EV production in the UK. Great for SW England which does not have the highest of average wages compared to much of the UK.

In recent years he has been a big EV advocate. Working with Robert Llewelyn quite bit. Lung cancer horrible way to go. Sorrow for him and family.

Not planning to stay in this house, too many bedrooms fir my current needs so want to move in the next year or so for a place with less bedroom but more garage and workshop area. Therefore just want a heat pump device, like with my solar tracking arrays that I can take with me. Both EV chargers will stay. Looking more at portable EV chargers anyways abd I did not pay anything like full price for them, one government subsidised so I only paid £449 and the other one came with the Renault Scenic ad part of 2024 Car of the Year celebration. The 24,000 BTU unit for £750 i should be able to quickly detach abd take with me. Being HEAT PUMP magic it should be able to cool as well as heat. Something gas boilers cannot do, just alway pollute when running adding to the climate crisis whereas heat pumps can take heat out of air, ir ground, and help us keep the Earth warming and CO2 growth to a minimum.

I am looking at a single unit, 24,000 but, 7 kw just for part of downstairs where I work from.cost is £750 and I will fit myself. At the other end of the scale is my brothers house that has heat pump heating. It wax a new biuld so all part of the complete house. Underfloor heating as well as radiator.i got him on Octopus Cosy Tariff so we shared the intro bonus. Big house with a very large lounge combined with kitchen.not perfect as the far part of the room with the patio doors not az warm as it could be but economically. Under flooring heating downstairs. The tech is moving rapidly.

2028 implementation? Starting low and ramping up. I will get my tax avoidance head on to circumvent or at least reduce exposure to it. Wonder if motorcycles would be included in any pay per mile scheme. Or trikes. Be interested to see any actual government details rather than right wing media speculation.

Gas is a dirty fuel, at least compared to renewable electricity which is thankfully increasingly a larger if not biggest part of our energy consumption. Their is excise duty of gas, think it is about 23p per kg, but gas used for heating is currently exempt from this excise tax. Also, even despite the Russian military action against Ukraine, is still very cheap compared to electricity. I pay 5.71p per jwh for my gas and even my quite cheap night time electricity GO rate is 8.5p per kwh gas is still significantly cheaper and perhaps both the excise duty exception for gas for heating needs phasing out as well as incremental increase on vat for gas should be introduced. To have carrot as well as stick even more incentives for heat pumps. Heat Pumps are magical and can even reverse climate change compared to gas use which is pushing us ever closing to all those bad climate change out comings. Hope the Chancellor does these measures both to affect public choices, help energy transition and raise more revenue for the services we need.

Not 20%, start eith raising just by just 1% and then 1% more each year to nudge people in to moving to heat pumps. Winter fuel allowance should increase accordingly.

Please provide specifics or withdraw the statement

It's creation in 1948 by Labour government was a phenomenal event. What the nurses and doctors did during covid was also immense, it must be that hundreds lost their lives performing their duties caught covid and died. NHS needs to be rebiult after 14 years of conservative bad management abd solving the pay issue after the staff gave been so devalued. There are big structural issues but compared to so many countries that require private health care the UK is better off them some but we should be aiming to be where tge vest of other European countries are but that is going to cost and take some years to get there. Roads have similar issues ie big under investment but tjere have been some notable big improvements. The A14 Huntington upgrade improved my journey time to Cambridge and Felixstowe by over quarter of an hour. Too much population in the SE of England abd not enough biulding of towns etc in the Midlands. As with NHS it is going to takes years if not decades to go from good in places to good all over.

I hope that is not true for most Labour MPs. It is very difficult to keep grounded if one is a high flying lawyer with a charge out rate in the thousands per day and then dealing with affairs of state national and international dealing with billions of pounds and vagaries of dealing with Trump etc makes the whole thing surreal. Hard to stay grounded in such rarified circumstances. Hope new Deputy leader and recent bielections like Caerphilly do keep their feet on the ground.

I have always worked and paid taxes due. Con party introduced salary sacrifice and encouraged companies and individuals to do so. It massively gives governments a massive market for the Gilts the need to sell to provide benefits like your state pension and disability benefits etc. My company only adopted salary sacrifice about ten years ago or so. Before than I raised millions in tax assessments from those who were not paying their taxes and in other jobs, pwc and tax software, tje aim is always to be legally tax compliant eleven when using bonded warehouses, inward processing relief etc, all EU and now UK tax suspension schemes which promote uk jobs. My conscious is clear and I have never sponged off the system but happy to help those less fortunate physically or less blessed with smarts. Life deals one a hand and one can be lucky or unlucky and one plays ones hand the best one can for oneself, ones loved ones and the society one lives in.

To pay tax is a privilege knowing one is still paying in and helping maintain the fabric of society.

Putting the vat off electricity supply and putting it on gas might give heag pumps a bit of a boost. The technology is changing by the month and the need for large water tanks and legionnaire cycles seems to be sorted now. Surprised a immersion element is not standard as to whack that on during the very cheap nighttime period sounds obvious to me. Lots of so called heating engineers just get it very wrong it seems ie radiator sizes, pipe bore sizes. Brother has a heat pump house, no gas in his little cambirdeshire village. Not perfect and install an the setup not perfect. Has a seperate room for all the gubbins which it sounds like today would not be all needed.

Were hoping for 0% on home electricity, maybe 5% for public charger VAT and perhaps VAT on gas to go to 20% or perhaps an intermediate figure like 8% or 10% or 12.5 % or 15% or 17.5%, all figures that have been used for VAT in the past in the UK.

Happy to pay a fair share and am proud to be British with a Free at point of need NHS, a not too bad road network and numerous other niceties living in the UK. The two NI cuts the Conservatives made last year were so wrong giving most money to the already well off. Not even sure that the new EV grants are even really needed. £1500 off would not have been make or break getting the Renault 5 to me or most others I suspect. Wonder how the Heat Pump grant is being taken up as that is much bigger by comparison at £7500. We have reached the stage where EVs sell themselves on a running cost basis. The future taxation of UK vehicles is uncertain but me and other EV users, I suspect and have heard in a few cases, have no issue as paying the standard chunk of road tax like everyone else. Our reason for having EVs is the very cheap cost per mile, home charging advantage accepted, low servicing costs as well our own wish to be green in not consuming fuel to drive or in servicing procedures. We will always consider all the options available and one T Rex in the room is that less and less people will actually buy, own cars but we will, I believe, increasingly use taxis, hire cars etc. My acquisition of a car for myself next week ie the R5, and the Scenic last year, may well be the last cars I actually obtain for myself to sit on the drive 99% of the time and only be used very occasionally now and then. Not very far away, I think, from a car that self drives itself from the hire company. Love "I robot", a worry this could be the future.......

I was reading some of this guesswork and it is hypothesised that it will include those hybrids with significant EV range. Presumably those newer ones that can do over 100 kms on lecky as they would get whacked too, presumably as a percentage they would be reckoned to run on lecky rather than that excise duty ICE power.

Only 13 cm ie 5 inches shorter than an R5 but massively less capable. Applaud use of LFP batteries, thought it might be at least 30 kwh to be signicantly better than the Spring which can be had for about £11k. Spring is dye to come out soon with about a 100 hp motor. Needs to get better wheels and tyres D already feels skitty. ICE Twingo was a real hoot. Turning circle like a London Cab and more power than the electric Twingo. Twingo etech needs more battery, more power etc sk hope there will be a hot version. I recall Renault paired with Smart was it, using their relationship abd part ownership of Mercedes to do a hot 120 hp version. We need that as well as a better base model I reckon.

But also how much more, ie spend just a couple of thousabd more, or few thousand more and get something a whole quantum better. If the Twingo is £19k but you can get a 40 kwh Renault 5 for £21k, or a 52 kwh R5 for £23k or a Megane e for £26k tgen tge Twingo looks not so good a bargain. Then there is the Leapmotor T3 and soon to be updated Spring. I want to see the Twingo do well but I think Renault may not have got it right. Selling A segment cars is the hardest of all segments for Europeans.

Twingo to be only 27 kwh battery, air cooled like my Zoe and LFP battery tech. Hmm.