Jaguar Land Rover shows the way to zero-carbon economy – leader comment

Jaguar Land Rover is clear about the direction of the future economy. The Government must be too.

Jaguar Land Rover has urged the Government to increase the number of electric car charging points. (Picture: Jon Savage)

The announcement by Jaguar Land Rover that it is to invest hundreds of millions of pounds in a new range of electric cars is yet another sign of the increasing pace and direction of travel of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Fossil fuels are heading for the museum as electricity and renewable energy gradually take over.

As Jaguar Land Rover puts it on its website, the company is “on a journey to Destination Zero – a world of zero emissions, zero accidents and zero congestion. Our ambition is to make our societies safer and healthier and our environment cleaner through relentless innovation, adapting our products and services to the rapidly changing world around us ... the world of internal combustion engines will give way to autonomous, connected, electrified and shared cars. Today’s industrial revolution will be driven by demand for decarbonisation, better air quality, less waste and greater convenience, through automation and innovation.”

But, on any journey of this kind, there are risks of missteps, pitfalls and wrong turns. Everyone concerned needs to plan the route ahead with care and be prepared for detours should they be necessary.

As it announced its investment plans, Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) called on the Government to do more to provide charging points for electric cars, saying the current network was not sufficient to cover the country or even “the hotspots of the cities”.

If the Government fails to ensure an adequate network, that will damage the electric car industry and the speed at which the UK economy as a whole moves into what is clearly the future. Research and development on electric cars, particularly batteries, will spin off into many other areas.

But the Government has many calls on the public purse and must balance them carefully.

The JLR announcement came after the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders complained cuts to subsidies had led to a fall in demand for alternatively fuelled vehicles.

Such subsidies are designed to help kickstart new technologies that will benefit us all. They cannot remain in place forever and there are judgement calls to be made about when to scale them back.

But it is vital to the economic health of the country that politicians and civil servants get these decisions right.