The Government has announced that new homes in England will be required by law to install electric vehicle charging points from next year and claims this will see up to 145,000 charging points installed every year.
While we welcome this as a well overdue positive statement, we have yet to see details, such as how this will be applied to houses without off-street parking.
Alan Steele, our lead Campaigner for Whitley Bay, says:
“There is a bigger issue here, however, in that housing strategy needs to be part of a comprehensive approach towards dealing with the climate crisis.
Housing strategy must be seen as a major element of building a well-being economy; delivering greener places, strengthening community resilience, reducing carbon emissions and actively enabling the use of renewable energy.”
Electric Vehicles are just part of the solution and only then if the electricity used for them is sustainable (although we do recognise that there are still other issues relating to Electric Vehicles),
The transport aspect of housing planning must encourage alternatives to driving by ensuring that secure footpaths, cycle storage and access to high quality public transport are included in all developments.
We have been, and will continue to, press North Tyneside Council to implement comprehensive plans to tackle the climate emergency – helping to provide charging points would be one significant step in the right direction.