Speaking at the London EV Show, Lilian Greenwood, minister for the future of roads at the UK’s Department for Transport, highlighted the government’s electric vehicle ChargePoint grant scheme and said over £6bn has now been invested by the UK sector.
The UK has 71,000 public charging points and over 680,000 households now have access to domestic chargers, she said. A workplace charging scheme has supported over 57,000 workplace sockets and more than 800 school sockets.
UK motorway service areas now have over 980 rapid and ultra-rapid charge points, and Greenwood praised the private sector: “Industry is investing billions in this rollout. We're already seeing the huge potential that investment can deliver, and that's why we're matching that effort with action. The public charge point regulations introduced last November will make charging simpler, faster and more transparent. From this month, all public charge points must share open data so drivers can find and easily find an available charge point.”
New charge points over eight kilowatts must also offer contactless payment.
Greenwood said the government was delivering “tens of thousands of local charge points through a £380m fund supporting 113 local authorities”.
In 2025-26, an additional £200m would be given “to accelerate the rollout of this infrastructure”.
The UK government has pledged to phase out the sale of new cars that rely solely on internal combustion engines from 2030 – and ban all new non-zero emission-cars and vans by 2035.
