GREEN cars – that is zero-emission vehicles – could soon be getting green number plates and I think it is a ridiculous idea.
The UK Government has started a consultation process to see what people think about the idea of making it easy to identify an electric motor from an internal combustion engine machine.
This idea has been floating around the corridors of the Department for Transport for some while, but I hoped it would just float off. Sadly, Ministers seem to have only cosmetic things to suggest to improve the uptake of electric vehicles.
I have interviewed literally hundreds of people over the years about switching over to electric vehicles and not one of them has ever suggested a different colour for number plates would make them drive electric.
The point of a different number plate colour is to make them easier to identify but, frankly, that is easy to do, and eventually we will all end up with green plates.
The theory is that electric vehicle drivers could be rewarded for driving an EV with free parking or being given permission to drive in bus lanes. Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) should easily handle identifying vehicles. I can see no justification for what seems to be little more than a gimmick.
Follow this thinking through to its logical conclusion and I wonder if we should have red number plates for anything V8 and above, a grey plate for petrol and black for diesel.
The whole point of electric vehicles is that they are just like any other car. Part of the issue for the Government is the fuel we choose to use and the impact on air quality.
What this ridiculous proposal does nothing about is tackling the fact that we have far too many vehicles on our roads and we have roads which are so congested that it is often quicker to cycle or walk.
Why doesn’t the Government ever deal with the big issues by taking bold decisions and making change happen? Messing about with cosmetic changes is not the way to encourage behaviour change. Legislation and extra investment are the only way to improve things.
