Examination of Witnesses

Part of Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 2:01 pm on 14 March 2017.

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Steve Nash:

Absolutely. I think it is worth understanding a little bit about our sector. Everybody knows we have a franchise sector, and we tend to talk about the independent sector, but that is a catch-all phrase. There are about 40,000 businesses in there, ranging from Halfords and Kwik Fit down to a man working on someone’s drive.

Right now, of all the technicians out there working on cars—there are just under 200,000 people we know of, but there are probably quite a few that we do not know of, because they do not necessarily belong to a trade body or anything else—only about 1% are qualified to work on high-voltage electrics. Let us make no mistake about this: you have to be licensed to work on domestic electrics, and I would venture to suggest that the electrics in an electric car are potentially more lethal than the mains. We are talking about direct current—more than enough to fry you—so you do have to be properly trained and know what you are doing. In this sense, a car is not a car, just because it looks like a car. These are the biggest technical changes we have seen for 100 years. This is not an evolution of old technology—this is new technology.

We know that the manufacturers will do what they need to do to ensure that their franchise dealers can cope. Most of them are already using our accreditation scheme to qualify people at different levels, including knowing what you should not do and how to disable the electrics to work on other non-high-voltage systems safely. The higher level is for working on the high-voltage systems.

If you really want these cars to proliferate, there are a couple of problems. One is that right now it can cost you up to 50% more to insure one of these cars, because the insurance industry is quite aware that there is a limited repair market out there. If your car has been in an accident, you need somebody who knows what they are doing to put the thing back together, and the industry is assuming a higher cost because there is a limited repair market. That will continue unless you find a way of engaging the wider market, and the wider market will not readily make that step because there is cost involved, so it becomes a chicken and egg situation.

As I said, there is a very real health and safety issue. You do not see it now, because there are 32 million cars on the road that do not have this technology, and there is plenty to go round in the service and repair market. There are cars that have been around for a while, such as the Toyota Prius models and so on, but we know from our own experience that a lot of the independent guys do not touch those—they pass them back to the dealers—because they do not need that work to make a living. However, as these cars proliferate—and that is everyone’s intention; if you look at the product plans that all of the manufacturers have at all the motor shows, it is all about plug-in hybrids and electric cars, so these cars will proliferate—if you want a competitive market for servicing these cars, you need the independent sector to engage.

To make that happen, first you need regulations to protect people’s safety, and secondly you have to consider using some of the large fund—I believe it is something like £600 million—that has been put aside to help move us in that direction. Some of that money should be directed towards a training fund to help the independents engage in the training that they need to work on the cars safely.