Italy Calls on EU to Pause Petrol Car Ban or Risk Industry’s “Collapse”
Italy has called for a review of the European Union’s 2035 petrol car ban amid fears it risked triggering the industry’s “collapse”. The Telegraph has more.
Ministers from Giorgia Meloni’s Government claimed the “absurd” policy was ideologically driven and required change to reflect the realities of the market.
There has been growing unease across the continent about a slowdown in demand for electric vehicles (EVs).
There are also concerns that Europe’s car industry is falling increasingly behind manufacturers in China and the U.S., which have benefitted from a flood of Government subsidies.
Last week, car giant Volkswagen warned it might close factories in Germany for the first time owing to issues such as high energy prices. This has prompted calls in some quarters for a rethink of tough EU climate goals which build up to a ban on internal combustion engine cars by 2035.
Gilberto Pichetto Fratin, the Italian Energy Minister, told Bloomberg: “The ban must be changed.”
Adolfo Urso, the Industry Minister, added: “In an uncertain landscape, which is affecting the German automotive industry, clarity is needed to not let the European industry collapse.
“Europe needs a pragmatic vision, the ideological vision has failed. We need to acknowledge that.”
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: Northvolt, Europe’s leading battery maker, has announced it is to slash jobs and scale back its commitments as the “challenging” market for electric vehicles bites manufacturers.
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This isn’t about the environment it’s about stopping private travel.
I think that in the storm of stupidity taking place inside the minds of the Professional Managerial Class who have their hands on the levers of the bureaucracy that runs (ruins) our lives, climate, public transport, electric cars, plant based food all swirl around without any clear idea or purpose. In their minds it all somehow feels consistent but they are incapable and uninterested in fully working through the consequences of any of those things.
We are in the hands of over educated morons who are manipulated by powerful people with access to them. To attribute to them a clever, sophisticated plan, I think, is a mistake.
A fundamental problem with the people who are put in positions where they can make decisions about things they don’t understand is that they rarely ask people that do know and even then if the answer is no when they want to hear yes they shut their ears and go to full steam ahead.
As an engineer I have a whole lifetime of people asking me a technical question and then, when they discover that there is no simple answer they roll their eyes and wish they hadn’t asked, usually saying “Oh, it’s awfully complicated, I don’t have time to learn about this now.”
The world is like this, people don’t want details and understanding, they want to think about other inconsequential stuff that doesn’t require thought.
They want to be able to buy a high status EV, or better still have one as a work-provided car without responsibility for considering the benefits or costs of it.
“shut their eyes and go full steam ahead”—-Group Think. —–It all emanates from the UN/WEF and filters its way down through all National Governments, down through Local Governments, where even the councillor in the smallest village in the country will want to plant Yukka Trees and install bicycle lanes, to protect the “children and grandchildren”, when infact he is condemning them to a life of slavery at the hands of technocrats controlling all aspects of their life.
I think their minds are all-electric and they have np sense of proportion
” ‘Stone age’ EV tech depresses used values.
The car market is moving into a scenario where the remaining combustion-engined models are becoming much more valuable second-hand than their electric equivalents.
The gap between ICE and EV is going to widen as legislation forces car makers to sell fewer combustion-engined models.”
– Autocar, June 2024
With replacement batteries up to £10,000 for a typical auto, the slightest crack in the casing from a collision requiring a battery replacement, this is no surprise. Not to mention the continuing daily deaths and maiming of children (and adults) in the [Chinese-owned] Congo cobalt mines.
Humans have agency.
ICE sales will continue one way or another.
I hope we find a way!
I was thinking this rhough on the way to the local petrol station yesterday. It is on a major bypass from Wakefield and, even though two lanes in parts, it is jammed every evening and every morning. Recently I saw a post on Facebook about the Council (Labour) altering the bypass to two single lanes and cycle lanes on each side. All the way from Wakefield City Centre on the most used road out of the City. I see maybe 50 bicycles on that road in a week. Since the Tour De Yorkshire it has been a popular road for cyclists. The changes are scheduled to be 18 months; the last time they said that it was three years. For, let’s be generous, a few hundred cyclists. Meanwhile thousands of motorists run out o fbattery power and pollute the environment. Most comments about this have been on the lines of “Well, that adds 30 minutes to the school run”; there are two big schools on, or near, that road. If oyu include the Infants then it is four. How does this make any sense? Destroy the industries, put people on the dole, reliant on the state and then dictate what… Read more »
Parasite class is a better word for these people.
The A27 is the major South Coast road from Hampshire and Sussex. Most of it is dualled but the section from Lewes to Eastbourne is not, yet millions were spend on a cycle path including new bridges while a short section of road got the three lane treatment. Needless to say our new government intent on a growing economy has now cancelled the dualling of the Arundel Bypass section. The section through Worthing never got built and the houses acquired for that project were resold.
I despair that this country can get get its infrastructure right, especially as it is now in the hands of loopy greens like Miliband.
Oxford council have done exactly the same thing on the road to the major Bypass and M40 link from Woodstock, in the mornings its a major commuter road as it heads to Oxford city, Newbury, London. or towards the midlands. For 2 years the road was dug up and reduced to traffic light manages single lanes, it had so much going on I imagined it was road widening for a new train link etc, the queues stretched back for miles, and journey times were increased by a minimum of 30 minutes, this was for 2 years!. All to as it turns out to build cycle lanes, and a bus lane. now with narrow roads the journey is slower, but the millions of pounds spent on the lanes has demonstrated that a few cyclists use it per day, I suspect no cost /benefit has been carried out, Oxford council hates cars, it has a blind spot where commerce is concerned, it is in hoc to developing 15 minute cities without the consent of the people who live there. There is no way that the majority of people who live in Woodstock or the surrounding area are going to cycle into oxford… Read more »
You mean Italy isn’t following the UK’s courageous lead over the precipice into oblivion?
Von Der Leyen obviously didn’t give the Italian PM enough of a bunce, just enough to keep the migrant invasion farse going though.
“Europe needs a pragmatic vision, the ideological vision has failed.”
That happens quite a lot.
But ‘Europe’ and ‘pragmatic’ in the same sentence – aching sides.
”We need to acknowledge that.”
No, no, no, no – that will never happen; it never does. If it did politicians and bureaucrats would all be out of work.
These things are like eternal Socialism, it just wasn’t done properly the last time it failed, this time with the right people in charge it can only succeed.
Yes but at least Europe are 5 years behind us and not doing it till 2035. —–We, under the cretinous goon Miliband are going to attempt to be Net Zero by 2030, a little over 5 years from now. It has taken a decade and we still do not have little meters changed to smart ones in all properties. Can you imagine how long it will take to get rid of 21 million gas boilers from the country and all the absolute clutter and cost of all of that in 5 years eg? Miliband is a total imbecile totally wedded to UN and WF phony planet saving ideology. I look forward to seeing the smug self satisfied smirk wiped off this moron’s face when reality hits home is a couple of years time.
Risks industry’s collapse?
That’s the reason for doing it.
Owning or using a vehicle for personal or family transport will once again become an elite privilege. Us proles can use public transport and be grateful for it.
Talking of public transport; I used my OAP bus pass for the first time last week. Slow, unpleasant, filthy and inconvenient – the bus, not me.
I mentioned before that every little road adjustment the local council makes always ends up inconveniencing the motorist. Call me a conspiracy theorist but FIRES Report anyone, all there but Radio silence from the BBC. Maybe one day when the sh*t hits the fan, the public will be like…..Where was the BBC to keep us informed, instead they just played the game of limited hangout, Tories, Labour and trivia!
I’ve noticed the Volkswagen-story with quite a bit of Schadenfreude because the reason the company is in trouble is precisely that its managers bet the farm on EVs for reasons of political appropriateness and it seems the company is now reaping the benefits of this highly prudent gamble. Nevertheless, I think we’ll need to find a way to separate the woketurds from all the institutions they’ve infected before they’ve turned all of them into smouldering ruins. I don’t mind them committing revolutionary suicide to punish a world that’s not going to bow to their deranged phantasies but I don’t want to end up as collateral victim of that.
The middle classes who mostly go along with this fraud (and can afford EVS mostly as a second car, because you need one reliable ICE car, you know, just in case) They will get dragged down with the rest of us, and their kids who usually benefit the more from middle class parents.
I have to admit that I find this revival of the Marxist bourgoise most irritating. My parents (both retired teachers) are middle-class. Small business owners are middle-class. Generally, everyone who’s genuinely self-employed. And people working in so-called white collar jobs (like me). By-and-large these are small people who go along with whatever the higher-ups impose onto them because kicking against the pricks usually doesn’t pay. This doesn’t exactly make them heroes (Who is, anyway?) but they’re not responsible for this bullcrap, either.
Can you imagine an electric Ducati?
Me neither.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news
https://www.ducati.com/gb/en/company/innovation/moto-e
Can you imagine going to the MotoGP and seeing a silent Ducati whizz by? Me neither. As bad as Formula-E.
We shall stick to our Scalextric set.
They have sound systems fitted. We have electric motorbikes in our town, so I know that is the case.
With so many dominant computing systems on board these EVil vehicles, they are little more than moving pcs.
Has your computer ever had a blue screen, ‘crashed’ without warning, or just frozen up?
As we get nearer to this 2030 date (UK) and 2035 (EU) the irresistible force (the public) is going to meet the immovable object (Government motivated by Ideology)——–We see when the people are pushed up against a wall that they ultimately resist, fight back and government capitulate. The reason this absurd Net Zero stuff is moving ahead here in the UK is because the vast majority of the public don’t realise what is coming. Net Zero is the iceberg that has hit us, but we are still sipping tea on deck not realising the danger. When that danger becomes apparent and reality begins to hit home there is going to be the most enormous backlash to governments plans to herd us all into 15 minute cities, take away our heating, take away our cars, take away our holidays, destroy national identity and basically continue this eco communist path to “Sustainable Development” where all aspects of our life are controlled under the false pretences of a “Climate Crisis”.
Not to mention “health Passport” control.
EV’S are the Betamax of the automotive industry. Fred Flintstones vehicle was more environmentally friendly to nature.
So Italy is demonstrating what we all know. Italy is no longer a Sovereign state, its people are no longer served by those it voted for as those politicians and the Prime minister do not run the country. This is evident in that Italy has to ask the E.U, a bunch of people unelected by the people of italy, MEP’s are but they decide nothing, Von der Layen and her “cabinet” decide, they are unvoted for by the people, and unremovable, these are the people that Georgia Meloni, and the other so called heads of countries, or should I now refer to them as States, have to ask permission of to act in the best interests of their own what were once independent countries. Why?, how did this happen that the citizens of those countries vote counts for nothing, after all their politicians are not there to serve them, but to serve the EU high command, once again an unelected and unremovable group of people. What if the EU says no to Italy? must its people be impoverished on the altar of Von der Layen, must they lose their livelihoods and industry for something and someone they didnt vote for?… Read more »
Von der Layen’s body of pencil pushers tasked with preparing EU draft legislation decide exactly nothing. They create legislative proprosals which are then voted on and/or amended by the European parliament and council of the EU (composed EU government ministers or heads of government, depending on that’s being voted on). Members of the European commission are proposed by the EU council (heads of government of the EU member states, not the same as the council of the EU) and these proposals are also voted on by the Europeans parliament. The European parliament may also dismiss the commission.