THE BOSS of Halfords called on the Government to address a shortage of specialist mechanics able to cope with its agenda to rapidly grow the number of electric cars in Britain.

Graham Stapleton, chief executive of the retailer and motoring services business, said he is "very concerned"

that sufficient steps are not being taken to address the "skills gap".

The Government said earlier this year that it will ban the sale of all new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2030. It said there are about 500,000 zero and low emission cars on UK roads, but this is projected to rise to up to 11m vehicles by 2030.

Stapleton said there is expected to be a shortfall of about 35,000 UK technicians able to deal with these vehicles, and called for state support to rapidly grow this workforce.

"I've been talking to the Government because I am very concerned that we need to be training more people, or at least setting out how this process will take place," he told the PA news agency.

PA

(c) 2021 City A.M., source Newspaper