How about helping our car industry build cheaper and more fuel efficiant cars rather than finance foreign companies who build big gas guzzlers like theve just done.These large car builders should be left to die,And we should be building efficiant cars that are cheap to buy and cheap to run after all most people only drive a max of 40 miles a day so why build cars that travel at speeds up to 200mph and use fuel like its ten pence a gallon.Next time your on the road just look at how many people are in most of the cars around you mostly one or two .

I have to disagree with you Ace. Brit cars sucks. Just look at the Rover K engines.

Ace, your logic is sound enough for city dwellers, but there are still a lot of folks who live out in the sticks and rural areas who drive miles just to get the shopping in, or go to the cinema, etc, who need traditional long range cars. But in general I agree there is a place for the type of car you suggest for the mass of city dwellers.

Ace: "How about helping our car industry build cheaper and more fuel efficiant cars rather than finance foreign companies"

How about letting the car industry stand on its own two feet, rather than giving it handouts.

What a stupid idea - 5000 pounds to subsidise the purchase of a vehicle that is heavy, expensive to produce and full of batteries which contain no end of heavy metals and other nasties. These batteries last a few years and need replacing at massive cost.

Instead of all this nonsense the government should be encouraging the use of older cars that have already 'paid off' their manufacturing costs, so to speak. Driving around in a ten year old 4 litre Range Rover is still more eco-friendly than driving a brand new Toyota Pious (sic).

By the way, Ace, firstly for heaven's sake sort out your spelling and grammar; how can you expect anyone to take you seriously? And the other thing is this: who are you to tell people what they can and can't drive; if I want to drive around in a 5 litre car that does a (limited) 155mph and 17mpg then that's my concern. How would you like it if I went around pontificating against something that YOU enjoy?

alvinlwh, That k engine was ok years ago with its headbolts that held it all toghether.But weve moved on .The americans have just started selling the "Volt car" that uses a small petrol engine to generate electric to run electric motors and it gives a minimum of 50mpg with a large car,this type of technology in smaller cars could in theory give over 100 mpg .this is the way to go,no building bigger cars that nobody use.It always seemed madness to build a 4x4s for people in towns to use on our roads for the sake of fashion.

alvinlwh
We have no british car industry anymore? rover=chinese, mini=german range rover ect=indian .so as far as british car industry is concerned we have none.Its time we invested in a truely british car made and designed by the great british designers and built by the british,to take on the rest of the world like we used to do.I drive a italian car because i stopped buying anything british years ago because our politicians allowed all our industries to go downhill or sold to foreign owners for pennies,just like rover to the chinese,and yet they wouldnt help rover out and put everybody on the dole.If we had invested properly in our car industry maybe we could be leading the world in new technologies in the car industry.

Never mind giving people £5,000. make the ones who buy 4X4s and other larger cars in the city to run children to schools ect extra "City tax" I have freinds who drive american pickup trucks doing around 9/12 mpg and large engined range rovers to go to the local shops around 10 miles round trip?Ive tried to get them to get smaller cars but they just say the same old thing "If i want to drive a big car i will" but they dont take into consideration the damage they are doing to the air we breath.So i think they should pay more,for their vanity/fashion.

Ace: "So i think they should pay more,for their vanity/fashion."

Have you never heard of fuel duty?

Ace Shakespeare

we used to have a "great british car industry", sadly the cars built by the great british workers (when they wern't on strike) and designed by the great british designers, were so poor the great british people (and others the world over) opted for japanses or korean, or just about anyone elses in fact.


as to a city tax on driving, didnt we just have a vote on a charge for driving in the city at peak times?
I believe such a system as to be introduced under labour in london, where the road charging would be linked to emmsions; with the advent of a conservative administration this was scrapped. As this change is likely to be followed nationally it seems unlikely to happen elsewhere

Also as well as more electric/petrol hybrids like the Chevrolet Volt, there should be a development and sale of Hydrogen powered vehicles with the major industrial gas companies like Linde/Airproducts/BOC/Airliquide etc setting up and spreading across the country hydrogen filling points at filling stations,their larger cylinder depots and their large cylinder agents which can accommodate a hydrogen filling point(some large Calor Gas Centres are agents for the industrial gas companies gases and refills)and places like Codon Alloys of Marton which have big enough yards to accommodate a hydrogen tank and pump. Hydrogen vehicles are the cleanest vehicles going and the only thing that is emitted is water;and it's even clean enough to drink!

Ace, what does it have to do with you what type of cars people choose? Do you not think we have enough edicts from this nanny state without being told what cars to drive. If somebody wants to drive an American pick-up that is their concern. These dictator's in Westminster would like to see us all driving some rubbish that is the equivalent of a milk float! Also, I agree with Orb please try the spellchecker on your PC.

The electric cars being shown like the Volt are far too heavy to be considered low carbon..we need something like a bubble car / smart car size. Weight reduction, rolling resistance and aerodynamics are paramount for electric cars since the power storage capacity is insignificant compared to a petrol fuel tank. Hydrogen fuel cells are like little bombs in the car, lithium to make batteries is scarce. When it costs almost nothing to run, then people will use it as some ask the Lord to buy them a Mercedes Benz.

Er Ford in the states successfully built and trialled hydrogen powered version of their popular UK model the ford focus(I saw tested on a car review programme a few years ago), and it isn't a bomb at all(which means the technology genuinely works and is a good clean replacement to petrol;(a)it's quieter,(b)there are NO harmful emissions or CO2,and(c)It could well prove a viable fuel source given some vehicle development and some finger pulling out from the industrial gas companies). I don't see why UK carmakers couldn't and shouldn't develop hydrogen powered cars, and I don't see why the industrial gas giants shouldn't and couldn't encourage and promote it by supporting the cars with necessary filling points at filling stations,at industrial gas company depots and at some larger industrial gas agents.

Hello Anthony, Hydrogen fuel cell is like a small bomb ...the Germans know all about its explosive capacity when they saw the Hindenburg, that's why they used Helium afterwards. When Hydrogen recombines with Oxygen, you get water...which is great...but a bomb nevertheless.

I think a question to Dave Cameron about whether they will honour the pledge would be more in order than pontificating in what or what not we should use for our future transport needs

All the green issues aside, the initial cost of these vehicles, even with the £5k proposed subsidy is quite an outlay for most people.

Anthony: "there are NO harmful emissions or CO2"

Maybe not from the car, but that's only part of the story. We don't have lakes of Hydrogen we can tap into, so it has to be created by breaking down water using electricity. That means the Hydrogen is only as clean as the electricity that is used to produce it. If we were able to produce enough electricity to fulfill our present demands and power our motoring by only using generation methods which produce no harmful emissions or CO2, then the claims made for Hydrogen would be valid. At the minute, if we switched in large numbers to Hydrogen cars, we'd just be moving the emissions from the exhaust pipe to the power station.

Ms B, Manchester
Its not just about the nanny stae all you have to do is look at the state of the nation since we allowed people to drink 24/7 .People need controlling to a certain degree because left aalone people dont regulate their lives or control their behaviour.That is wwhy we have so many problems in society.And people have been told that soon we will have massive problems with our enviroment and air quality but once again people left to their own devices dont listen .Just look at china when they had the olympics they had to ban cars from the city because the air quality was so poor that the athelets were finding it hard to breath.Somebody has to take control""like it or not""

would switching from petrol to electricity or hydrogen powered vehicles not simply move the prodcution of CO2 to power stations or hydrogen generation sites, rather than reduce it at all? Unless it is much more efficient to build more power stations and the cables required, there dosn't seem much point in this.

Ace: "Its not just about the nanny stae all you have to do is look at the state of the nation since we allowed people to drink 24/7"

Yes, the nanny-statists claimed it would result in the end of the world. It didn't.

"left aalone people dont regulate their lives or control their behaviour"

Utter rubbish. Most people are more likely to break the speed limit than jump a queue, yet the speed limit is laid down in law whereas queues are self-regulating.

"Somebody has to take control"

And let me guess, that somebody has to be you or somebody who shares your views exactly.

Anthony , Accrington,Lancashire,

well said,
but there is also methanol and ethanol which could be used as fuels, and i believe both are enviromentally friendly to produce and use,
i don't know a lot about this subject, but if any of you are wondering why these fuels (as well as Anthony's suggestion) have never really been seriousley looked at by the government, think about the ~70% tax that we are paying on petrol, thats a heck of a lot of revenue to lose,
in any case, these electric cars, where exactley does the electricity come from to charge them ?
yup, power stations, both nuclear and coal fired, yeah...thats really, really eco friendly.

Black Flag,
Yes ill take over when are you leaving black flag.when im in power you will be the first one my party will throw out of britain...

Ace, what has 24/7 drinking got to do with electric cars hmm? At the moment this is still a democratic country, so people are at liberty to choose their own lifestyles regardless of your opinion. Just a thought, have you ever considered joining the Taliban?

Ace, you couldn't organise a chimps tea party, let alone a political party.

In contrast to your attitude, if I was in power, I can assure you that I wouldn't throw you out of the country because, even though your presence here is entirely negative, I believe in traditional British liberal values rather than your loony authoritarian socialism.

However, you wouldn't be able to live off other people's work any more. You'd have to pay your own way.