Keir Starmer has announced rules will be eased around hybrid cars – as the government stood by its plans to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars by 2030.
It came as the PM warned Donald Trump’s tariffs will have a “profound” impact on the global economy as markets tumbled across the world. In a major speech, the PM said “nobody is pretending tariffs are good news,” but promised the government will “fight for the best deal” with the US. He pledged to support firms and workers in a new era of “global instability” as billions were wiped off the FTSE 100 on Monday morning.
Speaking at Jaguar Land Rover, Mr Starmer said he would back the car industry hit by 25% tariffs on exports to the US, saying: “These are challenging times, but we have chosen to come here because we are going to back you to the hilt”.
The PM stood by the 2030 deadline to ban sales of petrol and diesel vehicles after the Tory government pushed it back to 2035. But he announced hybrid cars, which use either a petrol or diesel engine with an electric battery, such as the Toyota Prius and Nissan e-Power, will be allowed to be sold until 2035 to give the industry more time to prepare. “That’s a new step that we are taking, a new annoucement today,” he said.
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He added: “Because we’re not ideological about how we cut carbon emissions, we’re also going to make sure that cleaner, efficient petrol cars sold before 2030 count towards your EV mandate.
“That will be good for British car manufacturers, like this one here.” He added: “British electric cars running off clean British power made by British workers. British cars for British workers. And as you know, by the way, switching to electric can also save you up to £1,100-a-year, so if we get this right, it can help with the cost of living as well.”
The support package will also exempt small and micro-volume manufacturers – supercar brands including McLaren and Aston Martin – from the zero-emissions targets. The Government is also going to make it easier for manufacturers who do not comply with Government-mandated sales targets to avoid fines.
He added: “This is a moment for cool heads, nobody wins from a trade war, you know that. But it’s also a moment for urgency, because we’ve got to rise together as a nation to the great challenge of our age – and it is the great challenge – which is to renew Britain so we’re secure in this era of global instability.”
His address came as the US President ignored concerns over a global trade war, warning countries not to be “weak” or “stupid” in a defiant post on his Truth Social platform.
Over the weekend he also shrugged off global turmoil and compared his tariffs to “medicine”. Speaking onboard Air Force One, he said: “I don’t want anything to go down. But sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something.”
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