8:19 am, March 20, 2026
Confidence in EVs is still a huge issue among motorists who have yet to make the switch away from petrol and diesel.
That is the verdict of Electrifying.com co-founder Ginny Buckley, who appeared as one of our keynote interviewees at Car Dealer Live yesterday (Mar 19).
Buckley and her team recently carried out extensive research in association with the AA which focused on the thoughts and opinions of 13,000 non-EV drivers from across the UK.
Thirty per cent of respondents said they wouldn’t feel confident about driving an EV while only 22% said they’d be confident charging one.
What’s more, 50% of people said they regarded the public charging network as unreliable – although that figure was down from 70% three years ago.
Speaking at the British Motor Museum in Gaydon, Buckley described this lack of faith as ‘a problem that we can’t seem to solve’ and acknowledged that it adds to the many pressures car dealers already face.
Affordability remains an issue, she added. When it comes to new electric cars, 57% of respondents thought they were too expensive although only 30% said used EVs were too expensive – ‘and that’s come down massively over the last couple of years’.
Perhaps the most startling statistic was also related to used EVs. Buckley said: ‘When we asked people if they were confident in buying a used electric car, only 3% of non-EV drivers said yes – extraordinary.’
Moving on to the proposed pay-per-mile EV charge announced last year, Buckley said: ‘There are a lot of drivers in this room and I think we all know that you don’t get very far with one foot on the brake and the other on the accelerator. That’s what the government seems to be doing, to be frank.
‘One the one hand, they are saying ‘‘here’s some money for grants’’ and ‘‘let’s spend millions of pounds on a not very good public information campaign telling us all to switch to EVs’’; but on the other hand, they’re saying, ‘‘we might tax EVs in a couple of years’’.
‘What kind of messaging is that? It’s not helping anyone really. I strongly suspect there will be so much pressure on this, the government will have to drop this policy.’
Buckley said it was important to realise that there are two different types of potential EV buyer arriving in car showrooms these days.
She told the audience: ‘You’ll still be seeing people who don’t know how to charge an electric car and who don’t know what a kilowatt is. Why should they? It’s still very new stuff.
‘But you’ll also be seeing people on their third or fourth EV, who will want to know about the charging curve, who will want to know about range drop-off in winter and they’ll want realistic answers.
‘It’s about giving people honest information. The worst thing you can do is sell somebody a car that’s not right for them – we’re really big advocates of that.
EVs aren’t right for everybody right now. They work for a lot of people but don’t be tempted to push people into them if it’s not right for them.’
Turning to the influx of new Chinese OEMs – a topic that cropped up during many sessions at CDL26 – Buckley said that 70% of Electrifying’s audience were completely open to buying an EV from a challenger brand.
She added: ‘It’s an interesting time. I’ve been in this industry a long time and there has never been a period as exciting as it is now.
‘I think we’re going to see a few Kodaks of the car industry but I welcome the competition and our audience does as well.’
