The City of Oxford, for example, has already declared its total prohibition on all petrol and diesel cars entering its city centre from 2020 as a world first, so I for one will certainly not be spending my hard-earned shopping or entertaining budget there, despite living quite close, as I plan to stick to my faithful (and low-emission) petrol-powered car for some time yet!
As if to emphasise the point that driving pleasure and the internal combustion engine are not quite a thing of the past as yet, the two car manufacturers that enjoyed the biggest UK sales growth during 2017 were the British performance marques of McLaren (sales up a staggering 3050 per cent at 567 units), and Aston Martin (+ 64.4 percent). Other major winners last year in the UK were Infiniti (up 21.6 per cent), Maserati (+18.5), SEAT (+18.3) and Abarth (+12 per cent).
Despite our seemingly insatiable appetite for new SUVs and crossovers, some of the biggest losers in the British market last year were established makers of 4x4s, with Jeep down by 54.5 per cent, Subaru dropping 26 per cent and SsangYong falling 19.2 per cent.
For the more ‘mainstream’ brands, offering a broader range of new cars across a number of sectors, the PSA Group took the largest hit overall, with DS Automobile down by 43 per cent, Vauxhall falling by 26 per cent, Citroen dropping by 18.3 per cent and Peugeot down 16.6 per cent. Conversely, PSA’s global sales for 2017 were up by 15 per cent, thanks partly to with strong demand in China.
Other ‘mainstream’ car makers such as Renault, Fiat, Mitsubishi and Ford also saw sales decline, as us Brits were tempted increasingly into more ‘prestigious’ brands such as Mercedes-Benz (up 6.6 per cent), Porsche (+7.3 per cent), Alfa Romeo (+2.4), Jaguar (+2.1) and Land Rover (+4 per cent).
With the 2018 arrival of important new model introductions, this year such as the Mercedes-Benz A-Class, Jaguar E-Pace, Volvo XC40, and BMW X2 and X7, British demand for a car attached to a prestige badge looks set to continue.