I do wonder about the future of Petrol cars, with Australia only selling 3.39% of new cars as EV you would think it will take forever for EV's to take over, but I feel the figure is much higher in other counties (like 84% for Norway) and once the rest of the world gets enough to cover local demand they will start to ship more here and it will increase exponentially. Using Norway as an example, if 84% of all new cars are EV and that rises to 100% in 2025 how long will it be before there are no petrol cars left in Norway? 2035 based on cars lasting 10 years?

Currently worldwide 2.2% of cars on the road are EV's. Any thoughts on when that will be more than 50% of cars on the road EV's? Also at what percentage of all cars being EV does the resale of petrol cars drop significantly enough to make them basically worthless?

They are interesting figures and I will admit to thinking on a small island level when I commented on the Morgan high end cars being off loaded.

In reality very little of the world will ever become EV orientated as the cost and logistics of an infrastructure are a bridge too far.

Europe is an easy target as always for this legislation and implementation.

All wishful thinking, already Banks are ceasing to lend for new oil and gas exploration, governments will hit hydrocarbon companies with windfall taxes so they wont have the internal cash resources (thru profits) to fund new exploration. Some Corporations are already being pursued thru the courts over their 'green' credentials and that type of action will grow.

So as the old oil fields dry up, no new fields will replace them. Add in the estimated £50bn clean up for the North Sea oil alone and petrol prices are only heading one way ie skywards with diminishing supplies. Already across Europe there are diesel supply shortages as refining capacity is reduced,

Most cities are now introducing emission zones, and like London they will extend them over time and make entry into them more difficult for the ICE, eg if Birmingham extends its zone to include M5 and M6, that will cause a few problems for commuters heading north or south.

True, but with double-digit inflation, highish interest rates and a shrinking economy for the next few years there's going to be a world of difference between having to fork out for an ICE vehicle to get to work and being prepared to spend >£50k on a weekend plaything.

One thing that a lot of us are going to notice is that with pensions index linked to CPI but real-worl inflation running at RPI +, our disposable/discetionary income is goign to shrink - and for those of us with mortgages it's going to be even more noticeable.

Add in tax free allowances are going most likely to be fixed maybe to 2028, with high inflation for a few years to come dragging more pensioners into the income tax trap. Even the RPI doesn't reflect what pensioners are spending their income on, more goes to heat and light their homes as a percentage of their income, where we have seen significant increases in energy bills. Disposable income is going to take a real hit for some years to come.

I'm struggling to understand the fuel cost issues and all the statements of gloom and doom.

In 2018 we paid Scottish Power about £220 pcm for gas and electricity: we have a large house and don't scrimp on the use of Electricity. .

Since then nothing has changed, other than replacing 25 year old double glazed windows earlier this year and switching to Octopus in March this year: I maintained the monthly £220.00 payments until Octopus put me on a "payment holiday" in June because my balance was more than 3 months average use.

Last month our Gas and Electricity cost £293.33, less £66.00 grant = £231.33, hardly a significant increase. When the next bill comes in we will have, including the Government Grant, £243 in the account.So I'll reset the monthly payment back to £220.00 - we spend more on petrol for the 3 cars.

Can anyone explain why I'm not spending much more than 4 years ago for heating and power?

So your power bill has gone up around £70 or more a month, the government won't continue to subsidise you for long, and the cost won't be coming back down.

It's not so much power as food that we've noticed an increase, our food bill has gone up by at least 30 percent in the last couple of months. Tins of baked beans that were £1 are now £1.50, butter now £2.50 for half a pound etc.

The likes of us who can afford to absorb these kinds of increases without too much pain are in a small and shrinking minority.

I fear we are all being misled. If the world suddenly changed tomorrow to all electric vehicles it would make a very small dent to the climate temperature increase. Why, because we the human race are destroying at an unprecedented rate our natural environment, the rain forests and oceans,etc. Nobody wants to focus on that issue, which would be the most effective, because it involves complex politics and extraordinarily large costs.

In 1974 I graduated from Brunel University into a world with a population of just over 4Billions.
Approaching 2023 we have, I read, about 8 billions infesting the planet.
Therein lies the cause of the problem.

Absolutely agree, Heather who has run our household for 50 years has commented of late that she notices weekly increases on quite a number of products, she shops in Lidl and Sainsbury's them being our local stores some 2 miles away in Dartmouth. She has never experienced the like before even through the last Labour period in the late 1970's when we had Mortgages at 15% and commensurate interest rates for everything else.

We are indeed fortunate that we can sink these costs effortlessly, many cannot sadly but we can all help others out in a small way with the foodbanks etc.