Whenever people learn that I have an electric vehicle (EV) the conversation invariably turns to whether I suffer from “range anxiety” – the fear of running out of charge. The answer is that generally I don’t, though I might if I were contemplating a drive across the Highlands of Scotland to Aviemore, say. But otherwise, no. Why? Because I am able to charge the car overnight at home, and most of my trips are much much shorter than the vehicle’s 300-mile range.

In that sense I am statistically normal. Government estimates are that 99% of car journeys in England are of less than 100 miles. So if you can charge at home, then most of your problems are over, which probably explains when the last time the Department for Transport did a survey, 93% of the country’s EV owners had home charging.

Sadly, there are a lot of people who are not in that happy position. They live in blocks of flats, or in urban terraces, not in detached properties with driveways. If they acquire an EV then – unless their car is made by Tesla (which has its own charging infrastructure nationwide) – they are at the mercy of the UK’s public-charging infrastructure. And that is – still – patchy at best. The government estimates that there were 53,677 public charging points on 1 January this year, which it says “puts us on a growth........

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