I certainly welcome the initiative that we're debating today to introduce planning guidelines for new developments to ensure that new buildings must include charging points and to make it easier for people to use electric vehicles in order to reduce carbon emissions, although it should be noted that electric vehicles by themselves don't reduce carbon emissions—it's simply a different source of power. Unless the base source is renewable, it simply shifts the problem elsewhere, so I think we should be careful in the language we use there. It will certainly improve local air quality, and that's to be welcomed, but overall air quality and overall emissions will not be affected unless we're using renewable sources of energy to begin with, so I think we should add that very important caveat.

As I understand it, the Welsh Government are going out to consultation on electric vehicle charging points this summer, and they're already getting kick-back from some developers about the idea of having to provide ducting. I would urge the Government to be very robust about this and also to be imaginative about it—to explore with some of the power-generation companies the opportunity to pilot different approaches, where sources of charging points can be put in where the cost is borne by other people. As I understand it, there are some companies interested in discussing doing just this.

We also need to think about the type of charging that we prioritise. Do we prioritise the current technology of the Nissan Leaf, for example, which takes, I understand, some five or six hours to charge, or do we leap ahead to the next generation of rapid-charging technologies, which will be able to do it in a fraction of the time? Which of those do we choose to prioritise first?

We need to think about where they go as well. We should be moving to a cleaner form of transport, but that mustn't be at the expense of sustainable forms of transport. We must say, I think, at the outset that the charging points should not be allowed to be put in pavements, where they could be an impediment to walking and cycling and disabled people, but they must be on roads. 

We must also, I think, ask ourselves: should we be planning for a one-to-one replacement of petrol with electric vehicles, or shall we take this as an opportunity, as people are making a change, to try to promote a more intelligent approach, favouring, for example, public transport and active travel in urban areas and focusing the electric vehicle approach in rural areas instead? I think this is something that we should be considering.

Finally, Llywydd, electric vehicles are going to be expensive, and this could entrench existing levels of transport poverty, where people in low-income families are forced to invest in running a car to access key employment and services, getting themselves into debt. I think we should be looking at car-sharing opportunities for electric vehicles. There are some examples of co-operative shared electric vehicle schemes in St David's and in Powys currently. There was an experiment with standard car clubs in Cardiff, as part of the sustainable travel city some years ago, and that's something, I think, we need to pick up with alacrity, because these are going to be out of the reach of many families, and not every family needs a car—most cars stand idle for 23 hours of the day in their drives.

So, overall, as we are shifting to a different technology, we should seize the opportunity to get behaviour change as well.