European automotive market data for June certify a 14% drop in registrations compared to June 2019 (and a 13.3% increase on June 2020, the year of the pandemic), which drives registrations of new cars to almost two million lost in the first six months of the year (-23%) compared to the pre-pandemic level of 2019. In fact, in June 2021 1,282,503 new cars were registered in the 31 European countries (EU + UK + EFTA) against 1,491 .465 of June 2019. In one semester the total registrations amounted to 6,486,351 units, compared to 8,427,639 in the period January-June 2019. In the first five major European markets Spain is worse than all, which compared to the first semester 2019 loses 34%. The United Kingdom (-28%) and Germany (-25%) are also bad. A little less worse than France (-21%) and Italy (-18%).
“The plan of the EU Commission, with the aim of reducing emissions by 55% by 2035, has raised the alarm for employment in producing countries: in France alone, the loss of 100,000 jobs linked to thermal engines is estimated” , reads an official note from Unrae, the national union representing foreign motor vehicles. “It is perplexing that, on the one hand, the utmost but exclusive support for electric mobility for newly registered vehicles is declared, while on the other hand there is total non-compliance with the principle of technological neutrality: that great patient that is the vehicle fleet in circulation in Europe, and particularly in Italy, on the other hand, it needs a much broader mix of solutions, which tackles problems with pragmatism and without ideologies, aiming at maximizing results in the shortest possible time “, explains the Director General of Unrae, Andrea Cardinali, reiterating that “a first step that Italy can take towards the objective of the EU is to make the Ecobonus structural”.
“Manufacturers – underlines Cardinali – are at the forefront of the energy transition of the auto sector, and they have been doing their part for many years with multi-billion dollar investments in the conversion to new technologies. The Commission’s initiative is certainly acceptable as regards the objectives of infrastructure development and mix of energy sources in the member countries, without which the transition to the world of mobility would be crippled or even useless, but it is essential that the commitments undertaken are sufficiently ambitious, expressed in a time schedule and achieved without delays or deviations “.