BRAVO NET ZERO

The charity Mission Motorsport is helping ex-forces personnel return to civilian life by training them to become much-in-demand EV technicians.

- Vicky Parrott

There are more than 1.2 million plug-in vehicles registered in the UK, according to a recent study. We're all aware of the worries about charging them, but another aspect of the proliferation of EVs that's rarely discussed is how the maintenance industry will evolve to cope.

Even manufacturers' official service departments have proven short of staff who are trained to work with high-voltage electric powertrains, and the huge network of independent garages is similarly struggling to find the training and staff to deal with the more difficult issues that can arise on an EV.

A few years ago, this subject was being discussed by some people in an industrial unit near Wantage, Oxfordshire. Not just any people, though. Mission Motorsport was founded in 2012 by Major James Cameron and several other exmilitary mates, including fellow tanker Aston Dimmock, workshop manager and resident barista, who greets me on a rainy Tuesday to show me around the charity's units.

The first warehouse is stuffed with cars of all kinds, from Citroën C1 racers to a Westfield and a Honda CR-V that's still liveried up for Mission Motorsport's well-known Race of Remembrance.

They were crammed into this one unit to make room for the expanding training programmes that Mission Motorsport runs in the adjoining building, including the EV course that we've come along to find out more about.