A damning report from MPs today reveals that 1.2 million disabled drivers have been blocked by the government from being able to use electric charging points cars at motorway service stations and garages.

While the UK is on target to increase the number of charging points for the growing number of electric cars not one of the 73,000 charging points reaches accessibility standards laid down by the government for disabled people to use them.

The reason is that to install disabled friendly charging points has been left as a discretionary option for installers rather than a mandatory requirement by government.

Sir Geoffrey Clifton Brown, the Tory chair of the Commons Public Accounts Committee, said: “It is of deep concern that the needs of disabled drivers are being ignored. Not a single charge point in the country is currently fully accessible. We are risking baking a serious injustice into the fabric of a major part of our national infrastructure. Government similarly needs to understand how to remedy financial inequalities for those who have no choice but to use public charge points. Our report therefore challenges the Government – it must move at pace to overcome current delays and encourage take-up, while taking the time to ensure no-one gets left behind in this all-important shift to the future.”

The report warns: “Many disabled people are reliant on their cars as existing public transport does not adequately cater for their needs. Failure to address problems with the uptake of the standard will mean that the public charge point network will continue to develop without meeting the needs of drivers with disabilities.”

The treatment of disabled motorists reflects the disparaging attitude both the last Tory and the present Labour government seem to have for disabled people. Rail travellers are similarly badly treated with patchy provision to access station platforms and the London underground is only partly accessible with Euston underground been seen as the worst station in Europe. Compare this to the excellent provision for disabled people on public transport in Singapore, Sydney, Adelaide and Rio. I have had a good experience taking my late wife in a wheelchair round these cities.

And it comes at a time when the new government is planning a £6 billion cut in disabled people’s benefits and is expecting the disabled to get to work without providing proper facilities for them to travel there.

The treatment of the disabled is just one criticism of the present electric charging provision. The report found a very uneven distribution of electric charging points round the country. London, where ministers mainly live, has 250 charging points per 100,000 of the population. While Northern Ireland has just 36 per 100,000 population – suggesting that people taking their electric car on holiday there might have problems. In England the worst areas for provision were the North West, including the Lake District and the East Midlands, including Lincolnshire.

Most charging points are in urban not rural areas and there is also a problem connecting charging points to the national grid – which suggests that when they are used more widely we might find them running out of juice.

The previous government set aside £950 million to do this – but the report reveals nothing has yet been spent as pilot projects were subject to delays.

There is also an economic problem with public charging points paying 20 per cent VAT while those who have the space for a home charger paying only 5 per cent VAT. So it is much more expensive to use public chargers.

There may be a further problem for the many people who live in terraced houses who install an electric charger and then put cables across the pavement and roads to charge their parked cars.

So much for the green revolution which we are all promised. It is certainly happening, but not been managed well and disabled people are just an after thought as far as policy makers are concerned.