Ford Focus Electric car costs £33,500 in the UK

The Ford Focus Electric has now gone on sale in the UK after Ford began European production in July. It will cost from £33,500.

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Until now, the most expensive Ford Focus you can buy in the UK is the Ford Focus ST with all the extra toys on offer in ST-3 spec at £25.5k. But not any more.

The ‘prize’ for the most expensive Focus on sale now goes not to Ford’s most powerful Focus, but to something much more prosaic – the Ford Focus Electric.

The Focus Electric will cost you a not inconsiderable £33,500, although the price you’ll actually pay will drop to £28,500 for as long as the government continues to bribe buyers with a £5k contribution. Which is by no means a given.

Ford are hoping to take some of the shine off the Nissan LEAF with electric Focus, but that’s not really been happening in the US where the Focus BEV has been ons ale for some time. In fact, Ford only sold just over 700 Focus Electric in the US in the whole of the first five months of 2013.

That probably translates to sales in the UK of the Focus BEV of no more than about 20 cars, and it seems likely that Ford will be using its fleet sales division to push discounted sales on business users rather than going all, out for a consumer market.

Despite that likelihood, Ford has commissioned a survey to try and get feedback on buyers’ attitudes to future transport, with the results showing:

• 72 per cent believe electrified vehicles are better for the environment
• 54 per cent believe climate change is the single biggest problem facing the world today
• 52 per cent say that their life would be impossible without their car
• 38 per cent are unsure of how to lead a more environmentally conscious lifestyle
• 28 per cent would consider buying a vehicle with an electrified powertrain
• 23 per cent want to change their future travel behaviour to be greener

Which should mean Ford will sell a shed-load of electric Focus. But the reality is more likely that those surveyed said what they thought they should be saying, not what they think.

Which is why the Ford Focus BEV is not going to fly out of Ford’s UK showrooms. There’s no real appetite, or none until the price is comparable to a similarly specced ICE car – and then some. Which means Ford, and other makers of electric cars, are going to have to find a way to cut costs by at least 50 per cent to make the electric car remotely viable.

Otherwise, all the electric car will be is a taxpayer subsidised second car for the better off.