Don’t invest too heavily in electric charging facilities because, in the long term, the market will move towards hydrogen, was the advice given to retailers at this week’s Top 50 Indie dinner by TV presenter and motoring journalist Quentin Willson.

"Put in a few chargers, but don’t invest heavily because the technology will change," he said. "The take-up of electric cars is going to start slowing. People want affordable electric cars, but the range is just not there."

He said there would be a rise in the take-up of hybrids, which may be good for town use, doing around 20 miles on electricity, but on longer journeys people will still use petrol or diesel to fuel the cars.

"The amount of people that drive pure electric cars will be very limited," stressed Willson, who has driven around 50,000 miles in a variety of electric cars he has owned in the past seven years.

"So, in terms of your future, you will still be selling petrol and diesel but less of it because the cars will be more economical. But the threat of an EV-only world is massively over-blown."