As dealerships reopened amid a tentative economic restart following two months of Covid-19 lockdown, the UK car industry started staging a recovery in June. New car registrations fell by 34.9 percent on the year to 145,377 units last month. This was a huge increase from the 89 percent year-on-year drop to 20,247 registrations in May, and from April's 97.4 percent decline to 4,321 units. However, many of the new registrations in June were likely for orders made before the lockdown began, implying that fresh demand remains very limited.
As lockdown restrictions eased, car dealerships were allowed to reopen in England on 1 June. Down from 1.27 million in the same period last year, overall sales in the first half of 2020 almost halved on the year to 653,502.
Sales of electric and hybrid vehicles bucked the trend, as those sectors continued to grow strongly. While new plug-in hybrid electric vehicle registrations rose by 117 percent to 4,926 units, new battery electric vehicle registrations climbed by 261.8 percent on the year to 8,903 units in June.
