About The Automotive Council 

The Automotive Council was established in 2009 to enhance dialogue and strengthen co-operation between UK government and the automotive sector.

The Council is made up of senior figures from across industry and government, meeting three times per year. The Council is currently co-Chaired by the Minister for Industry and Steve Marsh (Executive Director of Vehicle Programmes at Jaguar Land Rover).

It focuses on a collaborative approach (across businesses and government) to the major challenges and opportunities facing the sector. These currently include the transition to zero emissions vehicles, improving access to finance, accelerating innovation, including supporting emerging and disruptive technologies, fostering skills development, and improving the resilience and competitiveness of the UK supply chain.

The Automotive Council is critical to the delivery of the UK’s Modern Industrial Strategy, launched in June 2025. This sets out a new economic approach to backing the UK’s strengths, with ambitious plans for 8 high-growth sectors, including advanced manufacturing.

The Industrial Strategy is accompanied by the Advanced Manufacturing Sector Plan (AMSP). The AMSP prioritises six frontier industries, including automotive, that will shape the future of manufacturing in the UK. The AMSP is cross cutting and will also build on the sector’s resilience by making energy more affordable, accelerating grid connection times and deepening our strategic international partnerships.

For automotive, our ambition is to drive growth to increase volume of vehicles made in the UK to over 1.3 million, cement the UK’s leadership in zero-emission technologies and create the first European market for self-driving vehicles and services.

The Government’s flagship DRIVE35 initiative will support the latest R&D in vehicle technologies, accelerate their commercial scale up, and unlock investment across all aspects of automotive electrification. The Government is committing more than £4billion of capital and R&D funding for DRIVE35, with support running until 2035. This is the biggest government investment in our automotive industry in decades.

The Automotive Council will help to deliver the Industrial Strategy’s objectives, aiming to:

• Promote and support industry as it aims to meet the challenge and opportunities of the transition to net zero and, connected and autonomous mobility;
• Create a business environment for the automotive industry in the UK that provides a compelling investment proposition, including for related industries;
• Ensure aligned communication among members to amplify promotion of the industry to UK and global partners.

The activities of the Automotive Council are delivered through a variety of working groups. These groups provide industry evidence, advice and recommendations that are important contributions into government.

Membership of the Automotive Council

Membership is by invitation only. Further information is available from the Automotive Council Secretariat
.