Ford Escort/mercury Lynx Cars on 2040-parts.com

BMW boss tells the truth about electric cars. And then has to apologise for doing so.

BMW US CEO Jim O'Donnell - "EVs won't work for more than 90% of drivers" Really, you do have to ask what kind of barking mad world we live in when the boss of a car company is forced to apologise for telling the truth, simply because it upsets a vocal minority (and his bosses, no doubt) We’ve been banging on for years about how useless electric cars are as a replacement for the internal combustion engine, and how they are really only viable as inner-city runarounds and as toys for the better-off. Even then, electric cars have their problems. As inner-city cars EVs certainly do the local environment a favour by transferring emissions to the point of electricity generation instead of the point of use.

Smoking in cars containing children to be banned

SMOKING IN CARS in the presence of children is to be outlawed in England by the end of the year, Downing Street has signalled, after MPs voted overwhelmingly to make it a criminal offence. A No 10 source said Parliament had made its view clear and ministers are now looking at the practicalities of implementing the ban, with a view to getting it place before 2015. The Commons voted by 376 to 107 last night - a majority of 269 - to give the Health Secretary the power to impose a ban in England.

New Lotus Elite: Top-Down +video

New Lotus Elite (2014) Top Down I think we’ve just about got over the surprise of a New Lotus Elite dropping from a clear blue sky in the week before the Paris Motor Show. What we still haven’t completely got our heads around is the plethora of models subsequently revealed at the show itself. Yes, we were expecting the new Lotus Esprit – even if we reckoned we might have got that wrong after the New Elite showed up – but we hadn’t reckoned on the new Elan, the new Eterne and the new Elise as well (never mind a City Car concept).