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Department Of Road Transport Launches Electronic Draw For Electric Mobility Subsidies

by THEFUTURE.TEAM

December 10, 2025

Electronic Draw To Enhance Transparent Awarding Process

The Department of Road Transport is set to conduct an electronic draw on Tuesday, December 9, 2025, at 13:00 to determine the beneficiaries for the fourth announcement under the Electric Mobility Subsidy Scheme. The event will be hosted in the conference room of the Ministry of Transport, Communications and Works, where media representatives will be present to ensure full transparency and equal opportunity throughout the process.

Online Submission Under The Recovery And Resilience Plan

This new call is an integral part of the Recovery and Resilience Plan. Eligible applications must be submitted exclusively online between 09:00 on December 5, 2025, and 09:00 on December 9, 2025, streamlining the process and enhancing administrative efficiency.

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Simplification Of Verification Mechanism – Extended Vehicle Registration Deadline

In a pivotal shift guided by European authorities, the verification mechanism for subsidy eligibility will now rely on the completion of vehicle registration rather than the disbursement of funds. This change is expected to significantly reduce delays and accelerate program implementation, allowing approved vehicles to finalize their registration by June 30, 2026.

Budget Allocation Details – 520 Subsidies, €5.62 Million Total

The fourth announcement allocates a total budget of €5,620,000 dispersed across 520 subsidies. The breakdown of the funding is as follows:

Category Δ5 – New Zero-Emission Private Vehicles: Subsidy of €9,000 per vehicle for 380 awards, totaling €3,420,000.
Category Δ7 – New Zero-Emission Vehicles For Persons With Disability: Subsidy of €20,000 per vehicle for 40 awards, totaling €800,000.
Category Δ8 – New Zero-Emission Vehicles For Large Families: Subsidy of €20,000 per vehicle for 40 awards, totaling €800,000.
Category Δ9 – Used Zero-Emission Private Vehicles: Subsidy of €9,000 per vehicle for 50 awards, totaling €450,000.
Category Δ10 – New Electric Vehicles (Category N1 Up To 3,500 Kg): Subsidy of €15,000 per vehicle for 10 awards, totaling €150,000. More details on the electric vehicle initiative can be found here.

This strategic allocation underscores the government’s commitment to promoting clean energy and accelerating the adoption of zero-emission vehicles across the country.

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Google Cloud Outage Disrupts Banking And Digital Services Across The UK

by THEFUTURE.TEAM

October 20, 2026

A power outage at a Google Cloud data centre near London disrupted services across the UK on Tuesday, affecting banks, businesses and other digital platforms. Google said the incident was caused by a power event at its cloud operations, with full recovery expected by around 1300 GMT.

The disruption began at 0608 GMT and affected Google Cloud services in the europe-west2 region, which is hosted in London. In an initial update, the company reported elevated error rates and intermittent network failures across multiple services as engineers worked to restore operations.

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Banking Services Hit By The Disruption

Revolut was among the most visibly affected companies, with customers reporting problems with ATM withdrawals, bank transfers and card top-ups. A source close to the matter linked the issues to the Google Cloud outage.

Traditional banks also reported disruptions. Lloyds said some customers were experiencing problems with its app and online banking, while HSBC confirmed difficulties accessing its services. HSBC added that it was monitoring the situation and noted that other organisations were affected as well.

Disruption Spreads Beyond Finance

Downdetector, which tracks online service disruptions, recorded hundreds of reports involving other businesses, including property website Rightmove and the Royal Mail postal service. The reports suggested that the outage was affecting multiple parts of the UK’s digital economy.

The incident highlights the risks facing businesses that depend on shared cloud infrastructure. Even a temporary failure at a single provider can disrupt services across several sectors, from banking and payments to logistics and consumer platforms.

Companies Reassure Customers

Revolut said it had been working to resolve the issue since it was identified and apologised to affected customers. The company also confirmed that customers’ money and data remained safe.

As cloud platforms underpin an increasing share of digital commerce, the outage illustrates how disruptions to critical infrastructure can spread far beyond the provider itself, affecting businesses and customers across the economy.