James Ashton: Google needs to contribute more if the UK is to be its testing ground

A weekend report that Google has held five meetings with Department for Transport officials in the past two years to discuss bringing driverless cars to British roads comes as no surprise — I’m only surprised it is not more.

The internet giant, in common with its Silicon Valley cousins, views the UK as the most important market outside the US, especially for testing new ideas.

At the same time, the Government remains enchanted by Google long after the departure of David Cameron’s strategy guru, Steve Hilton, who is married to Rachel Whetstone, once the search engine’s chief spin doctor and now at Uber.

The default option is that any new technology arriving in Europe should come to the UK first for fear that Germany or France will steal a march on us. And there are few more congested roads than those in London that could benefit from a system that promises to eradicate accidents and regulate speed.

Driverless cars are not the only breakthrough being worked on in this area. Lord Drayson, the former science minister, has invested heavily in technology that wirelessly charges electric vehicles.