Electric and hybrid Towing Vehicles.

marketed by politicians as a panacea with no understanding of how people actually live and drive.

And probably no understanding of where and how the pollution of making the electricity happens, not to mention how the materials to construct batteries are obtained.  All they care is that it is not in THEIR constituency.

Spot on. Man made global warming, the biggest hoax since Saddams weapons of mass destruction.

Some of the latest euro 6 diesel are considerably cleaner and putting a lot of so called clean petrol cars to shame, so I personally don't think the diesel is dead and buried just yet, it some of the older dirty diesels that need taking off the road.

EV technology is now progressing so fast within a year or two we are going to see 500 mile ranges, the knock on effect it could make PHEV obsolete and not cost effective (Mitsubishi PHEV was due to upgraded with a 70 mile battery range, but I believe this has been dropped)

The Chinese have made great step using carbon batteries which charge up extremely quickly (as quick as refuelling a conventional vehicle)advancements in regenerative braking using carbon capacitors. Within the very near future we will have affordable EV capable of towing caravans.

At present I have a 2017 Kuga 2.0 diesel powershift, in about 12 months I will probably change over to a new 2.4 Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV, about 95% of my mileage is less than 25 miles, my energy supplier off peak overnight EV tariff 5 pence kWh,, which works out at 50 pence for 25 miles. The other 5% towing the caravan we can live with.

There's a lot of discussions on other forums about how environmentally friendly, or not, electric cars really are.

For me diesel pollutes low level, petrol at high level in the atmosphere, electric cars are made of components that are extracted from area that ruin the environment, then the end of life disposal of poisonous materials into landfill.

It's all a con in my opinion.

I was looking online as you do at a Mercedes e300de which is their diesel hybrid. There was a test on line of a Dutch car magazine on a towing test with this car but can not find it at the moment

This review is from the Green Car forum

https://www.greencarguide.co.uk/car-reviews-and-road-tests/mercedes-benz-e-300-de-amg-line-saloon-review/

Shame the Government is against hybrids as that appears to be the way to go, especially for people with caravans as the 100% electric option will mean we go back 40 years to vans weighting under 1000kg - think they had foot operated water pumps, although I could be exaggerating

Our first caravan not only had a foot operated water pump (cold only) it also only had gas lights,and a open flame gas heater,no grill but gas oven and hotplate, glass windows and the double? bed was, during the day  hinged against the rear wall,and a thunder bucket toilet,that was kept under the sink ,EHU ,if found, was 10amp max, real luxury

Can`t see any point in a hybrid whatsoever (unless used for a short commute everyday) then a small electric car is most practical. When you read makers forums most posters talk about how well they accelerate hardly ever a reference to saving the planet!