According to the latest data released by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), the UK’s used car market declined in the second quarter of 2017, following record results in the previous year.

The figures suggest that 1,832,400 used vehicles changed hands during the period between April and June 2017, a drop of 13.5%.

The society puts this down to the strong results of Q2 2016 being hard to match and turbulence in the new car market following the introduction of new vehicle excise duty (VED) rates introduced in the country on 1 April. This follows the trend of UK new car sales, which experienced another drop in August 2017.

Overall, for the first half of the year, the number of used car sales fell by 5.1%, with 3,966,356 sales in total. Most of this drop was seen in the petrol market, which declined by 5.1%, whereas the diesel market, which has been much maligned in recent months and will soon see the introduction of manufacturer-backed trade-in incentives in the UK, only declined by 0.1% year on year in the first half of 2017.

Demand for alternatively fuelled vehicles (AFVs) rose 24.2% with electric cars enjoying particularly strong growth – up 79.3%. However, volumes remain low with AFVs currently accounting for just 1.2% of the used car market.

Read more: Autovista Group