The new owner of an electric car has warned other motorists about the possibility of being fined when charging their car at his local supermarket.

Max Wilkinson, a councillor in Cheltenham, recently bought his Mini Countryman and went to his local Lidl supermarket to give it a charge.

He left the vehicle charging as he went to get groceries and returned around two hours later, Gloucestershire Live reports.

But a week later Mr Wilkinson was slapped with a fine of £90 (reduced by half if he paid quickly).

The councillor hadn't seen signs around the supermarket car park that specified you could only park for 90 minutes – which included the EV charge points.

Mr Wilkinson decided to pay the fine and not dispute it, although he feels that it doesn't make sense to restrict car charging to just 90 minutes.

He said: “I’ve paid the fine and it’s a fair cop. However, it seems illogical that quite a lot of EV and hybrid owners won’t be allowed to spend enough time in the car park to get a full charge.

“The company probably should make that clear on the app or the charger itself. For me, this further highlights the need for Gloucestershire County Council to finally deliver its on-street electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

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"People want to do their bit by switching away from dirty petrol and diesel vehicles. At the moment that change isn’t being made easy enough.”

In other news, a motorist was left fuming after being slapped with a £100 fine for some dodgy parking despite the car park being "deserted".

They took to Reddit to share photos of their "mistake", leading to fierce debate over whether they should have been fined.

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The snaps show the car parked outside a shopping centre and well within the white lines, but with the front end hanging over the path.

They described the car park as "unbelievably quiet", which the photos seem to support, before explaining that they'd been fined £100 for "overhanging the curb".

The angry motorist warned: "Don't make the same mistake I did."

Lidl have been contacted for comment.

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