Incentives to get Australian drivers behind the wheel of electric vehicles are “fundamentally wrong” according to Volkswagen Australia boss Michael Bartsch.
Speaking to Drive this week, Bartsch revealed his position on government support for the introduction of electric vehicles, running counter to much of the rest of the local industry. Several car makers and the Electric Vehicle Council have been lobbying the Federal Government for years to introduce incentives for EVs.
But Bartsch believes that isn’t the right way for electric cars to be introduced if they are to have long-term viability replacing internal combustion engined cars.
“I think it’s fundamentally wrong,” Bartsch said.
“Why should the public purse pay for something? Why distort the market with incentives? I’m really against it. I think what should be allowed to happen is let the entrepreneurs, let the capitalists work it out, because ultimately if it doesn’t make economic sense it won’t be sustainable.
“At some point the government will say ‘we’ve done this long enough’ and I’ve seen it in the US. I saw it with the [Toyota] Prius and the Nissan Leaf; you had at a state level the government giving $3000 subsidies on these cars and sales went through the roof. Then they got taxpayer fatigue and they pulled it off and suddenly the whole thing crashes, and you really want to avoid that here."
The German brand is investing heavily in electric powertrains in the wake of the diesel emissions scandal. One-third of Volkswagen’s line-up will feature some form of electrification, either full EV or hybrid, by 2025 and Bartsch wants Australia to be a part of that transition.
However, he maintains that Volkswagen and the private sector have to lead the transition and not rely on government support.
“We’ve seen what happens when the government gets over-involved in creating a nanny state or market that creates a false sense of security,” he said.
“What happened to the Australian car industry? What happened to Ford? What happened to Holden? What happened to Toyota? When I joined General Motors in 1984 they were talking about closing those plants down for efficiency reasons and it’s now 2017.
“What you want to make sure is when we launch this in Australia you have an environment that is sustainable. An environment where it’s not being paid by the taxpayers. It’s been developed and paid for by the capitalists and they come out with a product that is genuinely more efficient and more beneficial financially and environmentally than what we have in the market right now.
"Volkswagen has made it very clear, very public, that they want to introduce electric vehicles at the same pricepoint as what you would pay now for a diesel.”
5 Comments
Totally agree EVs like Tesla sell without incentives. EVs need to be viable on their own.
I have been saying this for years. EVs will take over because they are better and soon will be priced like non EVs and later will be cheaper. Nissan and Carlos Ghosn go to hell or make something better
EVs need to be competitive in the long term, but that doesn't mean some reasonable short-term investments to stimulate up-take and support creation of economies of scale (not to mention short-term environmental benefits). They just need to get the balance right - don't over-subsidise and create a completely skewed market. Waiving some taxes and charges (e.g. registration), and putting some time-limits on it, based upon projection of when costs may equalise (e.g. in 5 years time, 2022). The market will chase the cheapest, most profitable solution, not necessary the solution with the best environmental and social outcomes. If we want to address climate change, we can't just leave it to market forces. All this would change, of course, if we properly priced carbon. Running petrol/diesel vehicles would become relatively expensive. Running coal-fired power stations, likewise.
Instead of using public money to subsidize rich greenie's Teslas, we can also punish high polluters at the petrol pump by rising the excise or structure the registration prices according to the emissions of the vehicle like they do in most developed countries. This would of course require the emissions data supplied by the car manufacturers to be accurate or independent testing by the gov would need to occur, and VW would fail miserably in that department. They really have no authority to lecture anyone and if I'd be Mr Bartsch, I would STFU on that subject.
Really it just distorts the market and leads to other failures. We have seen this with the wind energy in SA. It grow to quickly due to the subsidy farmers and didtortion caused by the RET. Now they (the taxpayers) have to spend anopther half a billion putting on bandaids before next summer and the SA election. If EVs get over promoted and dont come in over time just because they are better for some, then we have all the issues of finding where the additional power will come from and where all the charging points will be. The bleating would start and somehow it would be the tax payers problem, again.