A top Liberal minister has been grilled on live TV over one obvious way to help Aussies deal with rising fuel prices.
Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment Dan Tehan deflected a question about cost of living on ABC’s Q&A on Thursday night.
“Look, we‘re absolutely aware that cost of living is something that we've got to deal with,” Tehan said.
He referenced tax cuts, child care subsidies and reduced electricity costs as some of the government’s interventions.
With petrol prices central to the concern of many, President of the Australian Medical Association Dr Omar Khorshid suggested there was one obvious way the government can help Aussie deal with the cost of transport.
“There‘s another obvious solution, Dan, to the impact on families of higher fuel prices – and that’s to break that reliance on fuel,” Dr Khorshid said.
“I guess, as an owner of an electric vehicle for the last four years, I‘m lucky to be able to afford one. I know that is just not available for so many Australians.
“Is there going to be anything in the budget that’s going to make electric vehicles more accessible to more Australians so that we can break our reliance on these increasingly expensive fossil fuels?”
Dr Khorshid added EVs would help deal with the challenge of climate change, to raucous applause.
Mr Tehan conceded it was a good question and one that the government had to “deal with”.
Already, many Australians are looking to plug into the second hand electric vehicle market but when they do, face a major shock.
The limited number of EV models available on the second hand market are sometimes costing more than they do at retail.
Lloyds Auctions, which specialises in EV auctions, reported this week it had seen a “huge spike” in EV resale value.
“Right now, we have a 2022 Tesla Model 3 on offer with the current bid sitting at $71,000 where they actually retail for around $68,000 and the bidding is set to close in a few days time,” chief operations officer for Lloyds Auctions, Lee Hames said.
With the price of fuel skyrocketing, more Australians have been seeking out a petrol-free alternative.
In the first two weeks of March, searches for EVs on carsales hit a record high, peaking at one in five of all searches.
“It’s flattened off since then, but it’s still consistently growing and we expect it to continue to grow,” carsales editor-in-chief Mike Sales said.
With the surging interest, Lloyds said its biggest challenge was finding enough EVs to resell.
However, the used car market as a whole is currently experiencing inflated prices for particularly sought after models.
“There’s a whole swag of cars selling for more than when they were new. It’s foolhardy to suggest that everything’s selling for more than what people paid for it, but there’s certainly some edge cases that are,” Mr Sales said.
“If you look at a Commodore SS V ute or one of the last of the VF II utes with a V8, people are paying between $70-85,000 dollars for those and they were $50,000 new.”
Advocacy group, the Electric Vehicle Council xjmtzyw(EVC), blamed the Australian government for allowing demand to outstrip supply in the EV market.
“The Morrison government seems to have confused its own Myopic views about EVs with those of average Australians and has completely misjudged how demand would grow,” EVC chief executive Behyad Jafari said.
“Global carmakers are far more interested in selling cars in Europe or the US or even New Zealand, where fuel efficiency standards are established and governments offer unambiguous support to the transition.”
The vast majority of those looking to switch to an EV are being forced to buy new from a select number of models available in Australia, with Teslas making up the bulk of sales.
“A practical approach to it is that most EV buyers now will be looking at new,” Mr Sales said.
“If you’re looking to buy an EV to save money in the short term, you’re probably kidding yourself.”
The issue with buying EVs second hand is that for most models there is not yet a “critical mass” of product in the market.
EV sales in Australia still make up only around two per cent of total car sales, with roughly 20,665 EVs bought in 2021.
“We’re talking about a very low base of cars available. It’s going to take a long time to get a critical mass of used EVs if only that many of them are being sold each year,” Mr Sales said.
Mr Hames said the stigma associated with EVs had dissipated and customers were beginning to clue in to the many benefits.
“There has been a false stigma around electric vehicles, with the common questions of: what if my battery runs out? How long does it take to charge?” he said.
“As people see more Teslas and more electric vehicles on the road, their confidence in this market is growing.”
