This week Rod rose in support of the Electric Vehicle (EV) road user charge.
He believes that we should be providing incentives to encourage the uptake of EVs.
That is why Rod and his crossbench colleagues have worked with the government to come up with a $100 million EV package.
This package includes:
20,000 subsidies of up to $3000 for new electric vehicles under $69 grand. Of which the first 4000 subsidies became available on the 2nd of May; $19 million for new EV charging infrastructure; $10 million to expand the government EV fleet by 400 cars over the next two years; and $5 million to establish a Commercial Sector Zero Emissions Vehicle Innovation Fund. With this subsidy in place, any disincentive that could have arisen because of this EV road user charge has been mitigated for the next few years.This bill is looking to solve future problems.
The transition to EVs is inevitable. As this transition happens, revenue collected from fuel excise will fall and there will be fewer funds to maintain and invest in our roads.
This is about fairness. All motorists should pay for the roads we use.
Rods support of this bill was conditional on the government committing to providing subsidies, investing in EV infrastructure and converting the government fleet to electric.
We are moving into a very exciting time!
See speech at here.
