2 weeks Ago By Ketan Joshi
It is extremely difficult to keep track of where Peter Dutton and the Coalition stand on the question of government policy to incentivise electric vehicles. Only a few weeks ago, Dutton was to entirely scrap the fringe benefits tax for all vehicles, rather than Labor’s current position to only exempt it for electric vehicles. The language in the press release is guarded – it’s not as an anti-EV screed but as a ‘fair-minded’ plea for accessible choices” (plug-in hybrid vehicles were only weeks ago into the fringe benefits tax scheme after having been exempt as ‘electric vehicles’): “The Coalition backs lower emitting vehicles because more fuel-efficient cars save Aussies money every time they fill up — but we won’t back Labor’s car tax that drives prices through the roof.
” I think that’s a far cry from the bad old days of Scott Morrison’s claim that EV subsidies would ‘end the ‘. Part of the thinking here is, I suspect, the relatively inescapable fact that it isn’t 2020 anymore, and that EVs have truly hit the mainstream. Even in cities with relatively low proportions of EVs of registered vehicles, they are still visible and many own them or know someone who does.
Part of it also seems to be a conscious choice by Duttons’ campaign to avoid straying too deep into Trump territory: an all-out far-right campaign based on fear and shouting, which I would’ve assumed would be the natural fit for Dutton, isn’t an option. The balance tipped even further on Monday, when Dutton seemingly on : QUESTION: Labor’s fringe benefit tax exemption for electric vehicles has blown out by hundreds of millions of dollars compared to what was first forecast. Would a Coalition government repeal the EV tax break? PETER DUTTON: No, we’ve said that what we’re opposed to is the Government’s big tax on hybrids.
For example, on a Toyota RAV4 almost $10,000 additional people will be paying if Mr Albanese is re-elected, for a Toyota hybrid. It just doesn’t make any sense. It’s $14,000 on a Ford Ranger.
I want people to have choice. If people want to buy an EV, that’s fantastic. If they want to buy a Ford Ranger or a Toyota Hilux or whatever it might be, that is a choice that they should have and the Government whacking a new tax on those people who are in the market over the next few years to buy a car.
I think a lot of Australians would be shocked to know that Anthony Albanese is proposing a $14,000 tax on a Ford Ranger, one of the most popular cars in the markets so we don’t have any proposals to change those settings otherwise. It’s a confusing answer, because Dutton first implies they do want to remove the tax on hybrid vehicles, but ends his answer by saying “we don’t have any proposals to change those settings otherwise”. As you might expect, only a few days later, the Coalition is back to the tax break for EVs: “The Coalition will: unwind Labor’s taxpayer-funded and badly designed electric car subsidies, saving upwards of $3 billion over the forward estimates and $23 billion over the medium term” This is really emblematic of the entire campaign.
There has not been any meaningful centre of gravity for the opposition party – they have been at odds with themselves much more than they have been against the government. It’s a pincer movement: climate solutions like renewable energy, home batteries and EVs have only risen in popularity and public acceptance since the last election, and Trump’s election in the US has resulted in a daily barrage of prominent media headlines of what life is like under the thumb of an authoritarian right-wing strongman. The 2025 Coalition re-election campaign doesn’t look all that much like previous party campaigns, or sound much like they sounded when they held government.
There does not seem to be a daily attack on wind farms or solar panels, and even their anti-EV policy is couched in language insisting that they really do care about low emissions vehicles. It is insincere: they simply moderate their tone because they see it as a way to get re-elected. But they are not moderates – they are a party of pro-fossil crony capitalists who very simply don’t do nuance.
Angus Taylor offered an to the ABC: “Our position on this taxpayer funded subsidy has been clear for a long time...
..press conferences have many, many questions asked, often in a raucous environment, and Peter misheard the question”.
That makes absolutely no sense: what did Dutton mis-hear, if he replied with ‘we don’t have any proposals to change those settings’? At best, Dutton misspoke, but the more fundamental story is that the Coalition still hasn’t figured out what campaign it is running: a mere nine days before election day..
