More electric madness

The galloping
stupidity of the Liberal Party has been highlighted by the ludicrous response
to the Labor Party’s plan to encourage the uptake of electric vehicles. Let’s
go back to the start, some time before the Labor Party suggested it had such a
plan. In January, 2018, Josh Frydenberg listed a few technological advances
which have appeared in the last few years and stated that “there is another
area of exciting technological disruption with real economic and environmental
benefits that is yet to really take off here at home”. And that was electric
vehicles. He added: “Capitalising on a declining cost curve, new investments in
recharging infrastructure and significant improvements in battery capacity, the
industry has now real momentum in Europe, Asia and North America, which will
inevitably be replicated here.”1

In October last year,
Energy Minister Angus Taylor spruiked the benefits of an ultra-rapid charging
network along the major driving routes from Brisbane to Adelaide and around
Sydney and Melbourne and in Western Australia. The government was kicking the
tin to tune of $6 million to Chargefox Pty Ltd to develop 21 ultra-rapid
charging stations powered by (I kid you not) renewable energy. This network is
expected to have no more than 200 kilometres between stations, and the charging
stations will provide a top-up charge adding another 400 kilometres range
within 15 minutes2.

Then Labor went and buggered it all up for
the Liberal Party by setting a national electric vehicles target of 50% new car sales by
2030, and 50% for the government fleet by 2025, as well as allowing business to
deduct a 20% depreciation for private fleet electric vehicles valued at more
than $20,0003. How dare they! Of course, the fact that the Labor
Party had an electric vehicle plan meant that the Liberal Party had to oppose
and denigrate it despite it being similar to their own policy, and despite the
government promoting its efforts in helping fund the charging network. Indeed,
its own forecast that electric vehicles will make up between 25% and 50% of new
car sales by 2030, is not very different from the Labor target4. So,
why did the Liberals start foaming at the mouth? It is a knee-jerk reaction which
is now characteristic of the Liberal Party whenever the Labor Party says almost
anything.

Ever since Tony Abbott became Opposition leader in 2009, the Liberal
Party opposed and did little else, seemingly believing that the term ‘opposition’
was prescriptive and not simply a matter of terminology. This has continued
into the realm of electric vehicles. So what have they said? Morrison has likened
electric car charging times to toy cars which take several hours to charge4.
Angus Taylor could have told him he was wrong. Even Angus Taylor tweeted a lame
meme showing an electric vehicle being charged from a petrol generator in the
back of a truck, with the caption ‘Camping with Bill Shorten’. Taylor also
posted a video from the television car show Top Gear, about the limitations of
battery life and driving range of electric vehicles. That Top Gear video was shown
several years ago as having been faked5. Morrison said that the
Labor Party wants to “end the weekend”, and wants to say “see you later to the
SUV”6, seemingly unaware that there are several electric SUVs in the
market. He also said that it would prevent Australians buying vehicles “with a
bit of grunt”. Again he is apparently unaware of the fact that a souped up Tesla
SUV beat a $US530,000 Lamborghini Aventador SV, one of the fastest sports cars
on the planet, in a standard drag race quarter mile7. That is a fair
bit of grunt. Morrison also said that Labor maintained that “50% of the cars
that we all are driving around in 10 years from now will be electric cars.”.
That is not what Labor said. They said 50% of new cars would be electric; i.e.
50% of those cars bought in the year 2030 will be electric6. That is
a big difference, and Morrison knows it. He has never been one to let the facts
stand in the way of his endless, rambling drivel. Morrison has also said that
Shorten is trying to tell Australians what to drive. This is just like the
Coalition has; they destroyed Australian car manufacturing, so now we will only
be able to drive imported cars.

The main problem with the Liberal Party is that they have not quite come
to grips with the modern world, especially in regard to the internet. They do
not realise that the internet never forgets, and using the right keywords, one
can find anything and everything that these muppets have said on any topic.
When they do a u-turn, or tell a porkie, it is there for all to see, and no
amount of Trumpian denial will erase it.

Sources

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More electric madness