Patricia Karvelas: As we've covered this afternoon, the federal government has unveiled its future fuels and vehicles strategy, marking a significant change in direction on electric vehicles. Now the plan includes partnering with the private sector to install 50,000 home charging stations. Tim Wilson is the Assistant Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction, and he's my guest. Welcome. The Electric Vehicles Council has called the policy a 'fizzer' saying it does nothing to make electric vehicles more affordable. Now EVs currently make up I think it's less than two per cent of the light vehicle market. How is technology alone going to facilitate a growth so that more people can afford these cars? 

Tim Wilson: Well, Patricia, if you tried to buy a Tesla about five years ago, that would have cost about $300,000. Today, they are moving towards about $60,000. So what we're seeing is a huge number of cars going into the market electric vehicles, fuel cell cars, hybrids going into the marketplace that are affordable. And if you actually want to see an uptake in cars and cars that are relying on battery technology and the like, you need them to be affordable to Australian households they can't just be the exclusive domain of the well-off. And that's what the focus of this policy is about is working with the technology and critically to build to fill the infrastructure gaps that exist. So people have, for instance, reservations about electric vehicles, for instance, range anxiety that they don't go far enough to invest in the infrastructure. So you can drive from Melbourne to Sydney to Brisbane when they open their borders to Perth to be able to use exactly these types of cars to meet your needs. 

Patricia Karvelas: Yeah, but it doesn't make the cars cheaper. 

Tim Wilson: Well, the cars are set by the market and the price-

Patricia Karvelas: The government can set, you know, all sorts of policies around that in terms of importation, taxation, I mean, there are so many levers available to government to actually drive down the price. That's not in the announcement today. 

Tim Wilson: Well, our focus on driving prices down is by make sure the incentive is there for businesses to deliver cars that Australians can afford, not merely to give tax cuts to the well-off. And that's the reality of the policy proposals that are often put out there, which would cut the cost of cars for those who are well off but do nothing for the average punter. We want to make sure that future vehicles, as part of the future fuels strategy of Australia, is available to everybody, not just to well-off Australians who of course have a right to be able to put their money on the table and be able to buy cars of the future. But we want every Australian to have that opportunity. 

Patricia Karvelas: When the government said at the last election campaign that it was a war on the weekend in relation to electric vehicles, that was an exaggeration and wrong. Do you agree that that was an exaggeration about what would happen if more electric vehicles were taken up? 

Tim Wilson: Well, I think that's not the spirit of the comment at the the time. The spirit of the comment at the time, is if you deliberately shut down pathways for people to buy cars that they can afford or shut down pathways where people can use cars that they enjoy presently, then you're going to have a problem down the road-

Patricia Karvelas: That wasn't the context. I watched that election campaign, every press conference, every interview. There was a deliberate attempt to really talk down electric vehicles more broadly, and Labor's policies to try and incentivize them. Was the rhetoric, that's the question to you, overblown and inaccurate? Prime Minister saying that, you know, you can't tell a boat or a trailer. I mean, that was wrong, right? 

Tim Wilson: Well, the technology at the time, there were severe limits on what electric cars and other types of hydrogen fuel cell cars could deliver. Technology, the basis of our policy and the basis of our approach to cutting greenhouse gas emissions has transcended that in a very short period of time. I used the fundamental numbers we had around purchasing electric vehicle only a few years ago to see how rapidly the technology is changing and we move with the technology and embrace it. And we want Australians to embrace it. Because what this policy does is provide a pathway for Australian households and businesses to be part of Australia's climate solution towards carbon neutrality by 2050 and-

Patricia Karvelas: But since three years ago, there hasn't been a radical change. 

Tim Wilson: Sorry there has been Patricia- 

Patricia Karvelas: That's not according to the industry. They say that this was all available to you. You just didn't want to take it up at the time. 

Tim Wilson: It was just very, very expensive at the time. And that's the critical difference. The price of these vehicles, the availability of these vehicles-

Patricia Karvelas: But the technology was ready. You just didn't want to invest in this at the time, and it became a really political issue. You've changed your mind. 

Tim Wilson: Now, I'm sorry, Patricia, that's not right. The volume of vehicles available in the marketplace, the range of them, the cost basis and the technology has markedly improved. You just need to go and talk to electrical vehicle manufacturers and they'll now tell you how many more products they aboard the marketplace. Were there electric vehicles a few years go? Resolutely, yes. They were very expensive in the exclusive domain of the rich. And what we were saying is we weren't both going to end the pathways for the average Australians to be able to buy affordable cars so they can do things like drop their kids off at school. But we also weren't going to give tax breaks exclusively to the rich because what we want to do is democratize the pathways, not just for Australians to be part of the solution to getting to carbon neutrality, but also so they can be part of the solution for buying electric vehicles, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and the like. 

Patricia Karvelas: There's no doubt that poorer people can't afford these cars. That's undoubtable. It's about how are you going to try and make it accessible so more people can drive them right? That's actually the point. Isn't that the job of government to try and, if you think these are the right vehicles to have on the roads because they get a lower emissions to try and make it easier for more people to buy them? 

Tim Wilson: And that's precisely why we're installing tens of thousands of charging points and other types of infrastructure that people need so that they can use them and address their concerns so confidence in electric vehicles increases over time. Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles increases over time. Today, the prime minister myself, Angus Taylor, Katie Allen, the member for Higgins, were down at the Toyota plant in Altona in Victoria, looking at a new hydrogen fuel cell vehicle and the potential that it can drive up to 600 kilometres. And that sort of technology frankly, wasn't commercially available. Only a few years ago.

Patricia Karvelas: The government says this plan is powering choice. Yet, in consultation, some feedback called for subsidies and tax concessions to make EVs a more realistic choice. Are these things that you think need to still be on the table for future announcements? 

Tim Wilson: Well, of course, we'll always look at tax arrangements on different policy areas, but nothing's being ruled in or out. Today, we released the Future Fuel Strategy, which is focused on what is it we need to do to build the confidence of Australians and empower them to be part of the solution to reduce Australia's transport emissions. Australia's emissions have gone down 20 per cent since 2005, and transport emissions make up 20 per cent of Australia's total emissions. So it's a critical part of the solution if we want to get to a carbon neutral future by 2050. And it's about actually empowering people to be part of that journey because it's also one of the core sources of households emissions. And of course, critically for businesses, those right relying on freight are where we need investment in heavy vehicle infrastructure and freight infrastructure, particularly using technologies like hydrogen fuel cells, to be able to be part of that journey to. 

Patricia Karvelas: The plan includes a pledge to partner with the private sector to install these 50,000 home charging station. How do you decide where they'll go? 

Tim Wilson: Well, that will go through a proper process to make sure that the allocation is done to ensure that it is empowering consumers. And so those details are being worked through. But what we want to do is make sure that there is that infrastructure because there are huge consequences to seeing particularly electric vehicles go into the grid, whether it's the demand that's going to be required on households and making sure there's enough energy in making sure it isn't going to send communities into having a lack of energy and electricity particularly critical stages of the day. And technology is not just a part of what drives these vehicles, but also how we make sure that their fuel too. 

Patricia Karvelas: As I said, the industry saying that this is a 'fizzer' of an announcement. You say the other proposals that I put to you are not off the table, you're not ruling them in or out. Is this it on electric vehicles or is your message that they will be more? 

Tim Wilson: Well, policy always evolves based on changing circumstances. But you know, as you keep asking me what our policy was only a few years ago, it would have led to the government subsidising the vehicles for the mega-rich. And we said we wouldn't do that. Now we're talking about what we can do to enable and empower average Australians to be part of the solution. So policy will always continue to evolve. But you know, there'll be policies that industry associations always want more taxpayers money being written off to the multinational corporations that they represent to advance their interests. We're focused on Australians what we can do to empower their choices and to be part of the future of Australia's climate solution. 

Patricia Karvelas: Tim Wilson, we're out of time. Thanks for coming on.

Tim Wilson: Thanks, Patricia.