DEFENDING member for Wright Scott Buchholz and independent candidate Innes Larkin have traded barbs over the future of the electric car industry in Australia.
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This comes after the Morrison government launched a series of attacks on Labor's target for electric vehicles to make up 50 per cent of all new cars sold in Australia by 2030.
According to a 2018 Climate Works Australia report, 2284 electric cars were sold in 2017 making up 0.2 per cent of the market.
Mr Buchholz said Labor's policy would be devastating for residents he represents in Wright.
"I am actually really angry that the alternative prime minister can have a plan that will add up to $10,000 to the price of new cars and severely limit the vehicle choices that local residents have in the future," Mr Buchholz said.
Independent candidate Innes Larkin said Coalition MPs had their heads under a pile of sand and were ignoring a global trend towards the industry.
"The following countries all have electric vehicle targets equal to or stronger than proposed by Labor - England, France, Germany, China, India, Norway, Denmark, Israel, Ireland, Sweden and Netherlands...that's approximately three billion people who will be dictating to car manufacturers what sort of cars they want to see manufactured," he said.
"What is not okay is for the Coalition to do nothing to prepare Australia for the inevitable move to electric cars and provide none of the infrastructure that we need to take advantage of the revolution that is coming," he said.
"I am sure some people were concerned that the change from horse and cart was going to wreck our life style, but they got over it too. Just as Scott Buchholz and his team need to."
Mr Buchholz told the Jimboomba Times that Mr Larkin was a green independent reading from Bill Shorten's playbook.
"Condescending comments by the green independent candidate telling people to get over it are dismissive of genuine concerns about a damaging policy that will increase cost of living and the cost of doing business," he said.
"Anyone who really knows our region understands that people in regional areas drive longer distances on a daily basis and current electric vehicles do not meet their needs.
"I'm fine with people in metropolitan areas making a conscious decision to buy an electric car, but I don't accept that the people of Wright should be subsidising that choice by paying up to $10,000 more for their non-electric vehicle of choice."
