'Either' Chris - Hipkins or Luxon - begged to boost electric vehicle uptake

Rewiring Aotearoa and Drive Electric have launched a "Hail Mary" ad campaign urging "either Chris" to back an electric vehicle leasing scheme - but neither National nor Labour has come on board.Under the 'EV Salary Boost' proposal, employees would lease a new or used EV for three to five years, with payments deducted from their before-tax pay.Rewiring Aotearoa chief executive Mike Casey put the cost to taxpayers at $5000 a car, but said participating workers would save an average $36 a week compared with a standard car loan.Drive Electric board chair Kirsten Corson said the leasing scheme would also increase the supply of second-hand EVs, extending the benefits to motorists unable to afford a new car.Both groups had previously pitched the scheme to all parties in Parliament, but new adverts targeted National leader Christopher Luxon and Labour leader Chris Hipkins directly."Let's face it. Your poll numbers aren't looking great and you're going to need to pull out all the stops," the advert said."So where's your electric vehicle policy?"The ad pitches the idea at "either" Chris.Screenshot / suppliedAsked for a response, National pointed to its target of 10,000 public EV charging points by 2030 and funding for cleaner heavy vehicles."National supports New Zealanders having access to a competitive and affordable range of vehicles, including efficient and electric vehicles," a party spokesperson said.Labour cited its manifesto commitments to strengthen clean car emissions standards and expand the EV charging network.Neither party directly addressed whether it would support the leasing proposal.Casey accused politicians of retreating from EV incentives after the backlash against the previous Labour government's clean car discount, dubbed the "ute tax" by its opponents.He acknowledged the clean car discount had subsidised purchases for wealthy people, but he said the coalition had scrapped it without a replacement, while also introducing road user charges for EVs."At New York Climate Week... the one thing that people know New Zealanders for is having good electric vehicle adoption - and then having it fall off a cliff."Supplied / StuffDuring the leaders' debates, Luxon said the fuel crisis was already driving more motorists towards electric vehicles.But Casey said the upfront cost of a new EV was still beyond many people's reach."Stop with the 'oh, we don't pick winners bull****," Casey said. "Stop with the 'oh, we're fuel-agnostic' bull****."Politicians that are just relying on market forces are not being strategic or courageous."Casey said hardworking New Zealanders who drove long distances, like rural health staff, teachers and nurses, faced large fuel bills simply to do their jobs.And he said the more businesses that could electrify, the more it would help tackle inflation."One of the biggest problems that we're seeing, for example, is tradies all having to put their prices up on everything because of the price of diesel."