Dear Editor
I am not opposed to electric cars and can see how they would suit our circumstances, but in announcing the new policy around Government departments needing to have electric cars as part of the climate emergency, I don’t think any thought has been given to the logistics of implementing this.
Let’s take for example Worksafe. They operate out of a privately owned building in Wellington which may or may not have car parking. If it has car parking, then who pays for the installation of the chargers and will the landlord agree to the changes to his building as every park that has a Worksafe vehicle would need to have a charger. If they use a private car parking building and lease the spaces where do the chargers go and again who pays?
Another thing to consider is if the users of these cars take them home at night (As some do due to being on call) where do they charge them? The owner will have a personal car and being Wellington a lot of people need to park on the road. If the user charges their car at home who pays for the charging? They will also then need to install (at taxpayer cost) a special charging station.
I can also see instances where these workers cannot continue with their planned day of work due to running out of charge and will either need to head back to the office or spend time finding an available charging station and then wait while it charges.
This sounds like another Kiwibuild in the making as buying the cars is the easy bit but the infrastructure for charging will be the stumbling block
Regards
Nigel
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