Industry buying fed last-minute interest in subsidy.

THAT almost a fifth of Government subsidies claimed for electric vehicles in December, the final month of the Clean Car Discount, were paid to car yards rather than individual buyers confirms industry conjecture expressed last month.

The electrified vehicle upsurge rounded out with a strong December, the last month for incentives, when low emissions types claimed 72.5 percent of the 9768 registrations.

On January 10, Aimee Wiley, the president of the Motor Industry Association - the organisation that acts for new vehicle distributors - told MotoringNZ she believed the December data required some circumspection.

Her thought then was the while increased EV sales for all of 2023 were driven by genuine demand, the December-specific result might also be fuelled by distributors and dealers pre-registering, and collecting the rebate, with intent of creating a useful used stock.

Dealers who did this have had to sign a statutory declaration saying they would use the vehicle themselves in that initial period as a company vehicle, demonstration vehicle or courtesy vehicle.

“We're still waiting on that data, but I know there's been a lot of demos put on,” Wiley said then about an entirely legitimate practice.

That has been supported by information supplied by Waka Kotahi / New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) and reported on today by Radio New Zealand.

The agency says more than 10,000 subsidies were paid out on vehicles registered in December, the final month of the rebate scheme.

Some 1906 of those rebates - almost a fifth of the total claimed - were paid to car dealers for company cars. That compared with 8488 payments to individual purchasers.

RNZ has reported a shopper saying he dealt with a dealer who said he had claimed the subsidy in December, and offered the vehicle to him at a discount just over a month later, which if true would seem to be against the rules.

RNZ said it spoke to the man, who said the dealer said his car yard had claimed the rebate in late December and promised to pass it on to him a little over a month later. The matter appears set to become a police complaint.

Registrations of new EVs plunged last month, to their lowest level in three years and February is not expected to be much rosier.