Quebec Cutting Some Subsidies for Buying Electric Vehicles?

Those who want to buy an electric vehicle in Quebec may lose out on part of the previously available money.

In Tuesday’s budget, subsidies for new fully electric car purchases would be reduced from $8,000 to $7,000, and for used fully electric automobiles, from $4,000 to $3,500.

The reductions come as the CAQ government announced that by 2030, it wants 1.5 million additional electric vehicles on the road.

“It’s unbelievable,” said Robert Poeti, President of the Quebec Corporation of Automobile Dealers.

The government claims that the subsidies are being adjusted to reflect the shrinking price gap between electric and gas vehicles. Still, auto dealers argue that this is not the case and that the changes will reduce demand for electric vehicles.

“They had to wait a year for the automobile and lose $1,000 to $3,000 for a hybrid, so they decided to buy another car that runs on gasoline,” Poeti explained.

Ruba Ghazal, a finance critic for Quebec Solidaire, noted that the cuts would not assist in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

“The government decided to lower it, but it didn’t replace it with other public transportation investments, which is bad,” Ghazal said.

According to some environmental groups, reducing rebates is unavoidable, but only until more electric cars are on the road.

According to Equiterre political expert Andreanne Brazeau, the existing refunds favor people with higher earnings.

“It would be better to have a measure more targeted to people with lower incomes, so they could also participate in the ecological transition,” Brazeau said.

“Its true subsidies will be tapered off sometimes,” she said, “but we believe it is too soon.” “However, the issue is not so much the quantity of assistance regarding how it is dispersed.”

Equiterre advises capping subsidies at specific income levels and increasing incentives for lower-income households to democratize the uptake of electric vehicles.