Ontario extends electric car rebate deadline for Tesla buyers

Thestar.com
September 4, 2018
Robert Benzie

Premier Doug Ford is doing a U-turn and giving hundreds of Tesla buyers $14,000 rebates after his Progressive Conservative government lost in court against the California-based electric car company.

Four days after an Ontario Superior Court judge ruled the Tories “unlawfully targeted” the automaker when they announced the phasing out of subsidies on electric vehicles last month, the province has capitulated.

About 600 purchasers of the Telsa Model 3 electric car will now qualify for rebates under a program being phased out by the Ontario government, so long as the vehicles are delivered and registered by Sept. 10.

The change announced Friday, which affects about 600 new Tesla owners, means all buyers of electric cars costing less than $75,000 will qualify for rebates as long as their vehicles are delivered and registered by Sept. 10.

“The court has rendered its decision. The ministry will abide by the court’s decision and I have directed the ministry to expand the wind-down process for the Electric and Hydrogen Vehicle Incentive Program,” Transportation Minister John Yakabuski said in a statement.

“Incentives will be provided as long as the following conditions are met: eligible vehicles were delivered, registered, and plated on or before July 11 or ... were on dealer lots in Ontario -- or on order by dealers or by customers directly from manufacturers on or before July 11, and delivered to customers, registered and plated on or before Sept. 10,” he said.

Toronto elementary school teacher Kurtis Evans, who is expecting to take delivery of his Model 3 within days, was pleased by the move.

“I am extremely relieved. I was very nervous that the government was going to pull a fast one. Technically they could have ended the program literally today,” he said.

Evans, who is replacing his 2014 Honda Civic, said the $14,000 subsidy was make-or-break on his purchase of the $74,000 car.

On Monday, Justice Frederick Myers delivered a searing 17-page ruling that said the government singled out Tesla and treated the company differently from other car companies that sell electric vehicles.

When the PC government announced the payouts would be phased out, it gave purchasers who bought their electric cars through independently owned dealerships until Sept. 10 to take delivery.

But Myers said that unfairly “singled … out” Tesla, which sells its vehicles directly to consumers.

“The decision to exclude Tesla by limiting the transition program to only franchised dealerships is arbitrary and …, in my view, it is egregious …,” wrote the judge, who ordered Queen’s Park to pay $125,000 for Tesla’s legal costs.

“If the government wants to transition out of the electric car subsidy program, the minister must exercise his operational discretion in a lawful manner. He has yet to do so. I, therefore, quash and set aside the minister’s unlawful exercises of discretion to implement the transition program announced July 11.”

Complicating matters, the Tories’ case was undermined by Ford’s own admission that Tesla had effectively been targeted.

“The common folks here in Hamilton have a big problem giving rebates of up to $16,000 with our hard-earned money to millionaires buying $80,000, $100,000 cars. We have an issue with that and we want to protect the little person,” the premier said earlier this month.

“Tesla can do what they want, but maybe they should think of coming here and opening up a manufacturing facility like the big five are,” he said in remarks quoted by Myers in his ruling.

“I have a message for Tesla: stop trying to get rebates for your millionaire buddies and putting it on the backs of the hardworking people of ... Ontario.”

In using Ford’s words against him, Myers noted the rebates were $14,000 not $16,000 and were available only on the Tesla Model 3, not its more expensive Model S and Model X.

Nor was a Tesla even the most expensive car to be eligible for a subsidy. That honour fell to the BMW X5.

In San Francisco, a Tesla spokesperson said the firm is “happy the ministry did the right thing by delivering on its promise to ensure all affected EV owners receive their incentives during the wind-down period.

“For customers who cancelled their orders as a result of the government's initial decision and now wish to renew, we hope the government will work with us to achieve a fair resolution,” the spokesperson said.

Eliminating the electric vehicle rebates is a result of the new government withdrawing Ontario from the cap-and-trade alliance with Quebec and California.

That accord raised $1.9 billion annually for the province with the proceeds going toward environmental initiatives.

But Ford, who was elected June 7, dismissed it as a “carbon tax” and is instead lowering provincial gasoline levies with hopes of cutting prices by 10 cents per litre.