The numbers will eventually tell the story, but I assume the car yards were a bit quieter over the weekend now that the second part of the mad feebate scheme kicked in as of April 1st.

Yes, along with the downpour of free borrowed money for everyone paid by the government, the cost of a regular petrol car went up. It's another one of those ideas that you thought was med when it was first announced, got a bit of pushback when it looked like it might be reality, and now that it's arrived, I guess we will put up with it, along with the other mad stuff we have to put up with.

By the way, you'll notice on Friday Auckland Transport were going to go ahead with their removal of hundreds of kilometres of parking, so all that consultation was the usual crap. They do it to fob the suckers off before they bowl ahead with the agenda anyway.

Discounts on hybrids and full EVs came in a while back because the second part, the petrol car charge, got delayed because the car industry got a shock when the legislation arrived and a whole bunch of stuff was in there they weren't expecting. So, April 1st it was.

The theory is the fees from the petrol sales will pay for the EVs sales. But that’s all it is, a theory. Given it was Julie-Anne Genter's theory, who the hell knows how it will pan out.

What we do know is if the money from petrol isn't enough, they will close the scheme. Numbers so far show a bump in EVs sales, but that will be people who were in the market anyway, and were simply looking for a subsidy.

The test is going to be whether petrol falls as EV rises or, as I suspect, people will simply hold their cars longer, therefore sales will fall, the money won't be raised, and the only loser will be the car industry who don’t do as much business.

Then we have the fundamental unfairness for the farmer and country dweller who use vehicles like Utes but have no choice given EV Utes barely exist, far less are readily for sale.

It's the sort of ideology you get from governments with little imagination. EVs can't stand on their own, so they are artificially given a boost.

Don’t get me started on the environmental issues around EVs. None of that appears to have been even remotely taken into account.

So, the test has begun, do you not buy a Ford Ranger, New Zealand's top selling car, because it's more expensive? And do you buy a Hyundai Ionic because it's cheaper? Was Genter onto it? Or is this just smoke and mirrors?

Let's give it a year. As always, the numbers won't lie.