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Speaker 1: Murray Old's Australia correspondent with US now hemus afternoon. Heather

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Speaker 1: right up for the second time this year.

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Speaker 2: That's right, second time in two months, and maybe another

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Speaker 2: one well almost certainly another one in May. And what

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Speaker 2: that would do would be to take it back to

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Speaker 2: where it was at start of the cutting cycle, back

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Speaker 2: in twenty twenty five, back to four point three five percent.

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Speaker 2: It was three point whatever it was before they went

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Speaker 2: into the meeting, three point eight. Interesting. I'm just looking

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Speaker 2: at the statement from the Central Bank here, the Reserve

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Speaker 2: Board Bank, the ninth person board voted five to four

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Speaker 2: to increase the cash rate. Four members said no, we're

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Speaker 2: going to leave it alone. So that's interesting that that

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Speaker 2: division is there. But the board has said here, look,

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Speaker 2: inflation's picking up. In fact, if this Middle Eastern crisis

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Speaker 2: keeps going. In terms of fuel prices, fuel feeds into

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Speaker 2: everything diesel and petrol. Australia lives on diesel. That's ninety

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Speaker 2: six percent of Australia's fuel is refined in Asia, in

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Speaker 2: Korea mainly and in Singapore. Four percent is refined here

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Speaker 2: in Australia. The two measly little refineries that Australia still

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Speaker 2: has left, so very much depending on the rest of

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Speaker 2: the world. And if the straits of Hormos are still closed,

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Speaker 2: that means there be very little supplies coming in here.

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Speaker 2: The government hasn't ruled out rationing either, which is interesting.

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Speaker 2: That was the Defense Minister Richard Miles this morning. The

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Speaker 2: government has released some from the emergency stockpile. But the

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Speaker 2: start and finish of all of this is that there's

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Speaker 2: inflationary pressures that are building in the Australian economy right

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Speaker 2: ahead of the budget coming down in May, and the

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Speaker 2: Reserve Bankers voted five to four to be on the

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Speaker 2: cautious side. They can always wind it back, I guess.

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Speaker 2: But if they don't do it now and they meet

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Speaker 2: again in May and this war is continuing in Iran,

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Speaker 2: well do they then go with half a percentage point

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Speaker 2: instead of a quarter, which would you know, it would

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Speaker 2: be a hell of a shock to the Australian economy.

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Speaker 2: So many moving parts here. That the unemployment rate currently

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Speaker 2: at a very historically low level of four point one percent,

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Speaker 2: well it's going to have to go up to take

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Speaker 2: some of the heat out of the economy as well.

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Speaker 2: More people out of work. A lot of those people

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Speaker 2: have got mortgages. It's a conundrum. That's one that's well

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Speaker 2: above my pay grape.

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Speaker 1: So do you think the failure of the government to

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Speaker 1: rule out the fuel rationing, does that sound to you

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Speaker 1: like they want to keep that open as a realistic option.

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Speaker 2: It's an option, isn't it. Yeah? I mean, I did hear.

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Speaker 2: Miles was on the ABC on ABC television this morning

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Speaker 2: and I watched him. I watched the interview and I

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Speaker 2: heard what he said. It did ring like alarm bells

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Speaker 2: in the back of my head, a bit like the

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Speaker 2: Reserve Bank perhaps moving now to avoid the possibility of

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Speaker 2: half a point rise in May, Miles, maybe throwing it

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Speaker 2: out there because don't forget. I mean, I'm sure I

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Speaker 2: mentioned this to you last week. There was one service

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Speaker 2: station up in northern New South Wales and Armadale, I

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Speaker 2: think from memory, that's about six hours north of Sydney,

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Speaker 2: that was selling unleaded fuel three dollars forty. Now, the

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Speaker 2: average pump price here in Sydney did this afternoon's around

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Speaker 2: the two dollars forty mark. So somebody's making money up north.

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Speaker 2: And the Australian consumer watchdog, the Consumer and Competition Commission,

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Speaker 2: They hauled in the big fuel supplies this morning for

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Speaker 2: talks I think in Canberra, basically saying well you've got

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Speaker 2: to justify these prices. People. PP was in their Ampole

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Speaker 2: Chevron ex On Mobile seven to eleven, as well as

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Speaker 2: a huge petrol player over here. All these different companies

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Speaker 2: were hauled in and asked to justify their prices. We

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Speaker 2: haven't yet seen the outcome of that.

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Speaker 1: Was I suppose everybody's buying evs in fact. In fact

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Speaker 1: us talking to the guys from Byd in New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: They said there was some ridiculous number like about eight

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Speaker 1: hundred byds that got sold in Australia on Saturday alone.

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Speaker 2: I wouldn't be surprised, is that A Well, that's a

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Speaker 2: new stat to me. I'm grateful to you because I'm

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Speaker 2: very interested in this. They've got some good contacts with

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Speaker 2: the Electric Vehicle Council of Australia and not surprisingly they

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Speaker 2: were pumping up the tires of EV sales this morning.

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Speaker 2: There were ninety thousand new vehicles sold in Australia in February.

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Speaker 2: Electric vehicles are record twelve percent of those sales plug

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Speaker 2: in hybrids right, the plug in electric hybrids up by

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Speaker 2: twenty percent. Now in twenty twenty five, nearly forty percent

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Speaker 2: of bought. There were one point two four million new

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Speaker 2: cars sold last year in Australia. One hundred and sixty

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Speaker 2: thousand of those were electric vehicles. And they gave me

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Speaker 2: some stats this morning, Heather. If you're driving a petrol

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Speaker 2: powered car one hundred kilometers an hour with fuel two

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Speaker 2: dollars per liter, it's going to cost you twenty two

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Speaker 2: dollars when fuel goes to three dollars a liter. To

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Speaker 2: Heaven help us, that same hundred case is going to

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Speaker 2: cost you in your petrol car thirty three dollars thirty

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Speaker 2: have a listen to evs. They can be charged to capacity.

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Speaker 2: The evening peak six o'clock is there's the evening peak

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Speaker 2: charging EV's in Australia. You can charge the car to

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Speaker 2: capacity for five dollars ninety. To do those one hundred

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Speaker 2: k's at noon, it's going to cost you a dollar twenty.

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Speaker 2: So you do the sums a dollar twenty compared to

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Speaker 2: what thirty three dollars. I know why they're buying evs

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Speaker 2: And the other big point about all of this there

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Speaker 2: are so many different models now byds. That's just one

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Speaker 2: of them. You go, cherries. You got all sorts of

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Speaker 2: different Chinese vehicles coming in and they are like rolls

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Speaker 2: royces that can fly to the bloody moon. Just about

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Speaker 2: all the bells whistles I've got, it's extraordinary. Love it.

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Speaker 1: Hey, thanks Mars, you look after yourself and enjoy your

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Speaker 1: new ev Murray Olds, Australia correspondent. For more from Hither Duplessy,

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Speaker 1: Allen Drive, listen live to news talks it'd be from

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