Renault’s glorious 5 hatchback EV blocked for Australia, and it’s all our kids’ fault

Drive most places in Europe and roads are overrun with a bounty of Renault 5 retro French electric hatchbacks.

Buyers love them, while Euro motoring journos regularly praise R5 E-Techs as the best electric small EVs available.

This week, while Renault Australia introduces another SUV EV (the mid-size Scenic, to sit above its Megane E-Tech), it was announced the much wished-for R5 is no closer for our market.

So, if you’ll pardon my French: Merde.

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We can blame kids for it. In a roundabout way.

Australia’s top tether child seat rules are preventing the R5 heading down under, with the fix to make it compliant estimated at 3 million Euros, or close to $5 million of our dollars.

Merde. Again.

The Ateco Group import and distribute Renaults here, and Renault Australia’s GM Glen Sealey told journalists the R5 was not being ruled out for our market, but a significant jump in EV sales would likely be needed to justify the investment in bringing it here.

Almost as tragically, it appears the similar (and retro lovely) Renault 4 EV SUV and incoming Twingo city EV also suffer the same top tether dramas, making none ADR compliant as they stand.

This retro group of Renaults lack a top tether mount for a child seat in the middle-rear seat, as demanded by Australian Design Rule 34.

It’s hard to believe such a relatively small matter scuppers the R5’s sale here, and that a homologation fix is so costly to implement. But that’s the reality, we’ve been told.

“The compliance cost of just the rear bench is about three million euro,” said Sealey, “so that’s testing, getting your rear bench right, making sure it takes double the force on that single tether point.”

It transpires the R5 was initially developed as a four-seater, hence no top tether was considered. When Renault later altered the design to a three-seat rear bench (due to greater subsidies under European tax changes), the ADR 34-compliant top tether mount didn’t make the grade.

Of note, in recent years both the Tesla Model 3 and Deepal E07 initially went on sale in Australia without being ADR 34 compliant. Both needed sales pauses to rectify the issue.

Ironically, the bonkers Renault R5 Turbo 3E – based on the standard R5 – was long ago confirmed for Australia in very small numbers. Expected to cost over $300,000, this hyper hatch EV bypasses ADR 34 because it has no rear seats at all.

Smart workaround, but that’s no help to Aussies lacking bottomless bank accounts.

Sealey suggested Renault Australia’s now bolstered EV range – Megane, Scenic and Kangoo E-Techs – meant the brand was “well covered” in a country where “electrification today is sort of sub-10 per cent in the marketplace,” he said.

In a blow to those who’s snap up an R5 if it landed here at the right price – it’s from approximately $44,000 when converted from RHD’s UK sum – Sealey said the funky hatch would be far easier to justify bringing in with the expensive modifications if Australia’s EV market share were around 40 per cent.

And that won’t be happening in any sort of hurry, no matter how high oil prices climb due to the current crisis in the Middle East.

Ergo, we’ll continue to miss out on one of the most compelling and successful EVs yet produced, and Renault Australia the chance to glow-up its showrooms with Europe’s so-hot-right-now award-winner.

Merde.