After a 269 per cent increase in electric vehicles sold in Australia over the past 12 months, Canberra's newest apprentices are poised to become the most poachable young tradespeople in the country.
Five young men graduated from the country's first Certificate III in Automotive Electric Vehicle Technology at the Canberra Institute of Technology this week and all will return to Tesla service workshops across three states.
But given the fierce market ambitions of rival Chinese EV brands like BYD and MG and the desperate need for trained service technicians, there's a better-than-even chance that these graduates will be offered some serious money to "defect" early.
That's the nature of the game in a superheated growth segment of the national car market where Tesla, the biggest-selling EV brand in the country and in Canberra, seized the initiative two years ago and began sending its apprentice technicians to the national capital and to CIT, which was the first to identify this need and generate a course to suit.
Tesla has already recognised the poaching issue and is paying its technicians above-award wages. This trend is certain to continue as the CIT course expands further and the competition heats up further.
Tyler Dowsey, who works at Tesla's service centre in Richmond, Victoria, and this year came to the ACT for live-in five week-long blocks of training, said it was apparent from just the number of EVs on the road now as to how strong the demand will become for people who can work on them.
"When I started on the tools three years ago, I didn't see an EV on the road at home," he said.
"Now it's every third car that you see."
The four CIT graduates - all third-year technicians who only need one more year of practical assessment in a workshop to be fully qualified - came into Canberra as part of the new course's "Tesla stream".
Another stream will be added next year with first and second-year ACT-based apprentices as other companies with big EV plans hustle to get their combustion engine mechanics trained up on the new technology. BMW is one such company in need after winning the lucrative contract to supply 140 electric vehicles into the Canberra-based Comcar fleet.
One of the fundamental differences - and which is instilled in the technicians very early - is that the 12 volts of a combustion car is replaced by 400 volts.
That makes the new skill a potential life-threatening one if the correct safety protocols are not followed.
Before the new Certificate III in EVs arrived, the basic training was in EV safety.
Now all the technicians are given exhaustive training in what they can touch on the car - and what they can't. And how to isolate the massive battery packs which sit under the floor.
"It's the first thing you are taught; there's a lot of instruction and training on the safety element before you even start any basic vehicle diagnosis," Jacob Hanna, another of the Tesla graduates, said.
EV graduates won't be draining oils, packing bearings and adjusting camshaft belts and that, says Tesla service instructor Gerry Sloan, is what will make the trade far more attractive to women signing on. The company already has a sophisticated introductory EV course which it takes out to schools specifically to entice more female technicians.
"You can't ignore it; for years and years automotive work was seen as a dirty trade," he said.
"But that's not the case any longer. In the future, we're going to see a much more gender diverse automotive workforce."
