Why Renault 5 is not sold in Australia

Multi-million dollar homologation issues are preventing the award-winning Renault 5 E-Tech hatchback from entering Australian showrooms.

Immensely popular in Europe, where it also claimed the 2025 car of the year crown, the compact Renault 5 E-Tech hatchback is not eligible for Australian sale because it lacks a child seat top tether mount in the middle seat of the second row, as uniquely required by Australian Design Rule 34.

Renault Australia general manager Glen Sealey told media at this week’s launch of the Scenic E-tech electric SUV a fix for the issue will cost the company a whopping €3 million – approximately $A4.9 million.

The 5 is not the first car to fall foul of ADR 34. The Tesla Model 3 and the Deepal E07 have both had sales paused because of it.

“I can tell you that 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.”

The deletion of an airbag switch on the front passenger seat is another issue that plays to production complexity rather than added cost.

The lack of progress on the R5 for Australia also impacts its fellow-retro SUV spin-off, the Renault 4 and the tiny Twingo EV.

“We're looking at R4, we're looking at R5 and you've got Twingo in there, you've got a whole raft of electric cars from Renault coming through,” said Sealey.

For now, Renault Australia’s permanent EV line-up will be capped at three, with the Scenic joining the Megane E-tech hatch and the Kangoo E-Tech compact van.

The hyper hot Renault 5 Turbo 3E is coming to Australia but in strictly limited numbers and expected to be priced north of $300,000.

Sealey said the brand is “well covered” in terms of EVs but admitted if demand for zero-emissions vehicles significantly jumped, the R5 would be a “much easier proposition”.

The homologation issue for the R5 traces back to the earliest days of its development, according to Sealey, when it was planned to be a four-seater, meaning a centre top tether wasn’t part of the development program.

But Renault later backflipped and made developed the R5 as a five-seater because of European tax changes.

“They determined there were far more subsidies if you had three seats in the rear bench. And that changed it. That doesn’t mean it’s ruled out, it just means it’s harder to get.”

Inspired by the original 1972-1996 Renault 5 petrol/diesel hatchback, the new-gen employs a 70kW, 90kW or 110kW e-motor driving the front wheels backed up by a 40kWh or 52kWh NMC battery pack and an 800V version of the Renault-Nissan alliance CMF-EV architecture.

In the right-hand drive UK market, pricing starts at £21,495 (around $A40,500).

With city cars like the BYD Atto 1 now priced as low as $25,000 and Chinese brands consistently driving EV prices lower, Sealey was clear the compliance cost of bringing the Renault 5 to Australia added to its business case challenge.

“It's got to work for the OEM in a very competitive market,” said Sealey.

“It's got to work for a dealer network in terms of distribution. And within all of that ticked off, it's got to work for the customer. So, bringing in a car with a high compliance cost and a very high price point is not necessarily going to work in a market that's fairly well swamped today.”

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