I went for a walk around the Royal Botanical Gardens in Melbourne recently and a friend’s child tagged along with an e-scooter, which ran out of power halfway along our perambulation. He looked at it as if it was broken and asked, “What do I do now?” I replied, “You just push it like we used to do in the old days.”

Photo courtesy of Unsplash/ GoodNotes 5

In some ways this kid had a point. The e-scooter was so heavy with its battery that it didn’t really work that well when the ‘e’ had run out – the same way that if your Tesla ran out of battery, it wouldn’t be a car anymore, just a lump of metal and an awkward reminder of a loony right-wing multi-billionaire.

Look at what happened to Spain and Portugal recently – plunged into darkness as the electricity grid was affected by some freak atmospheric blackout. No one could pay for anything with their credit cards, and no one had any cash. Even if they did have cash, the supermarket till wouldn’t work to accept their money. No Internet and no way to ring someone.