Labor cracks as Coalition revs up $10 billion in road funding

The Coalition has promised $10 billion towards road maintenance, as cracks appear in the Labor Government’s performance.

Undermined: Labor’s regional road resurfacing program has been cut back by 20 per cent year-on-year. Picture Yuri Kouzmin

Major cracks are appearing in the Victorian Government’s roads maintenance program as the Coalition revs up road funding as a major election issue, promising $10 billion over 10 years to revive the network.

Department of Transport annual reports show the government cut road resurfacing and rehabilitation work by 20 per cent during 2021-22, despite Labor Roads Minister Ben Carroll declaring yet another road maintenance blitz.

The DoT reports state that “we resurfaced and rehabilitated around 14,000,000 m2 of road pavements in regional Victoria” in 2020-21, but that number fell to “around 11,400,000 m2” in 2021-22.

DoT’s reports also show that despite ongoing wet conditions, it cut back cleaning out culverts and roadside drainage pits, from 7000 in 2020-21 to 4000 in 2021-22, which contractors warn has led to water building up and undermining adjoining road foundations.

Rather than resurfacing and rehabilitating the regional transport network, it appears VicRoads and Regional Roads Victoria crews have opted to fill more potholes instead.

The DoT’s annual reports showed road crews filled 260,000 potholes in the 12 months to June 30, up 50,000 on the previous financial year.

Victorian Nationals leader Peter Walsh said the jump in potholes reflected just how bad regional roads had become and highlighted the need for a major injection of, which he said the Coalition would deliver if it won the November 26 election.

Mr Walsh said the Coalition would put the bulk of the $1 billion a year into regional road maintenance.

However while the scheme would deliver $10 billion over the decade, the Coalition said funding would likely start at less than $1 billion in the first year or two as it reviewed the condition of the state’s road network, before then lifting its investment.

The Nationals have already identified some of Victoria’s worst roads, which Mr Walsh said would be prioritised for maintenance if the Coalition won office.

They include the Great Alpine Road, Princes Highway at various locations, Melbourne-Lancefield, Traralgon-Maffra, Paynesville, Woolsthorpe-Heywood and Heathcote-Nagambie roads.

Labor’s various roads ministers have announced road maintenance blitzes almost every spring since being elected, with Mr Carroll announcing another last month in which the government would spend $780 million to “rebuild, repair and resurface more than 1500km of roads across the regions”. Yet Treasurer Tim Pallas’s budget papers show DoT’s road asset management funding was cut from $823 million in 2020-21 to $605 million in 2021-22 and most recently to $592.7 million for this financial year.

Despite this Mr Carroll’s office said “over the past four years we have averaged $813 million per year on road maintenance compared to an average of $493 million per year when the Coalition were last in office.”

The Minister’s spokesman said since 2014 the government had rebuilt or resurfaced more than 10,000km of regional roads to ensure quality and safety.

“We are delivering another significant package of works as part of our upcoming maintenance blitz, with an investment of $780 million toward maintaining and renewing Victoria’s arterial road network this financial year,” his spokesman said.

But opposition roads spokesman Danny O’Brien said the government talked a lot about its pre-election funding blitzes, “but the reality is they’ve cut more than $200 million from the roads maintenance budget in the past two years”.

Mr O’Brien said the cut back in cleaning out and maintaining roadside culverts and pits made no sense in the midst of Victoria’s second wet season.

“Regional Victorians are calling all the time about the lack of maintenance of drains and culverts, which inevitably leads to pavement failure,” he said.

Mr O’Brien said a Coalition Government would also re-establish the Joint Investigatory Parliamentary Road Safety Committee if elected and fix roads, rather than cutting speed limits when they deteriorated.