Kay Hull (Riverina, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

I have risen in this House many times to support the trucking industry. It is no secret that I am an advocate for all issues that will benefit truck drivers across Australia, who do such a sensational job in supporting and underpinning our everyday lives. Many of them go unnoticed for that. The Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2008 and the Road Charges Legislation Repeal and Amendment Bill 2008 are very significant for that industry. From the outset, I will follow the lead of the representative industries for the trucking industry in order for us to get the best outcome over time to benefit those sensational truck drivers and their families across Australia.

The Interstate Road Transport Charge Amendment Bill (No.2) 2008 deals with the implementation of the registration charge elements of the 2007 heavy vehicle charges determination. This revises the national charges for heavy vehicles and trailers for application to heavy vehicles registered under the Federal Interstate Registration Scheme. It is my understanding that there is no objection to that bill by the trucking industry at this time. The fact is that there is a need for a consistency of registration. Some people will find that difficult, but I understand that the vast majority of the trucking industry is now paying the new charges. The three separate charging systems are causing some cross-border anomalies. It is probably a sensible thing to do, although I have fought this in the past. Truck registration going through the roof was not something that I wanted to see happen for the owner-drivers of Australia. I recall, when we were first discussing this whilst I was in government in a debate on the National Transport Commission, that I opposed it vigorously because it meant that registration costs would go extraordinarily high for some users, particularly in South Australia. I certainly was not advocating new costs for owner-drivers. However, I can see now that there are anomalies. It is currently cheaper to register a three-axle rigid truck in New South Wales than in the ACT, but it is cheaper to register a B-double in the ACT than in New South Wales.  In itself, that poses some problems.

Could I just talk about the bill in depth. The Rudd government has said it will supplement the determination with a $70 million, four-year heavy vehicle safety and productivity package that will fund the construction of more heavy vehicle rest stops along our highways and on the outskirts of our major cities to assist truck drivers rest, trials of black box technologies that electronically monitor a truck driver’s work hours and vehicle speed and bridge-strengthening projects and upgrades to link existing AusLink freight routes. I quote from an ATA press release:

The Australian Trucking Association (ATA) is calling on federal politicians to deliver 900 extra truck rest areas on major highways by 2019, under the industry’s plan to amend the Government’s new heavy vehicle charges legislation.

The ATA goes on to say:

The legislation would increase the effective fuel tax paid by trucking operators – the road user charge – from 19.633 to 21 cents per litre, and would give the Government the ability to index this rate in the future. The legislation would also introduce new registration charges for the 21,500 trucks with Federal Interstate Registration Scheme (FIRS) number plates.

The chairman has said that the ATA’s plan would be to tie future increases in the road user charge to the construction of truck rest areas on the AusLink national network. I absolutely agree that there is a need to have many truck stops right along every highway in Australia. As the ATA’s press release states:

A recent independent audit found there isn’t a single major highway in Australia that meets the national rest area guidelines. Our estimate is that the AusLink National Network needs an additional 900 rest areas to bring it up to the mark.

The ATA calls for those rest areas to be in urban areas, such as near the intersections of the M7 and the M4 in Sydney, through to gravel parking bays in remote areas. The ATA discusses the issues of heavy trucks and says:

… on average, at least 90 additional heavy vehicle rest areas per year have been constructed on the AusLink National Network since the last road user charge determination was issued …

That is clearly still not enough. I repeat that the ATA has proposed that 900 extra rest areas should be delivered across the AusLink national network, and I guess that is a realistic plan. The most important thing is that the truck owner-drivers and owner-operators see the benefits when their road taxes are increased.

The previous legislation also included an annual adjustment component, which was to be based on a road expenditure formula. The problem with this proposal was that the formula was very expensive for our truckies. The costs associated with road construction and maintenance, such as steel, concrete and asphalt—all of the inputs that go into building roads—have skyrocketed, and we certainly understand that. The automatic adjustment component locked in an annual increase well above the CPI. That is unacceptable and I am pleased that the opposition is steadfast in that belief. The opposition and the shadow minister responsible, Warren Truss, recognised that the pressures that the heavy freight sector was operating under were extreme. Over the last few months, the daily life of the average Australian has got tougher and it has certainly got tougher for owner-drivers and transport industry operators, with rising fuel costs and other costs that must be factored into running a business. These stresses fall particularly hard on those who do the job of getting our essentials to market, helping our lives to operate smoothly.

The ATA have called for quite significant improvements in this whole process. They do not want the government to automatically index the road user charge by an annual adjustment formula. They would like the government to adopt an open and transparent system for periodically setting the road user charge and they would like to see a link between future increases in the road user charge and the construction of an estimated extra 900 truck rest areas on the AusLink national network by 2019.

The industry themselves vigorously oppose indexation and refer to it as a stealth tax on the trucking industry. They strongly oppose the plan to index the road user charge, because it would be based on a weighted percentage change in road construction and maintenance expenditure and it would be a proxy for increases in the size of the heavy vehicle fleet and vehicle kilometres travelled. The industry believe that the formula in the government’s plan would increase the road user charge by more than seven per cent per year without any consultation with the industry or parliamentary scrutiny. That is why they describe this as a stealth tax, and I can certainly understand that. They are calling for an open and transparent system for setting the road user charge, not indexation. In support of the industry and the job that the ATA does on behalf of the industry, I certainly support the amendments moved by the opposition to fix this indexation.

Four national highways run through my electorate of Riverina: the Hume Highway, the Sturt Highway, the Olympic Highway and the Newell Highway. In September last year statistics showed that about 7,000 vehicles and, in particular, 4,500 heavy vehicles travelled over the Sheehan Bridge at Gundagai on a daily basis. As a result of an AusLink project by the previous government, we are now seeing the duplication of that bridge. More than 6,000 heavy vehicles use the Hume Highway around Tarcutta on a daily basis. So there is quite a significant traffic movement across the Riverina electorate and there is a need to ensure that safety is paramount for those drivers, who are doing such a sensational job in distributing goods across Australia. In fact, we have information from the RTA website that shows that most of the general traffic movements on the other three Riverina highways are of significant heavy vehicle value. The Olympic Way had an annual average daily traffic of 3,040 vehicles in just one very small area. I found statistics which showed that the Sturt Highway at Collingullie had an average daily traffic of 2,782 heavy vehicles in 2006, and that figure would no doubt have increased since then.

It is a significant issue for us to ensure that we act in the best interests of the Trucking Association, the owner-drivers and certainly their families right across the nation, who are entitled to know that their husbands or wives—there are women who are driving trucks now, which is sensational to see—or family members going out to work have the best possible chance of returning home to them safely and not being involved or, worse still, killed in a heavy vehicle accident.

In Tarcutta in my electorate is a remembrance wall. It is staggering to see the numbers of drivers who have been killed while delivering goods across Australia in their everyday vocation. When you stop at the Tarcutta memorial you cannot believe it could be possible that so many of those drivers did not make it home safely to their families. Each year there is a memorial service. People come from right across Australia to mourn their loved ones or friends who have lost their lives to enable the Australian economy to keep functioning.

We talk about our economic downturn at the moment and every eye is on the television watching the stock markets; every eye is on the day-to-day performance of finances in the Australian market and the international market. It would be sensational if there were as much concern and consideration and as many eyes focused every day on ensuring that those people who transport every good across this nation were able to do so in the safest possible way and were given the opportunity to return home safely to their families. It would be a wonderful thing if all of those eyes in Australia that are watching those markets now had the same interest for truck drivers particularly.

These two bills are significant for the industry. I welcomed the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, Anthony Albanese, to the Riverina for a visit just recently to inspect the progress of the work on the duplication at Kyeamba Hill. I was most impressed with the minister’s commitment to ensure that the road networks across Australia were going to be the safest and the best that he could possibly manage whilst he was responsible for this portfolio. He was very positive about the work on the Hume Highway. I thank him for that. You learn something about road construction every day, and it was good to accompany the minister. I thank him for including me in his visit to the Riverina and for allowing me to accompany him to this site project. It is very important to me. I have always been a great advocate for road safety in the industry and that will certainly not diminish. I stand here today to urge the minister to implement the ATA’s recommendations in full, thereby increasing the benefits to the trucking industry.

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