Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Boothby for her question. As a South Australian, she knows and is aware of the road funding anomaly that has meant that South Australian councils, in particular, have not gotten their fair share of roads funding through the financial assistance grants. For 20 years, there has been a temporary top-up in budgets, and each and every time they've had to come to the Commonwealth to ask for more money. This government is now fixing that permanently, thanks to the advocacy of the member for Boothby. Not only have we delivered an ongoing road funding base for South Australian councils—we've also increased it through indexation. Now councils in South Australia have funding certainty to deliver safer roads and freight routes that their communities need.

The budget has, of course, also delivered for councils right the way across the country. We're delivering $3.6 billion in untied funding to local governments through the financial assistance grants, bringing forward $2.9 billion this financial year to help councils with the cost pressures caused by the ongoing Middle East conflict. Through our $2 billion Local Infrastructure Fund in Minister O'Neil's portfolio, which is an extension of the existing Housing Support Program, we're supporting councils to unlock much-needed housing development through infrastructure. This fund will be open to local government and state utility companies to build that critical last-mile infrastructure—like water, power and sewerage—needed to support new housing development, building on our previous $1.5 billion program that they copied. Half a billion dollars over the next 10 years will also fund new shared paths, cycleways and other pieces of infrastructure that make it safer and easier for people to walk and cycle. Delivered through the Active Transport Fund, that's $50 million each and every single year, primarily going to local councils.

We're delivering an additional $750 million for the Growing Regions and Thriving Suburbs programs: more funding for our local councils and not-for-profits to build the spaces our communities rely on. It's building on the two rounds of Growing Regions and the one round of Thriving Suburbs that we previously had that are building 180 parks, town centres, theatres and sporting facilities right the way across the country—$1.7 billion worth of them overall. And we're continuing our increased investment in local governments, Roads to Recovery, committing $4.4 billion nationally over the current five-year funding period. That's $1.8 billion more going to every local council than over the previous five years. We are, of course, delivering increased funding for our Black Spot Program and also the Safer Local Roads and Infrastructure Program.

And let me assure the House that not a single one of those programs that I have announced today and that are in our budget look at the colour of any of the electorates. Unlike what those opposite did with their regional rorts programs, we're funding every single local council fairly. (Time expired)

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