Wednesday 2 October 2024
The Allan Labor Government has dumped Regional Roads Victoria in another glaring example of its lack of care for regional roads.
Regional Roads Victoria was announced with much fanfare by the then Roads Minister in 2018 with a claim that “regional Victorians will get the attention they deserve”.
That was quickly revealed to be political spin, as our roads deteriorated under budget cuts, and now Regional Roads Victoria has vanished.
Regional Roads Victoria’s website has been removed and its Facebook page untouched since last year. In its place, a new “Transport Victoria” website was launched last month to promote the government’s road and active transport activities.
But that is not the end of the pain as regional Victorians continue to miss out.
It has emerged the Allan Labor Government has been skimming off Federal funds meant to fix black spots across the state.
A Ministerial brief has confirmed the government had skimmed off 8.5 per cent of a Federal Black Spots Funding Program that was meant to improve safety on regional roads.
It comes as a government survey found last year that 91 per cent of roads were in a “poor” or “very poor” state.
Shadow Minister for Roads and Road Safety, Danny O’Brien, said the government had been found out for its political spin.
“Regional Roads Victoria was only ever a vessel for government propaganda to make it seem like Labor cared about regional roads,” Mr O’Brien said.
“The reality is otherwise. This is a government that has overseen $41 billion in blowouts on mega-projects in the city but has let our regional road network deteriorate to an appalling state.
“The roads maintenance budget is 16 per cent less than it was in 2020 and the amount of resurfacing works this year will drop by two-thirds, condemning our roads to a worse state in the future.”
Mr O’Brien highlighted the Ministerial brief that revealed the 8.5 per cent black spot cash grab by the government under the guise of “project and program management and departmental on-costs”.
“The brief reveals $1.57 million out of a total program of $18.4 million from the Federal Government was being taken by the state,” Mr O’Brien said.
“This was money meant to improve road safety across the state and instead nearly a tenth of it was kept by the Labor Government to cover costs of its bureaucrats.
“Labor can’t manage money and our roads and the safety of drivers is being compromised as a result.”