News

Roads | June 22, 2017

Western Victorian roads a crack up

The Nationals Member for Lowan, Emma Kealy MP is calling for an immediate injection in roads funding after a report today showed cuts to Victoria’s road maintenance budget is wreaking havoc across Western Victoria.

The report, tabled by the state’s Auditor General in the Victorian Parliament today, revealed approximately 27 per cent of the road network in Western Victoria is cracking and maintenance is only being carried out when it becomes critical.

Ms Kealy said the report, tabled in the Victorian Parliament today, proved that if you fix country roads you save country lives.

In the Western region of Victoria, 37 per cent of the road network is in either poor or very poor condition.

Twenty seven per cent of the roads are cracking, 18 per cent are rough and a further three per cent are rutting.

“The condition of the road network across Western Victoria is going backwards because the Andrews Government is not investing enough funding in road maintenance,” Ms Kealy said.

“These figures won’t come as any surprise to local motorists. The Auditor General has confirmed what we as rural residents have been saying for the past two years.

“VicRoads is putting temporary speed limits on roads when they fall into disrepair because Labor hasn’t provided the money to actually fix them.”

The Auditor-General found that the deterioration of the road network presents a ‘growing risk to public safety’ and ‘increases road user costs’.

Ms Kealy said while the report only examined arterial roads, the Andrews Government’s savage cuts to roads maintenance had also impacted on local roads.

“Our communities are bearing the brunt of the Melbourne Labor Government’s cuts to roads funding,” Ms Kealy said.

“Daniel Andrews axed the former government’s Country Roads and Bridges program which gave each shire in our electorate an extra $1 million every year to help maintain the local road network”, she said.

Ms Kealy is urging motorists across the Lowan electorate to join her ongoing call to Daniel Andrews to reinstate this funding by signing her petition at emmakealy.com/road_hazards.