Crucial project such as the North-South corridor will be an opportunity missed without flexible thinking
With the dust having settled following the State Budget, the South Australian Freight Council (SAFC) fears the lack of a proper debate on infrastructure funding surrounding tolls.
Both the SAFC and the SA Road Transport Association have sought to progress discussion on such a properly focused funding strategy.
But SAFC CEO Neil Murphy is concerned the State’s perceived need to make up shortfalls in other areas from projected Federal spending is diverting its attention and approach to road-funding alternatives.
“The crisis may actually lay in lost opportunities – what doesn’t get built because of the cuts,” Murphy states.
And at a time when asset recycling is fashionable in on Capital Hill, SA’s past privatisations leave it with little to attract Federal co-funding.
Murphy believes Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s and the State Government’s focus on the North-South corridor as the state’s most important road infrastructure project will remain unfulfilled unless more flexible thinking is brought to bear.
“The Commonwealth Government may offer to fund infrastructure improvements but unless the State has available funds to provide its contribution, be that 20 per cent or 50 per cent, the project cannot proceed.
“How will South Australia pay for the upgrade to the North-South corridor (which the PM has stated he wants completed over the next 10 years) if funds are diverted to schools and hospitals?
“South Australia has limited remaining assets to sell so we will have difficulty accessing the Commonwealth’s asset recycling funding offer of 15 per cent (which I assume would be in addition to the usual 50/50 or 80/20 deals that Governments enter into – otherwise that is also a shift of funding responsibility to the States).
“The issues associated with the State’s finances are well documented and coupled with the looming closure of Holden and recent announcements around companies such as Penrice, we will need to invest in infrastructure that improves productivity and economic development.
“The North-South corridor and projects that can assist development in the mining sector (eg: sealing of Strzelecki Track, facilitating port developments etc) can assist in this regard but we will need money to build them.
“Tolls may need to be discussed and this time in a meaningful way.”