By Jason Whittaker The trucking lobby will push for a fuel-based road charging regime as part of a review into tax
The trucking lobby will push for a fuel-based road charging regime as part of a review into tax regulations, advocating a hike in diesel excise balanced with a significant cut in registration fees.
As a plan to introduce a user-pays road tax hits the headlines, SupplyChain Review sister publication ATN has learned trucking groups will line up behind the Australian Trucking Association (ATA) in support of a fuel-based model in opposition to mass/distance charging.
The ATA has developed a policy in-house for consideration by a wholesale review into tax regulations by Treasury Secretary Ken Henry.
It argues road pricing is a tax issue and should be included in the review, separate from the mass/distance charging model given preliminary support by governments.
Transport ministers agreed to explore mass/distance charging – which would put a GPS transponder in every heavy vehicle measuring road use and load carried – with the Council of Australian Governments signing off on a timetable to test and implement the scheme.
But state governments are yet to test the scheme, according to the ATA which argues mass/distance charging is too complex and expensive for transport operators.
ATA spokesperson Bill McKinley has briefed ATN on the policy, which will effectively collect tax charges through a higher diesel excise combined with state-collected registration fees reset to “much lower levels”.
Its document will argue fuel charges more accurately reflect road use than the current split fuel/rego model, and is a simpler reform than a “big, expensive, cumbersome change” in mass/distance charging.
“Our proposal recognises that one of the key problems with mass/distance pricing is it is too complicated,” says McKinley.
“Our proposal is a simple evolution of the existing system based on one of the most important principals of tax reform – it makes them easier to collect.”
Also, he says in-truck sensors and monitoring equipment could come at too high a cost for operators.
Read the full story on the ATN website…