Regional Australian roads have become a “dangerous disgrace”, according to a new report that warns they will get worse due to paltry funding that favours cities and forces poorer regional councils to waste repair money erecting signs in tribute to government grants.
In a new report, the Grattan Institute has found that roads across the country have become riddled with potholes and other hazards because inadequate federal and state government funding has left councils under-resourced and without sufficient knowledge or data to maintain the roads they are responsible for.
Councils need an additional $1bn next year – an extra 25% of what they currently spend – just to keep already crumbling surfaces in their current condition and prevent further deterioration, the Grattan report estimated.
The report calls on the federal government to inject the extra $1bn via $600m in financial assistance grants and $400m in “roads to recovery” funds, and for the programs to be indexed annually to keep up with inflation and population growth.
“You don’t need to drive too far on a rural road in Australia to encounter a pothole, soft edge, or other hazard. Our local roads, especially in the bush, are a dangerous disgrace,” the Grattan report said.
It notes $1bn is just 10% of what the commonwealth spends on road funding each year and provides taxpayers with “better bang for their buck” than spending on megaprojects in major cities.
“Many councils do not have a realistic way of raising this revenue themselves. And while budgets are tight, delay is a false economy: when a road deteriorates too far, it ends up costing much more to restore,” the authors Marion Terrill, Natasha Bradshaw and Dominic Jones wrote.
Conditions on councils ‘can be over the top’
Onerous conditions placed on councils applying for road maintenance and improvement grants are now commonplace, the report found, following “a gradual erosion of untied funding”, which “has been terrible for local roads, especially in rural areas”.
The report said some grant funding conditions such as requiring money be spent properly were reasonable, but other rules wasted time and money.
“Obligations on recipients to erect a sign acknowledging the funding source – rules which not only specify the size of the sign and prominence of the Australian government crest, but also require the grant recipient to submit final proofs of the sign design for approval before production … can be over the top,” the report said.
“They can also have unintended consequences. Restrictive grant conditions can prevent councils from timing the spending of the grant to get the best value for money.”
The report said such conditions should be scrapped, adding that “when application processes are onerous, the councils least likely to apply or be successful are often remote and rural councils” due to a lack of resources.
The report also recommends the federal government directs grants to where they are needed most – noting that New South Wales and Victoria receive disproportionately high amounts compared with the Northern Territory and Tasmania.
The report also calls on the federal government to establish a hierarchy of the nation’s roads, with criteria then applied for what condition different local and state roads should be in and the accompanying maintenance requirements. It also says the government should help councils collate data on roads they are responsible for, so it is clearer where funding should be targeted.
Across Australia, councils manage almost 680,000km of roads, including suburban streets and unsealed paths to properties – more than 75% of the country’s roads – which link to arterials, corridors and freeways managed by state and federal governments.
Councils unaware of how many roads they manage
Under-resourced smaller councils are also struggling to keep track of what roads they are responsible for, a survey of 81 councils across cities, regional and remote areas conducted by Grattan suggests.
Only three-quarters of councils surveyed knew the number and lengths of roads they manage to an accuracy of 10%, which the report noted was an “extraordinary number”.
A quarter of councils surveyed also did not know how many bridges they managed. This knowledge was even poorer outside cities, with almost half of remote councils surveyed unsure how many bridges they were responsible for.
The problem is compounded by the fact regional councils have vast road networks but smaller populations, which means it is more difficult to raise revenue.
The Australian Local Government Association president, Linda Scott, a Labor councillor for the city of Sydney, said the Grattan research showed more funding was needed to reduce the “unacceptably high” national road death toll.
“Without urgent funding, the state of our roads will continue to decline and only get more expensive to fix,” Scott said.
Australian roads are becoming deadlier, with the road death toll steadily surging in recent years after reaching record lows in 2020.
