Michael McCormack (Riverina, National Party, Shadow Minister for International Development and the Pacific) Share this | Hansard source

Road safety is so important in our society. Better roads means less deaths on those roads. The member for Hawke politicised his argument. He said those opposite always make a political play thing out of this—not true; not true. But, seeing as he wants to take this motion there, the 90-day review put in place by the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, the member for Ballarat, prior to the federal budget last year, which turned into a prolonged, protracted, 200-plus-day review, led to a number of road projects being stalled. It led to a number of major infrastructure projects concerning our arterial roads—and, dare I say, our smaller byways as well—losing workers for those projects, and the road toll is up. That is a fact.

There was a total of 96 road deaths during the month of May 2024. It's higher than what it was previously. One death—one injury—on our roads is one too many. We lose 1,200 or so Australians each and every year on our roads, and that figure doesn't even generally take into account, when it's being talked about in the media, the tens of thousands of people who get injured in those and other road crashes. I know that, when I was in the portfolio area of responsibility for road safety, I took that very seriously—the issue of making sure that we had the right infrastructure in the right places. Our regional people are all too overrepresented in the road toll statistics.

Just last week, whilst driving around my very large Riverina electorate, I noticed that the line-markers were out doing those audio-tactile lines on the sides of the roads and widening the centre lines by painting another line up the middle of the road. The centre lines, the gap between one side of the road and the traffic going the other, were what former deputy prime minister and Nationals leader John Anderson used to call the 'corridor of uncertainty'. I take great pride in reflecting on the Roads to Recovery initiative. That program was brought about by the same John Anderson when he was the member for Gwydir and the infrastructure minister in this place. When you look at programs such as that and the other initiatives that we subsequently brought in—the Great Western Highway upgrade, the Beef Roads Program, the Local Roads and Community Infrastructure Program—so many of those specific targeted road projects and programs are saving lives. I was very proud that when I was the Deputy Prime Minister we put in place that $3 billion for the road safety upgrade during COVID because it has saved lives, and it will save lives. There will be people who may never know that they have been saved by just one of those audio-tactile lines on the side of the road, if late at night, or at any given time of the day, they just happen to veer slightly over before hearing that 'thump, thump' and realising: 'I've veered over. Straighten up and make sure I stay in my lane.' Making sure that we put that very slight additional room in the middle of the road by just another line makes roads safer.

I appreciate the work that the heavy-haulage transport operators have also put in this place. I take the member for Hawke up. He came in here and praised the union. I want to praise truck companies and particularly Andy Fox and Ron Finemore, who have two of the biggest transport companies in this country, for what they have done as far as road safety is concerned. We're all trying to get to zero 50—making sure that there are no deaths on our roads by 2050. It's a noble initiative and it's a difficult initiative. It won't be done by stalling road projects.

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