Following the release of the 2024-25 Federal Budget, NatRoad has pointed to a range of funding promises it says are good news for the transport industry.
Support for low carbon fuels, road safety funding, and power bill and tax relief for small businesses were given the tick by the National Road Transport Association (NatRoad), with its chief executive officer Warren Clark stating it’s delivered a range of positive initiatives for operators.
“A 12-month extension to the $20,000 instant asset write-off will help small businesses claim an immediate tax benefit on new assets through to June 2025,” Clark said.
“This is something we’ve pushed hard for in a number of Budgets.
“Eligible road transport businesses will also appreciate the modest $325 rebate on their power bills.”
Clark welcomed increased funding for the Roads to Recovery and Black Spot Programs too.
“NatRoad hopes that the $10.8 million in 2024-25 for a one-year National Road Safety Education campaign has a heavy emphasis on truck awareness,” he said.
“The $21.2 million over six years to improve the reporting of national road safety data via the National Road Safety Data Hub is important and long overdue.
“Whilst we welcome additional road funding where the routes are relevant for freight, ultimately we still need to see all governments, including the states and territories, implement road service level standards so we know our tax dollars are going to the roads which need it, with an increased focus on road maintenance.”
While NatRoad believes the Federal Budget delivered “mostly good news”, it did fall short on a number of areas the association had been pushing for.
Among these was the establishment of a $3.5 billion Clean Transport Fund, which NatRoad has been advocating for, for some time. It had hoped that such a move would help the industry tackle decarbonisation and the transition to alternative approaches to heavy vehicles, like electric, hydrogen and low emission trucks.
NatRoad’s pre-Budget submission had also called for a National Service Level Standards Framework, to drive more infrastructure spending, and act as a mechanism to cap future increases to road user and registration charges.
It had also hoped for practical action to reduce red tape, through investment in better heavy vehicle road access with an accelerated roll-out of a national automated access system.
In a newsletter distributed to its members last week, ahead of the Budget announcements, NatRoad said, “Too many operators like you are caught in the red-tape trap of applying to local road managers for permission to access roads and bridges.
“Opening up as-of-right access, and having access maps accessible online, would remove frustrations for operators, boost road freight efficiency and take costs out of the supply chain for consumers.”