Highways, rail the big winners

The Government has released a final version of its 10-year transport plan, which looks at where $48 billion collected from places such as fuel taxes and road user charges will be spent.

Road safety, rail and cycleways are the big winners, with each getting a substantial portion of funding. The Government also reaffirmed its promise not to raise fuel taxes or road user charges in the next political term.

The funding is set out in a document called the Government Policy Statement on land transport, or GPS.

It suggests how much money should be spent on different parts of the transport portfolio. The Government put out a draft policy earlier this year, which has not been substantially changed in the final version.

Transport Minister Phil Twyford said feedback to the draft plan had led him to increase the amount of money made available to state highways and rail.

‘‘We’ve decided to increase the upper range of funding for state highway maintenance by $510 million to help address the neglect under the last government and keep our roads safe,’’ Twyford said.

‘‘Rail also gets a $500 million boost in the upper range to keep the network on track, which will help us reduce emissions, accidents and the costs of road maintenance by shifting more freight to rail.’’

He said road safety remained the top priority for the Government.

A GPS looks out over 10 years, but governments make a new GPS every three years, making the first three years of any plan the most important.

Big changes include rolling funding for light rail into the wider public transport programme.