VCOSS response to Infrastructure Victoria’s state transport network study

The independent advisory body Infrastructure Victoria has released a study about modernising the state’s transport network.

These are comments VCOSS provided to journalists on initial release of the report.

Attributable to VCOSS CEO Emma King:

Infrastructure Victoria is proposing a raft of smart measures to reduce congestion and make getting around easier and more affordable.

Many of Infrastructure Victoria’s ideas are worthy of further analysis.

However, we remain concerned about the proposal for congestion charging on Victorian roads.

Congestion charges are unfair at the best of times, and these are not the best of times.

Congestion charges disproportionately hurt people on low incomes, and people who are forced to use their cars.

To be anywhere near fair, any road charging system would need significant exemptions and concessions for people doing it tough, and generous hardship policies for those who can’t pay their bills.

Let’s be blunt. This is a bad idea being floated at the wrong time.

We shouldn’t be talking about new road charges while Victorians are looking down the barrel of a painful recession.

###ENDS###

READ MORE: Call to scrap rego and myki, charge commuters for how far they travel – The Age, 25 March 2020