>Has anyone updated information on the debarcles of track access fees not
>finding their way into the Melbourne to Vic/SA border SG line and diesel
>fuel being taxed for rail use and not going back into the rail system?
>--
>Arthur Marsh, telephone +61-8-8370-2365, fax +61-8-8223-5082
> arthur@dircsa.org.au
>.endofsig
Sadly , theres no requirement whatsoever that track access fees are returned
to the infrastructure they are collected from.(its more likely the PTC are
simply using the money to reduce their running losses.)
In the case of the PTC and the Melb-Wolseley line the amount of money
originally allocated by the federal Govt (approx $140 million) should have
been enough to reguage and to concrete sleeper the line from Newport to
Ararat.Where the money has gone is anyones guess,but the last time I was in
Victoria there still were huge piles of concrete sleepers at Inverleigh and at
a few other places along the side of the track.
The issue of the federal fuel excise is also an interesting one.
The federal fuel excise is a TAX,and as such does not require that the tax
collector return one cent to the source from whence the tax came.
Consider the poor motorist who paid last year $10.5 billion in fuel excise
charges and the feds returned less than $1.4 billion to roads.
Whilst road may appear to get a hugely higher amount in real terms than does
rail,its about the same on a percentage basis.
The feds had to find approx $2 billion to bail out AN to remove its losses so
that it could be made a saleable entity,so its not true to suggest that there
isnt money going into rail.
In reality the Railways in the States are solely and wholly the responsibility
of the State Govts, there no requirement that the federal Govt fund state
railways.
I ,like most rail fans would like to see a much greater share of Federal
Funding going to rail,but lets be realistic, the federal Govt isnt going to
fund railways it has no responsibility for,and neither it should.
If the States cant or wont fund their own railways,they should give them away
as did Don Dunstan with the old SAR, then it would be the federal Govts
responsibilty to fund them.
One of the reasons that road gets a larger share of funding is that
in the case of the trucking industry it is a powerful lobby group,and speaks
with one voice for the whole of the industry across all of the country.Can we
say the same for rail, I think not.
cheers
MD