The Australian Trucking Association’s (ATA) Transport and Economics Committee will plan an industry response to the Government’s new heavy vehicle charges legislation.
Introduced to Parliament last week, the legislation is the Government’s second attempt to implement its part of the fourth heavy vehicle charges determination, which was agreed by the Australian Transport Council in February.
The Senate blocked the Government’s first attempt earlier this year.
The legislation would enable the Government to bring the registration charges on FIRS vehicles into line with the new registration charges imposed by the states.
As a result, the FIRS registration on a tandem-drive, tri-axle B-double would increase from $9,074 to $10,470.
The FIRS registration on a tri-axle semitrailer would increase from $5,065 to $5,070, and the FIRS registration on a 3-axle rigid truck would fall from $707 to $652.
The legislation would increase the road user charge paid by the industry from 19.633 to 21 cents per litre of diesel.
It would also give the Government the ability to make regulations to index the charge automatically each year.
The Government did not announce any extra funding for rest areas when it introduced the legislation, even though the road user charge increase will raise an extra $490 million from the industry over four years.
The ATA has urged the Government to make a major ten year commitment to building new rest areas, on top of the existing $70 million Heavy Vehicle Safety and Productivity Program.
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