ATA gives Coalition four out of four

In the lead up to this weekend's Federal Election, the Australian Trucking Association (ATA) says the Coalition is scoring higher than the Labor Government.

The ATA says it has awarded the Labor Party two ticks out of four, and the Coalition four ticks out of four, in its 2013 election report card. It says it assessed the parties against four criteria: their achievements in government, and their policies on the carbon tax, better roads and road access, and truck taxes and charges. The Chairman of the ATA, David Simon, said the report card showed the Labor Party still planned to extend its carbon tax to the fuel used in trucks.

“The tax would start at about 1.6 cents per litre instead of the 6.858 cents per litre in Labor’s original plan,” said Simon. “It would not stay at 1.6 cents per litre, though. Using Treasury figures from the Pre-Election Economic and Fiscal Outlook, the ATA estimates the carbon tax would increase to 5.1 cents per litre by July 2016. In contrast, the Liberal-National Coalition has confirmed it would abolish the carbon tax.

“Australia’s governments are looking at tracking and billing trucks by satellite. Under this plan, known as mass-distance-location pricing, every one of Australia’s 534,000 trucks would be fitted with a special GPS tracking device. Trucking operators would receive bills based on how far their trucks went, the roads they used and an assessment of their mass.”