Mr SAWFORD (12:39 PM) —I or someone in my family have been members of the Royal Automobile Association of South Australia over a continuous period of at least 33 years. On most occasions that I have ever required assistance from the RAA—and fortunately they have been few—the service has been more than satisfactory.

Recently, as the member for Port Adelaide, I received some brief correspondence from the RAA on GST and petrol. The RAA expressed great concern about the way the government has applied the GST and the resulting failure of the government to meet its promise that petrol prices would not rise. They also argued that, before the GST was introduced, motorists were paying 44.14c per litre in excise on unleaded fuel, with the Commonwealth retaining 35.79c and the states taking 8.35c.

Under the GST, the RAA claimed the Commonwealth has increased its share of excise by 1.65c to 37.44c and the states are now receiving the GST instead of their fair share of the excise. The RAA further argued that, based on a fairly conservative regional price of 93c per litre, motorists were now paying 8.45c in GST as well as the 37.5c in excise. In other words, the RAA said that, before the GST, motorists were paying a total petrol tax of 44.14c; but now, under the GST, they are paying the increased total of 45.6c in petrol tax. They added that, even if the petrol retails at 89c per litre, the government still makes a gain of 1.4c a litre.

The RAA, on behalf of its 600,000 members in South Australia, supports the application of pressure by its members to meet the government's promise that petrol prices would not rise as a result of the GST. The RAA also believes that the federal government should freeze indexation of petrol excise during the next 12 months—I think the member for Makin did something about that in her office in relation to a petition yesterday—to avoid a substantial increase as a result of the inflationary spike predicted under the GST. The government's response to that suggestion would be illuminating indeed.

The correspondence from the RAA also stated that while collecting more tax from motorists—$858 million—the government has reduced road funding by $350 million. This is where I place a different emphasis to the RAA. I believe motorist organisations like the RAA and their associated interstate colleagues ought to have a far broader perspective on road funding, alternative forms of land transport and road safety to protect their valued membership. The RAA claims that, in addition to the $858 million the Commonwealth receives because of extra excise and indexation, the Commonwealth has also reduced road funding by $350 million. However, I find that far too limiting and simplistic an analysis which overlooks some important questions.

If that total of $1,208 million was used to get long distance trucks and their multiple trailers off the road and onto rail, I would support that expenditure. Getting a proportion of those trucks and trailers off the road and onto rail would certainly assist road safety and road costs for their 600,000 members. The RAA rightly concerns itself with the road user costs of its membership, but it should also concern itself with the prohibitive costs of road trauma in this country. As far as road trauma is concerned, the costs could be estimated at up to $10 billion, and they could be as high as $20 billion in this country when you take into account road deaths, debilitating injuries, health costs, skyrocketing insurance and so on. Taking into account the matter of damage to roads and resultant road maintenance costs simply adds to the problem.

The RAA must recognise that many of its members are deterred from exercising their rights on the roads for fear of what could happen. In fact, a number of people in my electorate will not go on the road any more because one of the access roads in my electorate now has the big trailers on it. There have been numerous very close calls and people are intimidated by the traffic and sometimes by the speed of those vehicles.

In conclusion, I support the general thrust of the RAA claims on behalf of its members. However, I would be more encouraged in matters concerning land transport if the RAA and its interstate colleagues took a far more responsible and broader perspective on behalf of their members with regard to all the costs associated with road usage, including not only road funding but also the real costs of road trauma and the use of alternative forms of transport to make the roads in this country safer than they are.