The Victorian Road Safety Camera Commissioner John Voyage has again called for new regional point-to-point speed cameras, but Benambra MP Bill Tilley says the state of country roads needs to be addressed first.
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The eighth annual report from the Commissioner's office was released on Thursday, and for the fourth time Mr Voyage called for "prompt consideration" to putting new cameras on regional roads, "in particular those with a history of road trauma".
Mr Voyage said "speed remains the biggest road safety issue" and that Australia's road safety was slipping compared to other countries.
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Mr Tilley said he'd support any action that reduces the road toll, but that "this report has no current data on the correlation between cameras and road trauma".
"In fact its very first recommendation is that it needs better information," he said.
"This gets dumped in Parliament in October when already more people have died on roads, more on country roads, than in all of 2018.
"This report asks us to take a leap of faith that speed cameras will help."
Mr Tilley disputed that speed was the biggest issue, saying the government needed to do more to address the condition of rural roads, and drug driving.
"A Coalition government would do an extra 1000 drug tests each week on drivers, 52,000 a year, as well as increase the penalties," he said.
Mr Voyage acknowledged in his report "many possible factors are involved" in the road toll rise - of 34 per cent.
"There has been public discussion about the increase in lives lost on Victoria's roads in the first six months of 2019," he said.
"The role of road safety cameras is significant in reducing road trauma."
The annual report comes as data shows the number of infringements issues through the Lincoln Causeway camera system has stayed consistent.
In the first quarter of 2019, 428 fines were issued totalling $123,617, compared to 579 fines the previous quarter and 582 fines issued from July to September 2018.
During the 2017-2018 financial year, 2150 infringements were issued totalling $568,848.
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There are also 17 approved mobile camera locations in the North East, including five in Wangaratta and seven in Benalla, and sites at Chiltern and the King Valley.
Victoria Police has reviewed each mobile camera sites at least once during this financial year, Mr Voyage noted in his report.
He also raised issue with the collection of data by multiple agencies including TAC VicRoads and Victoria Police.
"There continue to be discrepancies in the road safety statistics, for example where serious injuries are either under-reported or over-reported," he said.