Earlier this month, Transurban reported that its net profit had more than doubled to $468 million as higher road-user fees saw its revenue growth outstrip traffic growth fourfold.
Transurban’s CEO, Scott Charlton, also cracked $7 million in pay.
Now, the ACCC has cleared Transurban’s bid for Sydney’s controversial $17 billion WestConnex project, which is likely to see its toll road empire grow. From The AFR:
The competition watchdog said Transurban can proceed with a bid to buy a 51 per cent stake in Sydney motorway WestConnex, stating a successful acquisition will not reduce competition for future tollroads…
Transurban’s bid is believed to be the front-runner.
Transurban has agreed to release more traffic data as a condition for receiving ACCC approval…
However, Mr Sims warned that state governments should reject unsolicited proposals from tollroad companies to ensure competition…
Transurban has been able to expand its tollroad network by striking deals with state governments to build new roads, such as Sydney’s NorthConnex and Melbourne’s West Gate Tunnel…
Transurban already operates seven of NSW’s nine toll roads, and 15 of Australia’s 19 tollroads.
All of which is part of Transurban’s plan to control Australia’s road system and become the prime beneficiary of Australia’s mass immigration ‘Big Australia’ policy:
Toll road giant Transurban is positioning itself to manage the entire road networks of Australia’s three major cities as governments make the “inevitable” shift to road pricing.
A senior Transurban executive told a private meeting of investors this month that the company wanted to be viewed as the “natural custodian” of the nation’s motorways, in the likely event of motorists being charged to drive on them.
The Melbourne-based company has a near monopoly on private roads in Australia already, controlling 13 of the 15 toll roads in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane.
Analysts Morgan Stanley have described a Transurban-run, user-pays system across all roads as a “meta-monopoly”.
Such a move would further entrench the company – which owns Citylink in Melbourne, the M2 in Sydney and all of Brisbane’s toll roads – as a de-facto private sector planning agency in those major cities.
Few, if any, countries in the world have allowed a private operator to control so much of their road network.
Even Jeff Kennett, the man who in effect launched Transurban through its Melbourne CityLink contract in 1996, now warns governments against granting the company more toll road projects, arguing that taxpayers are being “ripped off”.
This is the plan. To privatise the gains from mass immigration among the ‘growth lobby’ while socialising the costs on everyone else.
