The founder of a successful road safety programme says funding cuts in the South will cost jobs and jeopardise lives.
The Right Track programme founder John Finch was in Invercargill last week and said the focus in roading had shifted to potholes and away from road safety programmes.
He said he struggled to understand the funding cuts to safety education initiatives when road accident deaths and injuries were costing the country billions every year.
Mr Finch said the NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi administered the community fund via a "very effective partnership" with councils to pay for the programme but he was told this year the fund would be redeployed to be "spent on potholes and crash barriers and stuff like that" with only a small percentage going to road safety education.
"So with a sweep of the brush, some councils lost all their funding — some lost 90%.
"So what that means is now the pool of money that was available for things like The Right Track is gone."
Mr Finch said the Southland Right Track programme would be delivered next year, but he doubted it would be able to run in 2026.
Southland programme manager Rebecca Coats said The Right Track programme, introduced in Southland in 2018-19, had an 80% success rate in reducing escalating, anti-social driver offending from young offenders referred by the court.
A Southland District Council spokesperson confirmed the road safety programme it shared with the Invercargill city and Gore district councils received only 20% of the funding it requested.
An NZTA spokesperson confirmed the Community Road Safety Fund had been under review since December last year to ensure it was fulfilling its purpose of improving road safety through community initiatives. No new applications for funding were being accepted but existing contracts were being honoured.
"Mr Finch’s The Right Track programme’s contract is still current, ending on 31 December 2024. Existing contracts are eligible to have their funding extended to August 2025, in Mr Finch’s case if he provides us with these points which indicate his programme is achieving the goals set."
The Right Track programme also received funds from Community Trust South, the ILT and councils, but the local council had yet to confirm if it would be contributing, Mr Finch said.
"Because the announcement still hasn’t been made yet in terms of what council can fund, I think we’ve been very lucky that we’ve been able to maintain about 80% of that funding from the previous year from council."
The Right Track was not the region’s only council-operated road safety programme. He expected there would be other initiatives impacted by the funding cut, he said.
- By Toni McDonald
