Most Sydney road tolls to keep rising after Transurban accused of blocking reforms

The cost of using Sydney's biggest toll road will continue to rise at least 4% a year after the multinational private operator was accused of blocking the state government's push for sweeping reforms. This was reported by Qazaqyia.kz citing The Guardian.

Only a handful of Sydney's motorways will receive one-off toll cuts under a deal announced by the state Labor government on Monday, as the tolling bill footed by taxpayers surpasses $1bn.

Eleven of Sydney's toll roads are run by Transurban, a $47bn company with operations in Victoria, Queensland and the US, with most under contracts granting exclusive operating rights into the 2040s or later.

The deal will see the state pay $850m to widen the M2-M7 tollway, boosting traffic flows, which Transurban expects will increase its toll revenue. The government will separately spend $143m to settle the deal, negotiated over two years.

Under Monday's deal, Transurban will cut some fares by 10% on the Lane Cove Tunnel and the M2 in July 2027 and the M7 in 2028. The cross-city tunnel toll will be cut by a one-off 20% in 2028 while the eastern distributor's northbound fare will be cut and a southbound fare added.

Those highways accounted for less than half of the 1m trips recorded each day on average across Transurban's Sydney network, suggesting most tollway trips would not see a toll reduction.

The Westconnex highway, which alone accounted for 359,000 trips a day by the end of 2025, and the NorthConnex will not get a reduction.

The premier, Chris Minns, told reporters on Monday the government had failed to negotiate a deal for the excluded highways at an appropriate cost with Transurban.

"We weren't able to get the rate of the dollars that we wanted in exchange for, I guess, what we had to give up," Minns said.

"We need toll relief now and it's better to have it at a lower base given the multiple increases that they have through the year."

Transurban's chief executive, Michelle Jablko, told investors on Monday the state would have had to spend significant amounts to fund a WestConnex toll reduction.

"Even a small change in WestConnex could cost taxpayers quite a lot," Jablko said.

Transurban data indicates the average Sydney customer spends nearly $650 a year on tolls. It costs $12.74 for a car to travel the full length of WestConnex and the motorway's tolls increase by at least 4% each year.

Allan Fels, a former chief of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, led the state's 2024 tolling review and called for the different roads' tolls to be standardised so toll burdens would be balanced between Sydney's west and its wealthier north and east. Jabklo on Monday said sweeping reforms could worsen congestion.

Fels, who was not directly involved in the government's negotiations, said Monday's toll reductions represented a "good start". But he said Transurban had blocked reform and put profits over public interest. The company declined to comment.

"It's essentially a financial vehicle, that receives an enormous amount of money, and that's what it's all about," Fels told Guardian Australia.

"[Transurban's demands] were excessive, completely out of the ballpark ... Their whole approach to compensation ruled out some public interest reforms, including on WestConnex."

NSW taxpayers already pay Transurban more than $100m a year to cover Labor's cap on tolls introduced in January 2024, covering the difference for motorists spending more than $60 each week.

That figure will more than double to $211m in 2026-27 after the state budget temporarily lowered the cap to $50.

Fels said commuter anger at growing toll bills would force the state to revisit the contracts in future.

"The government deemed it was just too tough politically in the face of resistance by Transurban to deliver the whole package ... [but] they hinted they might come back to this," he said.

Jablko did not directly answer when asked on Monday whether the government had promised it would not amend the contracts in future.

"By working constructively with the government, we were able to deal into what was important to them today and protect the value of the contracts," she said.

"What government wants to do in the future is always going to be a question for them, but it was really important for us to show up in the right way."