Will Commonwealth environment committee senators address the nation’s vehicle wildlife collisions explosion?
By Patrick Francis
On 7 August 2025 all six members of the Senate Standing Committee on Environment and Communications were emailed the following request to consider an inquiry into the adequacy of the Commonwealth of Australia’s Road Safety and Environment Protection policies, visions and regulations to cope with the biodiversity and human consequences of wildlife vehicle collisions across the national public road network. As at 1 October 2025, not one of the six senators on the committee has acknowledged receiving the email and that a problem exists with wildlife vehicle collisions. Politicians talk about protecting biodiversity is just that, it seems they are not prepared to act and include into relevant national road safety and biodiversity protection and enhancement policies and strategies the published speed reduction guidelines needed to protect wildlife and vehicle occupants from injury and death in wildlife vehicle collisions.
After six months of research into Commonwealth, State and Territory government policies, strategies, visions and regulations for road safety and biodiversity protection it is surprising that wildlife vehicle collisions are ignored as being relevant. This means wildlife vehicle collisions and their human and animal consequences are not part of the decision making process used at any level of government to make a case to reduce or prevent such collisions.
While all state and territory Transport Departments have Speed Zoning Policies and Guidelines none include road wildlife vehicle collisions risk ratings and the Austroads Safe System Speeds in their decision trees for setting appropriate speed limits for rural and regional roads outside town boundaries.
The reasons why wildlife vehicle collisions are not a catalyst for local and state governments to act upon to change the situation are complex but can be traced right back to Commonwealth of Australia’s road safety and environmental protection policies, visions, strategies and regulations which ignore wildlife vehicle collisions. To illustrate this point the National Road Safety Strategy 2021 – 2030 and its associated Vision Zero 2050 (road fatalities) , and Australia’s Strategy for Nature 2024 – 2030 make no mention of vehicle wildlife collisions as a factor to be considered to achieve their 2050 Visions.
Even taking a step further back, the National Road Safety Strategies and Speed Zoning policies are based on the internationally adopted Safe System Principles. But these principles don’t recognise or include wildlife vehicle collisions as an issue to be addressed for developing road safety risk ratings and strategies despite thousands of vehicle occupant casualties each year associated with vehicle wildlife collisions.
Figure 1: Wildlife vehicle collisions are not included as part of the Nation’s road safety strategies or biodiversity protection strategies. Image design and photos Patrick Francis.
Similarly Australia’s Strategy for Nature makes no reference to vehicle wildlife collision and their avoidance despite the fact that there are an estimated 10 million annual wildlife road kills on Australia’s roads. This Strategy states as its Vision that by 2030 “Australia will halt and reverse biodiversity loss” and by 2050 “we will be living in harmony with nature”. Behind the Strategy for Nature sits the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework which the Commonwealth of Australia is a signatory. Despite the Frameworks stated vision of “a world of living in harmony with nature where by 2050, biodiversity is valued, conserved, restored” there is no reference to vehicle wildlife collisions as a disharmony threat.
A current Victorian Legislative Council Economy and Infrastructure Committee’s inquiry into “Wildlife road strike” has received more than 460 submissions from NGOs, local governments, researchers, wildlife groups and individuals highlighting the enormous concern for wildlife protection and welfare and human casualties amongst the community. Unfortunately this inquiry has no terms of reference around the adequacy of Victorian road safety regulations, Speed Zoning Guidelines and Biodiversity protection and enhancement polices, for preventing and reducing vehicle wildlife collisions. Instead it has opted to focus on “the capacity of relevant legislation and regulation to monitor wildlife road strike, promote driver education and raise public awareness”.
Of the submissions to this inquiry I have found only one that raises the core issue that until vehicle wildlife collisions are included in Commonwealth road safety and biodiversity policies, strategies, visions and regulations and subsequently filter down to their state and territory equivalents there is no appetite for state/territory ministers to include vehicle wildlife collision road risk assessments into speed zoning guidelines and biodiversity protection strategies. This characterisation is based on the fact that the National Road Safety Strategy 2021 – 30 (based on nationally adopted Safe System principles) and Australia’s Strategy for Nature 2024 – 2030 are both jointly signed off by their Federal ministers and their State and Territory counterparts.
An anthropogenic analogy is the Commonwealth’s Net Zero 2050 Greenhouse Gas Emissions policy. Without associated policies, strategies and regulations that direct greenhouse gas reduction and abatement outcomes nationally there would be little or no reduction in emissions, more likely they would continue along the business as usual trajectory. That is the current issue for wildlife road kills without their anthropogenic reality being included in road safety and environment polices, strategies and regulations, the exponential rise in road kills will continue particularly across peri-urban Australia.
An important Commonwealth government policy that supports achieving Net Zero 2050 Greenhouse Gas Emissions is the Australian Carbon Credit Unit Scheme. Its approved project activities include revegetation and reforestation both of which are widely adopted and will be increasingly so as local and state governments and businesses search for credible CO2 abatement to achieve their own net zero greenhouse gas emissions objectives. Both Vegetation methods provide new habitat for wildlife to move into and depending on project location the risk of vehicle wildlife collisions increases. None of the Vegetation project methods include vehicle wildlife vehicle collision risk rating and prevention strategies as part of their responsibility.
The same unintended wildlife vehicle collision outcomes are about to happen with the Commonwealth’s Nature Repair Market policy. This is likely to create enormous interest amongst existing landowners and investors creating millions of hectares of new wildlife habitat on previously cleared agricultural land. This will bring wildlife’s natural movement behaviour into conflict with vehicles wherever Nature Repair projects are undertaken in the agricultural zones of Eastern states and Tasmania.
I finish on how basic the issue currently is, on the one hand state Transport Departments, motorist NGOs and vehicle insurance companies advise motorists to hit wildlife if they cannot safely slow or stop, on the other hand the NSW Transport department states 1 in 41 vehicle wildlife collisions on rural and regional roads results in vehicle occupant casualty or fatality. Some state Transport department describe how the use of Standards Australia approved vehicle frontal protection systems can prevent or reduce damage to a vehicle in the event of a wildlife collision. In contrast no state Transport Departments have speed zoning guidelines that include vehicle wildlife collision risk as part of the speed-setting decision process!
All the relevant policy, legislation, road kill research and NGO attitudes to road kills is included in my seven detailed research documents on my web site that you will unlikely have time to read. It’s why I have attached my summary and recommendations documents.
If you want to understand why so many Australian’s are continually frustrated by the lack of effective action by their local governments and state parliamentarians to reduce rural and regional road speed limits to the published Safe System Speeds that will save wildlife from road kill and reduce human casualties and fatalities I have included my six year case study of attempts to have the 100km/h default speed limit on a narrow gravel service road in the Macedon Ranges farming zone reduced to 40km/h. The Council’s multiple responses highlight that traditional, widely advocated ‘low hanging fruit’ solutions are not reducing vehicle wildlife collisions and road kills.
If it would help to give you a greater understanding of the multiple issues behind reducing wildlife road kills across Australia before you make a decision on my suggestion I would be happy to meet with you in Canberra at any time. As well all members are invited to visit Moffitts Farm to see for themselves how gradual restoration of habitat on farmland can contribute to vehicle wildlife collisions on adjacent roads.
By the way I am not affiliated with any NGO or political party, nor do I have a social media presence. My experience with road kills is based on living with them every day on my farm’s adjacent roads due to improving habitat for wildlife from virtually zero in 1986 to a highly diverse wildlife populated farm today. Our success over the last 39 years has left me with a responsibility to help prevent further wildlife carnage happening across Australia’s road network as a result of policy black holes preventing workable solutions being adopted.
Table 1: This Austroads published table is not included in any of the national, state and territory road safety strategies to achieve Vision Zero by 2050; nor is it included in any biodiversity protection and living with nature strategies. No governments acknowledge wildlife are subject to the same biomechanical tolerances to vehicle impact as human beings.
