While this is true, it is true to such a marginal extent that the government really shouldn't be bragging about it.

A major part of the reason they have been able to confidently brag about this is because the amounts allocated from the road fund under earlier governments were not conviniently available, however you can find these amounts (with CPI adjustment) in a simple spreadsheet on the statistics page.

Three things have changed over the years to create the impression that a lot more money is being spent than ever before:

1. Inflation.

2. Heavy vehicle deregulation, particularly the end of rail protection. Along with the change to Road User Charges this increased roading revenue and expenditure by over one hundred million dollars between the mid 1970s and the mid 1980s.

3. Over the years a number roading related costs originally met by ratepayers or taxpayers have been shifted onto roadusers. This means that the road fund is meeting an increasingly greater share of the nations roading bill and that increasingly smaller proportions of the road fund are actaully being spent on roads.

4. The way that unspent allocations are dealt with has changed recently. Since the introduction of the National Roads Board in 1954 unspent allocations had been reallocated, either to smaller projects that could be completed and paid for within the current financial year or to purchase land needed for future road works. The latter was a major benefit to the peace of mind of the affected land owners who were able to get on with their lives sooner than expected. Under the new system unspent allocations are simply reallocated to the same projects in the next financial year but, unfortunately these amounts are not recorded as reallocations or amounts set aside from previous year's funds. Due to the fact that many of these allocations are for major projects which could take several to complete, the first few years of this system were always going to progressively and permanently inflate the annual allocations by over a hundred million dollars.

The first three points have been taken advantage of by earlier governments and not just the current government.