Kimberley counts the cost of washed away roads

While the Shires of Derby-West Kimberley, Broome, Wyndham-East Kimberley and Halls Creek are all eligible for assistance measures under the DRFA, there are fears that layers of red tape and bureaucracy associated with the program will lead to lengthy delays and potentially stop important recovery works from going ahead in the region.

Wyndham-East Kimberley Shire chief executive Vernon Lawrence said while all four Kimberley Shire's had great working relationships and would continue to assist one another, offering support in the way of personnel and plant equipment, as a result of the smaller revenue base of each shire, they were not sustainably funded to respond adequately to these types of events, leaving the Kimberley region at the mercy of State and Federal support.

The initial clean-up phase from the floods primarily involves State and Federal responses addressing damage to major highways and local community housing before the recovery phase moves on to rectifying damage to local government infrastructure.

Part of the DRFAWA mechanism is to fund local councils to repair local government infrastructure, however this is limited to "reinstatement" works.

This continues to be a bugbear for remote local governments in the Kimberley which, over the years, have been forced to repeatedly repair the same roads and water crossings impacted by the wet season.

In December, Shire of Derby president Geoff Haerewa also expressed his frustration around the DRFAWA application process, with the Shire inevitably applying for the funding program each year due to road damage caused by the wet season.

The DRFAWA application process incorporates an assessment by Main Roads and the Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES), with the department confirming whether an event is deemed eligible.

However Mr Haerewa said the whole process to have their roads reinstated through the program often took as long as two to three years.

Mr Lawrence said the best way the Federal and State governments could support the region's recovery was to ensure that when infrastructure was rebuilt, it was constructed to a standard that could withstand the ever-increasing severity of weather events.

This is where the Federal National Emergency Management Agency comes in.

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Established in September 2022 through a merger of the National Recovery and Resilience Agency and Emergency Management Australia, the agency is responsible for providing another funding stream to local governments affected by natural disasters and wishing to construct infrastructure better able to withstand significant weather events.

"Our Shire has received funding under this program for a master plan for the upgrade and construction of infrastructure that will improve our resilience and allow for our community to respond adequately to natural disasters in our area," Mr Lawrence said.

Impact on Wyndham-East Kimberley

Still waiting for a final damage assessment of some remote roads within their Shire, Mr Lawrence anticipated damage to Kalumburu Road and Port Warrender Road to be consistent with previous weather events in the region.

"We have damage to infrastructure in this area about every three out of five years," Mr Lawrence said.

"Other than that we are extremely lucky to have missed the worst of the event."

While there had not been any significant impact to infrastructure assets in Kununurra and Wyndham, the East Kimberley Shire's main issue now revolves around the road detours in place due to the collapse of the almost 50-year-old Fitzroy Crossing Bridge on January 4.

"The flow of goods and supplies has slowed and shops are experiencing shortages and increased transport costs associated with the re-routing of supplies," Mr Lawrence said.

This includes the local Coles supermarket which has continued to have shortages in fresh produce since the floods.

While the West Kimberley was the main region hit by the floods, Western Roads Federation chief executive Cam Dumesny said it was important to not overlook the horrendous costs the road detours were having on East Kimberley communities and businesses, which also have important markets based in Perth.

"If we use Fitzroy Crossing as the marker, it's about a 2400 kilometre trip to Perth normally, but because of the detour caused by the floods, you are now facing just under a 6000km trip to get to the East Kimberley," Mr Dumesny said.

With trucking and freight logistics companies already working in a tight margin industry, he said those businesses regularly supplying the East Kimberley should be provided with fuel subsidies by the Federal government.

"At the moment, both the East Kimberley community and those trucking companies are paying huge costs in fuel and the immediate response is 'why don't you have things transported from Brisbane or Adelaide instead' etc, however East Kimberley businesses also have established markets in Perth and if they stop supplying those markets they could lose them," Mr Dumesny said.

"That would also have flow-on effects for the truckies who have continued to support East Kimberley producers."

Liberal MP for the Mining and Pastoral Region, Neil Thomson, said the collapse of the Fitzroy Crossing Bridge would have a massive impact on the Kimberley's agricultural sector if not repaired quickly and agreed that transport subsidies should be considered to ensure business continuity in the region.

"Before its collapse, the Fitzroy Crossing Bridge provided a vital link to established Perth markets for products as diverse as cattle and mangoes, while delivering inputs from farm machinery, fertilisers and hay," Mr Thomson said.

While acknowledging that alternative markets might be available for some agricultural businesses, he said transporting produce additional distances through the Northern Territory would likely come at a significant cost, potentially making some businesses unviable.

"The Kimberley Abattoir and Port of Broome will also suffer if the bridge is not reopened by May this year because presently, about 150,000 cattle are transported each year through the West Kimberley for live export or for meat processing."

With the wet season not over, Mr Thomson said every option for road needed to be considered including "a military styled bridge, upgrading the Gibb River Road, developing a new 300 kilometre haul road to the south of the Fitzroy River or scheduling a regular and free roll-on, roll off ferry from Derby to Wyndham".