Prepare for a cut to Total Mobility
This is Flexible Funding 2.0!!
Earlier this year I posted about the Total Mobility Review, and how it was dragging on, and how there was no new information in sight,
Well there have been developments, of a sort..
This story has recently gathered interest, and Today I spoke to RNZ’s Kathryn Ryan about exactly what is going on with Total Mobility, and challenged the Minister, Chris Bishop to speak publically about exactly what is going on with the Review.
The Disability community, and all the people using the scheme have been waiting long enough and deserve to know what is going on!!
Back in May I put in a Request to the Ministry of Transport for information relating to the Total Mobility Review, and on the 13th June at 4:42pm I received a response with an attachment of 198 pages.
I was initially very happy to receive the response, until I found the vast majority of the pages were redacted or partially redacted.
One thing that was clear from the information that was published, was that there are serious cost pressures mounting on Total Mobility and something needs to be done to keep the costs under control.
Here is a basic illustration:
The total number of trips using Total Mobility has steadily increased over time:
1.6m trips in 2021/21
2.7m trips in 2024/25
Forecasted to increase to 4.7m trips by 2030
This is an increase of 70% in trips over the period, so why has this happened? Why have all these trips been taken?
A few reasons for the increases are suggested:
the increase in subsidy from 50-75% is suggested as a reason
An ageing population, especially in Auckland, who are the majority of the population using the TM card
the average taxi fare is increasing when adjusted for inflation, so the average, fare is increasing over time
I need to first explain how Total Mobility is funded,
Total Mobility is funded through the National Land Transport Fund (NLTF) which is administered by Waka Kotahi, and by Council’s & Regional Council’s, with both the NTLF and each Council contributing a percentage toward the cost of funding Total Mobility.
But the key part to this funding arrangement is that it is demand driven, i.e. when the bill arrives it is paid. This will become important very soon.
Documents reveal that the increase in the number of trips take over the last few years is beginning to put pressure on the NLTF and Council transport budgets.
What this means is that the amount that was budgeted for Total Mobility through the NTLF for the 2024/25 year was originally $12m, and the actual amount that has been spent, in terms of total rides by Total Mobility customers is closer to $20m, so there is an $8m shortfall.
If we reference this against trip data, that shortfall will grow year on year, out to 2030.
The very long awaited Review into Total Mobility
It is worth saying that the The Review into Total Mobility first started in 2005, it progressed to another review in 2013, then stalled to a subsequent review in 2018 which was completed then not released, and then in 2023 we had a change of government.
This piece of work is 20 years in the making.
From the released documents, which are heavily redacted, which is always suspicious, the Ministry is looking to target the Total Mobility scheme to those in the highest need and restrict the scheme in several ways:
Reducing the total available subsidy per ride, which is set at the moment at $60
Setting a maximum number of trips per week, by setting trip caps
These two measures alone will have a huge impact upon disabled people’s ability to travel.
One of the big pieces of feedback that government recieved after Covid when the restrictions were lifted was that having the freedom, or the sense that a person could call a taxi to go out to a doctors appointment or to a friend’s when they needed to, was hugely empowering,
‘A scheme, whose scope who has expanded’
The Ministry of Transport describes:
“Total Mobility was originally established to support people with disabilities with high levels of unmet need (e.g. people in a wheelchair who could not access a bus or a taxi service)…. But over time the scheme has widened to include a wider cohort of people than was originally envisaged…”
What the Ministry is in effect saying here, is that Total Mobility has grown, and there are people who are using the system who, in their opinion should not be using the scheme but are getting the benefit from the taxpayer dollars associated with scheme.
Any future scheme will look to move back to the original intent of focusing on disabled people with high unmet transport need.
There will absolutly be a tightening of the entry criteria to get into Total Mobility.
I would push back against the contention by the Ministry, that there are thousands of people around the country using taxi’s when they should be using buses or some other forms of public transport.
The Total Mobility user data, which is collected by Council’s around the country proves this to be not the case.
If you look at the Councils own reporting 73% of people using the Total Mobility Card in Auckland alone are over the age of 65, and right across the country a clear majority are in their 80 & 90’s.
Over 75% use the Total Mobility card to get to medical appointments. If this is not a clear demonstration of the original intent of the scheme then I do not know what is!
What has not kept up with the original intent of the scheme under this government is the funding allocation!
This current government is looking for a reason to cut Total Mobility. Last year it cut flexible funding, this year its looking to cut Total Mobility
On the positive side, one thing the Ministry does get right is highlighting regional variations in how Total Mobility is administered and delivered.
I am sure that most card holders, who have travelled outside their region would agree with that!
The Ministries proposed solution to this problem is to consolidate the administration of Total Mobility into a central Government Agency, presumably Waka Kotahi.
This will almost certainly go ahead as a contract for the Administration of Total Mobility was recently put up on, GETS, the government contracting site.
A real question for future debate will be, is it a good thing to have the agency that funds Total Mobility, also the same agency that Administers & runs Total Mobility?
This really is an open question, as we have plenty of examples across government where the funding agency also delivers the service, a prime example of this is within the employment service of MSD.
The 50% + 25% fare discount
Given the real funding pressures that Total Mobility is facing, a possibility that could be on the table for discussion, may be the removal of the Crown contribution of the 25% discount, which started in 2023, and would mean, if implemented that the Discount that Total Mobility cardholders receive would return to 50%.
To break this down a bit further, this is what the current fare discount looks like, in terms of the percentage that each party pays:
Total Mobility user 25%
NLTF 30%
PTA / LA 20%
Crown 25%
The Crown Contribution was introduced in 2023, and to remove this component seems like a very easy win for this government, which is so focused on keeping an eye on costs and returning to surplus.
Removing the Crown contribution and redistributing each component evenly between the other three, for the sake of argument, would result in the following distribution:
Total Mobility user 16%
NLTF 22%
PTA/LA 12%
Flexible Funding 2.0
The parallels between what is now happening with Total Mobility and what happened last year with Flexible Funding are eerie!!
The question is, When will the government cut Total Mobility like they Cut Flexible Funding?
If you look at the customer profile of Total Mobility, the majority of current customers are over 65, many are into the 80-90’s and many user their Total Mobility cards to complete tasks like going to the doctor.
For many of these customers, using public transport is not an option, for a variety of reasons: safety, Accessibility, crowding & cost.
In writing this I call on the Minister of Transport, Chris Bishop to front up, and be transparent with the disability community and All Total Mobility users about what the plans for the scheme are, if there are not changes, then say that!!
But if there are changes coming, then my message is to come out and say that there are changes coming.
Total Mobility has been in place, for such a long period of time and any change will be disruptive and must be well signalled. So just front this decision sooner rather than later!!