Judgments about the existence and scale of any infrastructure shortfall or gap involve striking a balance between two considerations:
■ the level of service being provided by the infrastructure; and
■ how much is being spent on infrastructure, or is required to be spent in the future.
The two approaches are linked. Ultimately, we get the infrastructure (and therefore the level of service) that we are prepared to pay for, either through taxes and/or user charges.
However, as infrastructure is required to sustain our way of life, any discussion about infrastructure gaps involves reaching some broad agreement about the quality of service provided by or expected from our infrastructure. Subsequently, such a discussion should aim to reach broad agreement as to how much the public at large (through taxation) and/or users of infrastructure (through user charges) are prepared to pay for the services provided by infrastructure.