More than 450 streetlight faults in the ACT have been left unfixed for more than three months, prompting the opposition to declare the delays were unacceptable and had left residents feeling unsafe.
Four faults date back to 2022 and Roads ACT has been working on an "in-depth review" of long-term problems.
The majority require complex works and some are affected by supply issues for streetlight columns, the government has said.
Peter Cain, the opposition spokesman on government services, said streetlights were basic infrastructure and repeated reports should not be required to prompt the government to keep the lights on.
"Canberrans are contacting my office saying they feel unsafe walking their streets at night without working streetlights. We are also hearing concerns about cars and properties being broken into while streets are left in darkness," Mr Cain said.
There were 460 streetlights with recorded faults left unresolved for more than 90 days, the government told a parliamentary committee last month.
"The age of an open fault should not necessarily be taken to mean that no repair activity has occurred during that period," the government said.
"Streetlight faults can be complex and may require multiple inspections, investigations or repair activities before they can be fully resolved. In some cases, an initial repair may identify an underlying electrical, cabling, structural or supply issue requiring further work."
The government said the primary reason in the table was the current key constraint or activity needed to keep working on the fix.
"The directorate and its maintenance service provider continue to review longstanding faults, undertake site investigations and repairs where practicable, and engage with relevant third parties to resolve external dependencies and return affected streetlights to service," the government said.
"For these reasons, it is difficult to provide reliable completion dates for individual outstanding faults."
Mr Cain said the figures showed the scale of the government's backlog and the explanations were not enough.
"Canberrans ... need the government to fix them. Canberrans pay some of the highest rates in the country. They should at least expect the government to keep the lights on," he said.
City and Government Services Minister Tara Cheyne told the Legislative Assembly in May that Canberra had inherited a lasting and extremely expensive legacy from a planning approach that put streetlight cables underground.
"That is because underground infrastructure is inherently more complex and more expensive to maintain, repair and upgrade. And it often requires under-boring rather than simple surface works," Ms Cheyne said in May.
Under-boring services were under strain owing to high demand which had made the problem in the capital particularly acute, she said.
"So, when we have multiple street lights out it will almost certainly reflect a cable fault. That cable is almost certainly underground. When there is pressure nationally on highly specialised under-boring services to find the location of that fault, then yes, capacity is limited and things will take longer," Ms Cheyne said.
