Page 506 - Week 02 - Thursday, 22 February 1990
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MRS GRASSBY (4.22): It is good to see the Liberal Alliance Government implementing Labor Party policies. There is no use in Mr Duby pretending, as he did in his speech on this Bill last week, that the Motor Traffic (Amendment) Bill (No. 2) was merely the result of bureaucratic work prior to self-government. The record is clear. At the 1989 election our policy document stated:
Labor will investigate compulsory training for motorcyclists along the lines of the successful scheme operated in Tasmania ...
Nobody else made that promise. Following the election of the Labor Party, work proceeded on developing the idea. I pursued the funding for this proposal and had it included in the first ACT budget which funded most of the initiatives which we promised at the election. Work on this Bill was well advanced when the Follett Government was removed from office. As was said earlier, "thrown out" was a little hard.
So it is quite clear why this Bill is here today. It is here because it was a Labor policy. It is here because Labor cares for our community. It is here because we, alone, had a detailed and practical set of promises to implement in government. We will watch in the months ahead to see whether Mr Duby can dream up any policies of his own; I suspect he will not. I think we will see Mr Duby and the other Ministers continue to implement Labor policies or simply let the bureaucracy run things on autopilot.
Training for motorcyclists is very important for new riders, with the road toll as high as it is today and with more and more traffic on our roads. It is important that before persons are able to get a licence to ride a motorcycle they should have training on the way to ride it safely and to know the rules of the road. We have seen enough deaths involving motorcyclists in the past few years, and, as the Minister said, if it saves only one life it is worth this Bill being passed in the house today.
However, this was only the first part of our training for young persons who are about to drive a motor vehicle. Our Labor Government was looking at introducing training in year 10 for students wishing to get a permit to drive as soon as the legal age was reached. We were to put driver training into all secondary schools, with lectures to explain the dangers of speed, drinking and taking drugs while driving. Motor vehicles of any kind are lethal weapons in the hands of our young people and they should be taught the value of their own and other people's lives.
We were negotiating with the police to take possession of the police driving range where people could be taught to drive cars safely. Year 10 students and anybody else could learn the proper way to drive a car and the rules of the road while at the same time being taught the dangers of
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