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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 13 Hansard (5 December) . . Page.. 4517 ..

MR DE DOMENICO (continuing):

The problem with the one-off practical driving test, we are told, is that learner drivers are taught practical driving skills by relatives, friends and/or professional driving instructors to pass the practical driving test rather than to learn how to drive. Listen very carefully. Under the continuous assessment approach, the one-off practical driving test is no longer the main focus, and learner drivers are taught how to drive through achieving each of the 22 driver competencies - not one competency, but 22 competencies. We expect, therefore, that the competency-based training and assessment scheme will improve road safety by producing a greater level of competence in newly licensed drivers - competence that may prevent the young people from, as they did the other day, driving a 4.1-litre Falcon at up to 150 kilometres an hour around the bend, and you saw the tragedy of that.

Mr Speaker, statistics show that over 90 per cent of accidents involving fatalities are attributed to driver error, with only 5 to 10 per cent being due to vehicle defects. They are not my statistics; they are Australian road safety and other statistics. The competency-based training and assessment scheme will place emphasis on the importance of driver attitude in reducing road accident statistics. Driving instructors who wish to become accredited under the scheme will complete a two-week training course which focuses heavily on the importance of promoting good driver attitudes in novice drivers. Notwithstanding that these people have been out there for years and years doing this job, they still go through this training course anyway. Private driving instructors will be required to gain accreditation through a government-approved training course, to prevent any inklings of corruption that you might think are there, Ms Horodny. There is accreditation through a government-approved training course at their own cost if they wish to be authorised to certify learner drivers for a provisional licence.

A comprehensive computer-based audit process will monitor the performance of accredited private driving instructors. We have the audit in there from day one. The auditing function will be performed by government-licensed examiners, who will ensure that driver licensing standards are maintained. As we are aware, South Australia was the first jurisdiction in Australia to introduce a competency-based training and assessment scheme for learner car drivers. Their scheme was introduced on 19 April 1993 and there has been strong community acceptance of the new option for gaining a provisional car drivers licence. Approximately 70 per cent of learner car drivers in South Australia are choosing the option of achieving their provisional licence through the competency-based training and assessment scheme. Ms Horodny, your statement was wrong. Seventy per cent are choosing the competency-based scheme, and 30 per cent are choosing the scheme that you said 70 per cent were; so you got it wrong.

The ACT will be the second jurisdiction in Australia to introduce the option of a competency-based training and assessment scheme for learner car drivers. New South Wales and Victoria are also considering similar arrangements. In the ACT our aim is to produce safer drivers. The introduction of the competency-based training and assessment scheme early next year, hopefully, if the committee so decides, will help to achieve this. The NRMA and the Australian Driver Trainers Association fully support the introduction of competency-based training and assessment for learner car drivers in the ACT.

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