Page 2676 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 26 September 2007
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P-plate drivers, the evidence is clear that it does not help”. The NRMA has said that. The NRMA recommendation about driver training, we suspect, is made for the following reasons. The NRMA has made the statement that the problem is that P-plate drivers, particularly boys in that age range of 17 to 19, think of themselves as being bulletproof. I thought I was bulletproof at that age; you all did. That is just a natural part of growing up.
A little bit of additional advanced training at that age can be more dangerous than useful. If you put a young man onto a driver training course and invite him to let loose in his car under speed conditions and then try and recover, that is an enjoyable pastime. It does not necessarily prepare him to become a better driver. So the question is: are we properly preparing these young drivers? Are we giving them sufficient time in the saddle, so to speak, or are we, when they are still at a relatively young age and immature in terms of accepting responsibility for high powered machinery, perhaps giving them a little bit too much, too early?
I would like to quote to you, Mr Gentleman, and to you, minister, an interview conducted by Ross Solly with Professor Danny Cass, from the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. He was talking about this phenomena of young drivers getting injured, particularly between the ages of 17 and 19. He said: “Look, we surgeons want a uniform learner driving age of 18, not 17 or 16 and 10 months, but 18.” They say it will save lives and that it will also improve their attentiveness. Seventeen-year-olds apparently have a problem with the frontal lobe of their brain. This was an analysis of the learning ability and maturity of young men. The professor went on to say: “The evidence is that the brain is not fully maturing at the age of 17. They actually keep maturing up to the age of 25 in males and 23 in females.” Females are ahead of us, and now we know why. They found that it was a particularly difficult age for skills to be taught at that time.
Mr Gentleman, so that you do not mislead the public on this, the opposition does not propose that driver training not commence before the age of 18 but, in terms of analysing what is important in ensuring that our young drivers are fully able to accept all the responsibilities of being a driver, you cannot ignore this evidence. It has to be factored in to looking at what is going on. The college of surgeons makes the point that, if you teach young people too early, you may be putting them in danger.
The other point is this: young drivers need to have sufficient time in the saddle, so to speak. You do not simply reward young drivers and allow them to shortcut their training because they may have impressed the instructor. You have to give them time in the drivers seat, under supervision, during those immature years, to properly prepare them. The opposition is asking questions about that. You cannot ignore that evidence. We are saying that we do not think any jurisdiction in this country has given proper attention to that aspect. Those are fundamental issues.
Let us look at a couple of other issues. We have talked time and again in this place about random drug testing perhaps being an important facet of a safe driving regime in this jurisdiction. In Victoria, they have moved fully into a random drug testing policy. In New South Wales, they are very close to doing that. The opposition in this place has provided you with the evidence to suggest that it is very important to urgently trial the concept and mobilise a policy here in the ACT. There is growing
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