Page 4427 - Week 10 - Thursday, 23 September 2010
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That being said, we have now been told that certain things are happening. There is some evaluation of road safety engineering treatments and policy initiatives. There is the implementation of the computerised smart form and how that fits into TAMS data entry and there is a review of ACT licensing, training and testing requirements for novice drivers. These are all underway. The committee making recommendations at this time is a bit premature. But I do make the point that it is more than four years since the first report was tabled.
I will simply close by drawing members’ attention to paragraph 4.4 on page 13, where it says, “The committee is also concerned that the government’s response to the Auditor-General’s report No 2 of 2009 took approximately 13 months to be received by the committee.” It is discourteous and it is unfortunate, and I would trust that no committee ever has to wait that length of time again for a government response so that they can get on with their work.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Road Transport (General) Amendment Bill 2010
Debate resumed from 26 August 2010, on motion by Mr Stanhope:
That this bill be agreed to in principle.
MR COE (Ginninderra) (11.53): The Road Transport (General) Amendment Bill 2010 is a bill that the Canberra Liberals, the opposition, will be supporting. The purpose of the bill is to clarify the requirements in the Road Transport (General) Act for giving notice to people who have not paid certain infringement notice penalties or, indeed, their court fines.
As we understand it, the bill ensures that the confirmation notice will inform the person which type of suspension and enforcement action is to be taken. In addition to this, the RTA will advise clients in the suspension order that they may call Canberra Connect before they receive their confirmation notice, if they do wish to check their drivers licence or vehicle registration status. We think this is quite a reasonable step.
I also understand that the bill will provide clarification of the existing requirements. It became necessary, following the court ruling, that the format of the existing suspension notices did not comply with the relevant legislation. I believe it was Magistrate Burns’s summation that there was a fundamental error in the process of suspension which brought this about, after he had to dismiss a number of cases of repeat offences by disqualified drivers, because of inadequate warning of impending suspension.
We believe that this bill may provide more incentive for people to pay their fines, by reminding them in more detail of restrictions that may be pending, and will certainly prevent challenges to the validity of the administrative systems in the courts. The Canberra Liberals will be supporting this bill.
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