Page 2739 - Week 09 - Thursday, 8 August 2013
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
driving on our roads, whether it is speeding, whether it is burnouts, whether it is racing—all those behaviours that are of concern to the community, drink driving, drug driving. All of these are matters that can be addressed through improving the resources available to our police. This funding means four additional dedicated vehicles, with the RAPID camera technology deployed, to further strengthen the road safety operations team.
The government will also continue with work to improve the way our graduated licensing scheme operates, recognising that we still see too many novice drivers ending up with speeding offences or with other dangerous or antisocial driving offences. As a result, we are looking at how we restructure that licensing scheme to improve the education available to young drivers and reduce the prospect that they end up with a speeding ticket, end up with some other charge being faced in court, because of their poor driving behaviour. And we want to reduce the overrepresentation of novice drivers in ACT road crash data.
We are also going to continue rewarding good drivers. In the most recent budget we are providing a discount on licence renewals for those drivers who have maintained a clean driving record. People who have not incurred penalties for speeding or demerit points on their licence for a set period will receive a 20 per cent discount on their renewal fee for their driving licence as a way of sending some positive signals as well as some sanctions for drivers to do the right thing.
These are the types of measures the government is putting in place as part of our ongoing effort to improve safety on our roads and make the travelling public safer. (Time expired.)
MADAM SPEAKER: Supplementary question, Mr Gentleman.
MR GENTLEMAN: Minister, can you please outline for the Assembly how initiatives such as RAPID are contributing to road safety?
MR CORBELL: I thank Mr Gentleman for the supplementary. As I have previously indicated in my answer, we are expanding the road safety operations team to deliver more RAPID camera capability into ACT Policing. Members may be interested in understanding the scope and capacity of this system. Between 1 July last year and 30 April this year, a total of 830,852 vehicles were identified and scanned in the ACT. When you consider that the size of the ACT public and private vehicle fleet is smaller than that, you can understand the capacity of the camera technology to scan vehicles on multiple occasions.
Between 1 July last year and 30 April this year, ACT Policing issued 1,160 traffic infringement notices as a result of the utilisation of the RAPID camera technology. That equates to an average of one detection or ticket issue for every 716 vehicles scanned. That can include everything from driving unlicensed and unregistered, to having outstanding fines, to speeding and a whole range of other offences.
This really demonstrates the capability of the RAPID technology. We know that we can safely move away from registration stickers being required on vehicles because
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video