Australia’s governments must take a new approach to truck driver licensing to increase safety and encourage more people to join the industry, said Australian Trucking Association (ATA) chair Mark Parry.
In a statement to mark the release of the ATA’s plan for truck driver licensing, which was developed with the advice of a Workforce and Driver Training Summit held in June, Parry said the licensing arrangements for truck drivers were inadequate.
“The problems became apparent to all in February 2016, when the crew of a B-double proved unable to reverse their overheight truck out of the entrance to a Sydney tunnel,” said Parry, who is also the managing director of Ron Finemore Transport.
“The association of government transport agencies, Austroads, has done an extended review of driver licensing, but governments now need to act.
“Many driving training organisations do a great job. Others train to a price or a time. Driver trainers must be assessed more rigorously, by experienced auditors who understand driver training and competencies.”
Parry said there should be minimum behind the wheel training times.
He said the driver training experts at the recent ATA summit proposed longer training times for discussion than the ones put forward by Austroads.
“At present, truck drivers progress through the licensing classes on a time basis. For example, once you have a medium or heavy rigid truck licence, you must wait a year before you can get a heavy combination (HC) licence.
“You are not required to use your licence and build up your driving skills and experience.”
Austroads has proposed that drivers should also be able to advance through the licence classes based on their driving hours, with accelerated progression for drivers who are supervised.
“There would still be training and assessment requirements,” Parry added.
“We support these new pathways, but the existing time-based option should be removed. There is no connection between the passage of time and driving skill.”
Parry said the current MC class should be split into two classes, to reflect the extra skills required to drive combinations such as triple road trains, quads and quins.
“Drivers with existing MC licences would be automatically assigned to the higher MC2 class,” he said.
Parry said driver medicals should be part of the licensing process and should be done before training gets underway.
“Our summit participants told us about job applicants who had gone to the time and effort of getting a licence and then being offered a job, only to discover during their employer induction that they did not meet the driver medical standards,” he said.
Parry said that strengthening driver licensing and training would encourage more people to join the industry.
“Truck driving is highly skilled, but the issues with the licensing system mean that many drivers end up having to learn critical safety skills and attitudes on the job,” he said.
“Many people who might consider a driving job can’t see a connection between getting a licence and having the skills to work safely and confidently in the industry.
“Strengthening driver licensing is a vital step toward encouraging more people with a safety-first attitude to join the industry,” he said.
The 2024 Workforce and Driver Training Summit also developed industry approaches to vocational education, short courses and licensing drivers from overseas. The ATA said it will announce its plans on these issues soon.
Yeh well what do u expect when you and licences out willy nilly to foreigners that have none or little experience in our country ,some of us have started with a LT ,then HR then HC ,MC and that’s over years of driving our country and city roads .
Exactly right Mark. The times driving down the south east coast with very narrow roads and bridges that only have enough room for 1 truck at a time, to have head lights of the on coming truck that is near killing you to be someone from overseas that doesn’t speak English. Enough is enough, if you can’t speak our language or drive a car on our roads properly, stay away from our heavy haulage industry
Exactly Mark so Many in the Industry started when we were very young before eighteen wether it was older experienced operators or predominantly in the country experiencenig all facets of Trucks and Machinery and Mechanical know how,It has been a passion for all concerned to be involved and a life long commitment tired and saddened by the amount of good older operators leaving the industry feeling concerned about the overseas steerers coming towards them so many have tried to advise and help those who are the problem and just falls on deaf ears,How many more deaths is going to take before the Government officials do something about this. Fair Go
Just handing out MC2 licenses to anyone whom already has an MC just shows how out of touch the ATA really are. Thousands of current MC drivers never have and never will drive anything bigger then a B Double. Drivers should have to produce evidence that they are both employed by a company that operates MC2 class vehicles and that they are adequately qualified to do so.
If they automatically give it to you then we will see a rush of people upgrading just to get the higher level. I have seen a steady flow of MC drivers whom try Quads after only ever having B Double experience and fail miserably. Thankfully they were under training conditions at the time.
Medicals for MC should be done by government doctors free of charge not medical practises that charge $140