Many new drivers are taking advantage of how easy it is to get a truck licence in Queensland, says a former staff member at the Department of Transport and Main Roads (TMR) familiar with the state’s licence training procedures.
The source, who wished to remain anonymous, told Big Rigs that drivers based in Victoria and NSW are even faking residency in Queensland to exploit the state’s less stringent training and test requirements.
This allows them to travel up to complete their heavy combination (HC) or multi-combination (MC) training and assessment, to give themselves a better chance of passing – even though they may not have the skills required to make them a safe driver, he said.
They then simply transfer their licence back to their home state. The source said tests are easier in Queensland for a number of reasons.
“In NSW and Victoria, the truck you take out needs to be loaded to 75 per cent of its maximum GVM.
“In Queensland, it’s empty. So, you don’t need to be good at braking with a load – it’s almost like driving a car, because if the lights turn orange, you can just jump on the brakes and it will pull up.
“You don’t need to think ahead and start slowing down in case the light changes, etc.”
Another example he shared was the requirements around reversing.
“For your HR test, according to the official guidelines, you need to reverse the truck around a corner without hitting the curb or bumping into anything.
“But depending on where you go for your test up here [in Queensland], if they ‘can’t find’ a suitable place for you to reverse around a corner, they just get you to reverse in a straight line for 20 or 30 metres.
“That doesn’t require anything special – if you can’t do that, you probably shouldn’t be on the road at all.”
The source also thinks truck schools in Queensland get away with far too much and more random audits need to be taking place.
“The quality of schools up here is abysmal and they’re not getting audited unless there’s a reason to audit them,” he added.
“Anybody and everybody is getting a licence, and these schools continue to fly under the radar.”
The insider said TMR first discovered the residency ruse because there were a few driving schools where many people who were passing their tests had listed the same address, usually one that the school provided and monitored.
However, once TMR cracked down on this, he said truckies got craftier.
“They started saying, ‘Alright, if you want to change your home address to Queensland, we need to see a home loan or a rental agreement.
“But they accept handwritten rental agreements, so truckies realised that if anyone writes ‘Joe Bloggs lives out here and pays $500 rent a week’ then they’ll take that as proof of residency.”
In a written statement, a TMR spokesperson told Big Rigs that due to “some concerns” raised about the process to obtain an MC licence in Queensland, all RTOs have recently been through a thorough audit or have one in progress.
The audits to date have resulted in five Service Provider Deeds being terminated.
“In each instance, significant non-compliance was identified during the RTO audits,” the spokesperson said.
TMR said it had commenced 19 audits of MC RTOs, with seven of those completed and closed with no action.
The spokesperson also added that TMR no longer accepts bank statements or declarations signed by a landlord as proof of residency.