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House of Assembly - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-03-26 Daily Xml
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MOTOR VEHICLES (PRACTICAL DRIVING TESTS) AMENDMENT BILL

Introduction and First Reading

Mr HANNA (Mitchell) (11:08): Obtained leave and introduced a bill for an act to amend the Motor Vehicles Act 1959. Read a first time.

Second Reading

Mr HANNA (Mitchell) (11:09): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I will briefly outline the legislation. I bring to the House of Assembly a proposal for our elderly drivers to be required to undergo an on-road driving test to maintain their licence past the age of 85 years. The second aspect of this is to require a further on-road driving test every two years in order to maintain the licence.

The current situation in South Australia is that, from 70 years, people are required to undergo medical tests with a view to their fitness for driving. However—and this is quite obvious—that does not necessarily correlate with driving ability. The other important aspect of these medical tests is that they are generally done through an interview with their general medical practitioner.

The GP has an ongoing and familiar relationship with the people going to be assessed, and I suggest that there is some reluctance to come up with a recommendation based on those assessments that actually precludes people from driving further. I recognise that taking away someone's licence because of inability to drive is a very serious matter, and there are already issues of isolation and incapacity for elderly people. These are very serious issues, but at the same time the issue of road safety is probably more important.

There is a lot of focus on the safety and the danger of younger drivers, and insurance companies recognise the high risk of younger drivers through increased premiums for under 25 year old drivers and so on. However, a number of people in the community have observed to me that there are risks with older drivers as well, and in some cases the risks appear to be even more pronounced than in the case of younger drivers.

Of course, one cannot make generalisations about drivers. There are some excellent 90 year old drivers, I am sure, and there are some terrible middle-aged drivers, and there are some average younger and older drivers, but this parliament is about making rules that apply to fit the general population, as best we can.

The proposal I bring to this place is not entirely new. The requirement for 85 year olds to have an on-road driving test in order to continue with their driver's licence is currently the law in New South Wales, Western Australia and Tasmania. In New Zealand the requirement is to undergo an on-road driving test at the age of 80, with subsequent testing every two years in order to maintain one's licence.

There are also a couple of US states which have this requirement. I refer to Illinois and Delaware. There are a couple of other US states which have requirements for on-road driver testing, but it is triggered by some cause such as frequency of accidents and so on.

There is, I admit, debate about the correlation between age and the likelihood of crash. There is some evidence to suggest that older drivers are at risk and create more risk beyond a certain age, and we would expect that. However, I am prepared to admit that that is not conclusive.

What I can say on the basis of the research that I have done is that, for people over 70, it would seem that car driver fatalities arising from road crashes are over-represented, and, in terms of the nature of crashes in which older drivers are involved, there is a higher representation of those crashes at intersections.

When we look at younger drivers, the 18 to 25 year old age group, there is a higher representation of crashes resulting from speeding and overtaking. So you are looking at different driver behaviour; nonetheless, accidents at intersections can be just as fatal and just as dangerous as any other kind.

So, I bring this to the parliament knowing that I am taking some political risk, because my opponents might write to all the 85 year olds in my electorate and say that Kris Hanna wants to do this terrible thing, but I am willing to cop that in the interests of road safety.

I just add a couple of points about the demographics. According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the number of people aged 85 years or more will rise from 216,100 in 1997 to between 440,500 and 442,500 in 2021, and reaching between 1.1 million and 1.2 million in 2051. I ask people to imagine what it is going to be like with double or five times the number of people aged over 85 on the roads. I think that older people—particularly those over 85—ought to be able to continue to drive when they are fit to do so. I think it is a matter of public safety to ask people to undergo a test at the age of 85, and a subsequent test every two years. I realise that that is an imposition on people aged 85 and over, but I ask them to consider that small sacrifice for the sake of the road safety of all motorists and pedestrians. I commend the bill to the house.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. I.F. Evans.

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