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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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MOTOR VEHICLES (DRIVER LICENSING) AMENDMENT BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 14 November 2013.)

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (11:45): I rise to speak on the Motor Vehicles (Driver Licensing) Amendment Bill 2013 and indicate that the opposition is supporting this legislation. The bill has been debated and passed in another place, and minister Hunter, the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, has steered the passage of that bill through the other place.

The opposition had presented an amendment to provide for the exemption that would be granted under the processes of this bill to be conditional upon the completion of an intensive drivers education course and an assessment of competency. That amendment has been rejected by the government and, accordingly, the bill before us is in its original form.

The opposition is very disappointed that the amendment has been rejected in circumstances where the presentation of this bill for our consideration and the information provided in briefings all clearly aligned with the recognition of the importance of an educative role being played in the event of the exemption being granted in circumstances which we accept.

I will just outline the purpose of the bill for our house. The government claimed that there were a number of impediments to those in Aboriginal communities—in particular the APY and MT lands—being able to access, obtain and retain employment opportunities when they were resident on the lands, and they were not able to access driver's licences, or they had but had lost them, and circumstances prevailed where they were disadvantaged as a result of those circumstances.

On this side of the house we fully recognise that education is a very important passage and pathway to opportunities in life. We also recognise that a driver's licence is often a passport to having success. What are the problems? The government says that the process of obtaining a driver's licence in South Australia through a graduated licensing scheme is onerous, expensive and inalienable to many people who live on these remote communities. Why is this the case?

The government acknowledges that there are difficulties in complying with the graduated licensing scheme, most specifically the requirement for 75 hours of supervised driving experience having to be undertaken before the young person can proceed along this graduated scheme. The house is familiar with our graduated licensing scheme, because we have only recently debated legislation to introduce even more layers of compliance that are necessary and, from our side at least, some unnecessary and onerous aspects to which we are opposed.

But, we all agree, I think, in this house, on the importance of people who are learning to drive to have as much opportunity as possible to do that in a cost-effective way, over a period of time during that vulnerable period of being at risk when they are just learning to drive, especially after the L-plate period, where one has a responsible adult, perhaps a parent or older sibling, in the car helping the new driver learn the ropes. In that first 12 months of the P1, we understand the significance of the vulnerability in that period.

So, what has happened is that in having a graduated licensing scheme, which goes from L-plates to P1 to P2, now under the government's recent bill there is going to be a restriction one way or the other until you are about 20 if you started this exercise when you turned 16. That is a very long period of time, and part of that process is to have 75 hours of supervised driving experience in the first tranche.

There are some aspects of this scheme that are not required in remote or rural areas already. For example, my understanding is that the hazard test, which under the recent amendments was brought forward, needed to be undertaken at the local Services SA office on a computer at the time of transition from the L-plate to the P1-plate. We are happy with that, but that is not a process which I understand is necessarily imposed in remote parts of South Australia, because quite clearly there is not a Services SA office out there in reasonable proximity for people.

So, for that little aspect of it, there are already some exemptions, so I do make the point that it is quite a long period and there are a number of steps that mostly young people—but some of course start this later in life—have to progress through to be able to acquire their driver's licence. There is a limitation of access to services, which I have touched on. We agree that, in remote parts of South Australia (and particularly the APY and MT lands are classic areas), there is limited access to services.

The government also points out that there is the cost of progressing through the licensing system. I almost had to laugh when I read that, actually, because whose fault is that? The cost of actually undertaking these levels is onerous, and of course it is even more onerous if you go along to each of these steps and you fail certain steps and have to pay the fee again and come back and make another appointment and the like. So, these processes are not cheap and, of course, if one is on a limited income—a pension or a low income—then that is even more of a financial burden to them.

There is the limited access to roadworthy vehicles, and we agree that probably in the Aboriginal areas that we are talking about, in the APY and MT lands, this would be a challenge, not because there are not roadworthy vehicles up there—there are actually lots of vehicles up there—but they are not necessarily accessible to young Indigenous youths who are living on the lands. They may be owned and operated by government representatives, or they may be for people who are traversing the lands.

Just because there are plenty of vehicles up there it does not necessarily mean they have access to them. Certainly, if they are owned within families on the lands, there is the issue as to whether they are in a sufficiently roadworthy state to be a useful tool to learn to drive in and of course to be tested in.

Then there is the cessation of business orders on the client files of a number of residents. As I understand the process, which I assume is still the case, when someone is convicted of an offence—it may have nothing to do with driving offences; completely unrelated, in fact—if fines are issued and penalties apply, a failure to meet with the fine obligations can ultimately result in a cessation of business order, which means that the person then cannot be served.

You cannot actually go into a Service SA office and say, 'I want to progress the next stage of my driver's licence,' because they have a bar on them that restricts them from being able to access that continued service. Part of the penalty process is that, until you have paid your fine and the cessation of business ordered is removed, you cannot get access to further services. Obviously, if someone had a COB order on them, that would be an impediment for someone being able to progress.

Difficulties have been raised in acknowledging a notice of disqualification within the required time. That speaks for itself. There are difficulties in booking a practical driver's test. I do not understand why that would be particular, unless it is to a specific agency, but I suspect that is more a question of accessibility to supervising drivers or qualified persons. Next, they say there are increased costs and complexities associated with obtaining a driver's licence from a remote community. We agree with that.

There is not too much that does not have an increased cost or is more complex as a result of being in a remote regional community. This is just one of many, to be honest. Even an apple costs a lot more, obviously, because it has to be transported in a refrigerated vehicle to be available on the lands. Of course, there is massive extra cost in logistics and transport for just about everything. Distance can be a significant threshold in raising a barrier against accessibility.

We are told there are language barriers. I do not think that is unfair. Again, it would cross a number of areas where children may not be sufficiently proficient in English to be able to understand all the tests that are required to be followed through if one were living in the city. I think it is fair to say, though, that on the occasions I have visited the APY lands there is a high level of understanding amongst the younger children of the English language for those who are attending school. Indeed, a number of these children do have an opportunity to travel to Adelaide.

Some are resident under our Wiltja program, which provides education at the Woodville school and which provides children with a number of opportunities. I think it is fair to say that, of the 3,000-odd people who are living in the APY lands, for example, an enormous number of that population are mobile, have sometimes come from other regions and are not necessarily Anangu people. In any event, we accept there is sometimes a language barrier.

Then, of course, there is the lack of qualified supervised driving personnel to train L-plate drivers on the land and a lack of understanding of the driver licensing-related requirements. So, there are a number of thresholds that effectively become barriers to a younger group in the community being able to acquire or have reinstated a driver's licence. The importance of a driver's licence, when someone wants to live in a remote area and there is not necessarily employment in that area—or, even if there is, it requires a vehicle to travel to and from that work or to do that work—is probably self-evident.

The reason the opposition is agreeable to progressing this significant exemption and granting the minister the power to grant an exemption to overcome some of these hurdles is, I think, in direct response to the fact that we accept there is a need and we accept that the government's position, in the work it has done on this, has justified us granting the minister this power. We also agree with the process, that is, that it be by ministerial exemption.

What is very puzzling to us is the government's refusal to add into this process of exemption the condition of having an intensive driver education course, as it has described it, and an assessment of competency. In everything we have been presented with, there has been an understanding of and proposals put regarding the need for the exemption (for all the reasons it has said), and that it would be coupled with and supported by a different approach; namely, that there would be some form of intensive driver education.

Over the course of the development of this we had briefings—and I thank those from the department who provided those briefings—on the bill, and they recognised that there was clearly going to be provision for a road safety education and intensive driver training program. We were not only told about it, we were given the detail of how it was going to work. We were pleased to hear the process that would be undertaken, and that there would be access to a training facility.

I made a note of the particular facility that was being developed on the lands to accommodate this. The training centre—which, if not already open, is to be opened at Umuwa on the APY lands—would have personnel retained to provide the course and would have access to vehicles for the purposes of the course. There was an indication that the cost would be something like a million dollars a year for the first 12 eligible persons, as nominated by elders in the community, to do the training and complete that work.

These are young men who are over 20, so they are not as young as those we would normally be starting out on a graduated licensing scheme, but they are people who would be nominated as being suitable. Funds would be necessary for them, and there would be $120,000 to provide some process for them to be exempt.

I found it extraordinary. I should say the language of the minister, in his contribution to the parliament, is always on the basis that we need to provide a streamlined, different pathway for these people. 'For all these reasons, it is important that they have their licence, and we can do it if we bring in the personnel, if we give them some incentive and training and provide them with a car to do it in. These are all the necessary ingredients that will cost money, but we are going to be committing to do this.'

I suppose the only inconsistency with all of that is that I subsequently had a meeting with representatives of the Motor Accident Commission. When I raised with them the importance of their contribution to road safety and being able to help support this scheme, which we understood was in the form of a fund that could be accessed to do it, their indication was that that would not be happening and they would not be financing this.

It is not for us on our side of the house to say where government gets its money from. We like to have it disclosed in the budget each year but, if the Motor Accident Commission are saying to us that it is not going to be available and that occurs, then who is going to pay for this and where is it going to come from and out of what budget, or is the government planning to simply allow these applicants to have a licence with no threshold, with no training, with nothing?

That would be easy. A minister could simply say, 'Give me the 12 names. They have been nominated; we will just simply sign them off. We will ask them to do a bit of extra training down the track, but we will give them a licence.' They might be 25, they might have had a licence and lost it, they might be disqualified from being able to access it for one of the other reasons I have said, or they may be in a situation where they have never applied for a licence, they have not got much money, they have not got their own car, but it is known that they have been driving around and they think they will be okay.

So, you get someone to sign a form to say that these are the nominated people and that the minister would like you to sign a form here granting exemption with no actual threshold of training or assessment being necessary. Now, that is a concern, because that would be entirely inconsistent with what has been presented by the government and in briefings, but we raise it as a concern because the very source of the funds to actually support such an initiative at a cost of $1 million a year are saying they are not going to be providing for it.

It is true that the government has had the benefit of the generosity of the Motor Accident Commission for this year's budget. The government says that the Motor Accident Commission had a really good year—it is like having a good crop—so it decided that the Motor Accident Commission would give $100,000 to the government for road safety initiatives. This is the way it has been described by the government.

The Motor Accident Commission says, 'Yes, we are happy.' Did it actually have any say about how it was going to be applied? 'No.' Anyway, whatever happened, the government has got the $100 million out of the Motor Accident Commission, it has got its hands on that money and spent $52 million of it on projects it has identified as being road safety initiatives, and there is another $48 million sitting in a fund, waiting to be allocated by a new task force—which, I think, has now actually been put together by the government—to apply the balance. Can it come out of that? Apparently not.

I am at a bit of a loss because we are told one thing and clearly the situation is another. That does not mean that the government cannot find the $1 million a year to do this. However, the fact that they have resisted our saying, 'Look, you can set conditions for these things and we think as the minister it is reasonable for you to be able to set conditions', at the very least, surely, if their intent is genuine, they would say, 'Yes, a driver intensification course; a snapshot collapsed into an intensive period of training; have a test to see that you are up to standard.' You would think that would be a basic condition that the government would accommodate. No, it has not. There is not much point in our putting it up again: we can count and we know we cannot win that argument here.

We are not going to reject the proposal to make it easier for people who are disadvantaged, young people in this situation who are disadvantaged on the APY and MT lands. We are not going to do that, but we are very disappointed that the government, when it had the opportunity to really secure what it said the situation was going to be in the legislation, has backed away from it at 100 miles. It is quite disappointing and it is also not very helpful in the lawmaking process here which time and time again we have been victims of because of them indicating one thing and then really delivering up another.

It does not give us a lot of confidence that they are genuinely interested in ensuring that we give these young people an opportunity. Could it just be that they are picking up this project, an excellent idea, and trotting it in a few months before an election? That is possible—have not actually worked out where we are going to get the money from yet but we just need to push this through. It would be very disappointing if that is in fact their objective here because we think there is merit in the process of providing some exemption.

Again, I am a little sceptical about what the government's motive is in introducing this. I do not see this as an issue of road safety, although the road safety minister has the passage of this bill in this house. In fact, without conditions specified in the bill—for example, of having the intensive driver training—it is totally inconsistent with the road safety message that the government presented to us as a parliament just weeks ago when it insisted that we tighten up and add more layers or levels to the graduated licensing scheme.

Identify the circumstances, the geographical barriers for these people and recognise that we could work out a new program that is not all 'one size fits all'—a great idea—but they were in here preaching to us only weeks ago that it was necessary to take all P1 drivers off the road between midnight and 5am. There was a major road safety issue attached to this. We needed to act to ensure that we protect the lives of young people, and one of the initiatives was that we take them off the road between midnight and 5am.

Sure, they added some conditions in under pressure and all those things but the message was very clear: road safety is the highest priority of this government blah, blah, blah. We heard it all. Hang the inconvenience—so what if young people's parents in the country have to get out of bed in the middle of the night; so what if they had to rely on other people? That is one message to us—and we accepted a number of the initiatives. We have consistently accepted initiatives that we think are of demonstrative benefit to young people learning to drive. That is why we have actually ended up with quite a long and intensive process relative to what we did, of course, in the generation of most of the people sitting in this room.

I do not know about you, Mr Deputy Speaker, but it was a little bit easier in the days when we got a licence. I think I remember driving to the police station at 16, and pulling up and the local constable came out and said, 'We'll just drive around the block, Vickie, and we'll come in and get your licence.' This was quite normal. It is very important that we recognise that, because of the age group vulnerability the statistics in our fatalities in particular, but also in serious injuries, we should do something about it.

We have acquiesced to this. We recognise the importance of that. However, on the flipside, they come in here and say, 'Let's introduce a program that's going to strip away all these other layers that we say are an impediment to this particular disadvantaged group.' And we say, 'Yep, that's a very good idea, because we recognise the importance of the licence.' Yet they do not allow to be put with it the necessary prerequisite, that we see, for there being a balance between the opportunity to drive and get a job, or keep a job, or do a job, and the road safety imperative that goes with it.

The government has announced, with some very significant federal government funding, the upgrading of the main road into the APY lands based on road safety requirements, initiatives that are part of the road safety agenda. These are all important things when the government wants to say, 'We care about road safety.'

Well, if they care about the road safety of the young people that they are proposing to give a licence to they would commit, and they would say to this parliament, 'Yes, we have allocated the money for this; yes, we will ensure that the eligible persons who apply for this, or who are nominated from the community, are given the support that they will need to be able to have these exemptions,' otherwise, we are just completely dismissing the importance of the road safety and protection of this particular group, as if they are not disadvantaged enough.

The government themselves, in their own contribution, have highlighted the high level of data of young people being representative in our fatality and injury statistics. It is absolutely puzzling to me, perhaps it is because they have not really thought about the detail, and they are keen to try and look like they really care about this project. I do not think that it is a situation where the idea of providing this extra intensive training, and the idea of the importance of giving people access to a licence to be able to get employment and the like, has just suddenly dropped out of the sky.

This is not some light bulb moment that somebody has published in the middle of this year, with the government thinking it is a great initiative—'We will see if we can get some support from the opposition, we'll go ahead with it.' Oh, no; this whole concept has been around for years, and it just seems as though the government has been kicking and screaming in coming to the barrier on this. I could project that perhaps it is the fact that it is under the era of new minister for Aboriginal affairs, the Hon. Ian Hunter, in the other place, that there is some enlightenment on this. This is an issue that has been brought to the attention of our government many times, and over the last few years in particular submissions have been presented.

I wish to acknowledge, as indeed minister Hunter did in another place, the work of the Palya fund and trust. This is a group of trustees who operate a trust on behalf of some of the arts community on the APY lands, and they do great work. It is my understanding, briefly, of the material that they publish that they are a body that is interested in encouraging Aboriginal people, local people, to have projects and ideas to resolve the health and problems that they might have in their communities and to raise funds to apply to those projects.

For the transparency and accountability requirements, they have a board of trustees. Judge Peter McCusker is one who I am aware is a trustee, and who has for years now been promoting a number of projects for the advancement of people in that community. One of the most important has been the Mutuka project, which is for training young Anangu people to obtain employment as drivers.

Members would probably be aware that in the APY lands, for example, at present there is a major camel project. It is different ways of dealing with a pest problem in the desert, namely, the huge numbers of camels and the destruction to the desert community. You cannot drive trucks or work in the rounding up of the camels, which are ultimately taken to the Peterborough meatworks, unless you have a driver's licence to get to work or to drive the trucks or to be in the field providing for this.

You cannot provide supply trucks for things in or out, whether it is art supplies or food coming in, or other produce going out—the artwork and so on that is done—unless you have a driver's licence. Whether you are driving a car, a truck or a utility, you need to have that as a prerequisite. As I understand it, the Mutuka project ('mutuka' being the Pitjantjatjara for the word 'motor car') is one which provides the training. It is conducted under the instruction of qualified people, of course. It teaches training in vehicle care and basic maintenance, and it trains people how to drive different types of vehicles.

You only have to live in a remoter part of South Australia to understand the importance of understanding how to operate a vehicle and change the oil and a tyre and all the necessary things if you are living in a remote area. Great; this is very important. One of my sons says he does not need to learn to change a tyre because that is what we have the RAA for. That may be so, but for people who live in remote parts of the state, it is very important that they learn these skills.

The Palya Trust has been very active in this field in developing this project, because they understand the importance of giving these young people an opportunity. There are others in the community, particularly in the transport industry. I think Ray Scott is another one who has been active in this space to try to give young people a chance to pursue a career, but they need a driver's licence. For so many opportunities, it is a prerequisite.

I thank Judge McCusker and others who have been presenting this over a number of years now. I appreciate at least that the current minister, the Hon. Ian Hunter, has taken up the initiative, but there does need to be some accountability, I suggest, for the failure to agree to the importance of having the testing. I just conclude by saying that we were presented with the project being operative in the Northern Territory, of a similar nature. They provide training. Interestingly, they do not provide it in Alice Springs. They provide it along the coast and in some other areas where there are job opportunities, rather than in remote parts.

My understanding is that when this initiative was first flagged, it was actually flagged to be an option available in the northern suburbs and at Port Augusta where there would be automatic access to other types of employment, certainly a more diverse opportunity of employment. That would be logical actually but, nevertheless, the government has decided they will present this as an initiative in the APY lands and MT lands. That is fine, but they do need to dedicate the funds to do it and they do need to ensure that the training facility is resourced with people to train and the vehicles to be able to train in before they progress this initiative.

I will conclude by saying that there is quite a bit of industry amongst the community who live on the APY lands, nowhere near enough perhaps, but it is fair to say that there has been an extraordinary advance in the work in arts, particularly on the APY lands. When I first visited Ernabella when I was a young girl in about 1976, I went down there from Alice Springs with a truckload full of art supplies because my grandmother lived in the Northern Territory and she had an art gallery and art supplies business.

I can remember driving down in a non-air-conditioned truck and it took forever but, anyway, we got down there. This was pre the APY act. Obviously this area had the support of the Lutheran community that operated at Ernabella and I have to say it was a very different environment. There was a little school there. I remember it because I can remember taking in boxes of paints and paintbrushes as we unloaded the truck.

Thirty years later I went back to the same town. It had changed its name to Ernabella. It was still geographically a very beautiful place, but I was shocked to see how the built infrastructure in that environment had changed. A new aged-care facility had been built there and there had been some other infrastructure developed. On recollection, there had been a problem with the health clinic that had been burnt down and a few other things. All of that side was disappointing, but what was really encouraging to see was that with the elder women particularly in the community and in the other towns, such as Fregon, there had been a pulling together, there had been a strengthened resilience, there had been an advancement of the arts opportunities amongst those communities.

It was fantastic to see because they had diversified, not just to paintwork and woodwork, which had been more common in the mid-seventies, but to many other types of art with different textiles and fabrics, and I was immensely impressed at what had been occurring. It just seemed to be able to give an enormous amount of energy to an enterprise which they clearly loved to do and which could generate income and self worth in those communities to be able to advance some economic independence which is consistent with the Palya trust's objective and that is that the local people work out solutions and work towards those solutions themselves. That was immensely encouraging.

Where good people, like Judge Peter McCusker, have worked to ensure that we give those people an opportunity and encourage the advancement of that, we on this side of the house support that, but we do say that, if you want to change the rules, if you want to be able to modify this very significantly—here we are going to give the minister complete power to be able to grant the exemptions and to be able to grant the licences for all the reasons we have discussed—then at the very least there must be this commitment of the resources to do it. We think that should be in the legislation because at this point there is little trust left when we get told one thing and then the money starts to evaporate around us. That is deeply disappointing, and we want that commitment to be given.

If the minister says today, 'We don't want to have it in the legislation. We want to be able to keep the flexibility. We'll set all that by regulation down the track,' let him say that, but we say that it is critical that we do not let these people go out to pursue their opportunity of employment with their driver's licence without the protection of those two qualifying features to protect passengers in their vehicles or other road users with whom they might share the road.

Mr VAN HOLST PELLEKAAN (Stuart) (12:30): I rise on behalf of the people of Stuart to make quite a few brief points. The APY lands are not in the electorate of Stuart but there is a strong connection between the electorate of Stuart and a range of Aboriginal communities, including the APY lands. Certainly I have had a reasonably strong connection with that area in the past through my former business interests on the Stuart Highway and, of course, a bit with regard to the Natural Resources Committee since coming into parliament.

I will first say very clearly that the opposition supports the intent of this legislation and compliments Judge McCusker for pushing it along. He was, among others, the person who brought it to people's attention. I was very fortunate to meet with Judge McCusker and the Leader of the Opposition Steven Marshall to discuss this several months ago. Certainly the two key aspects were trying to improve safety and also trying to improve opportunities for employment. There are others, but they are really the two that stand out to me as the key opportunities here, and they are supported by myself and my opposition colleagues.

The issue that the member for Bragg mentioned, that there should perhaps be a heightened focus on intensive training and on capacity testing, is quite important. She also mentioned the issue of cost and where the cost is coming from. I will not go back over all of that, but that is an important issue, not that the cost would not be justified but that, of course, the cost needs to be well spent. It needs to be effectively spent. If you are not giving the very best training available and if you are not testing the people who have undertaken that training, then obviously the cost will not be as well spent as it could be.

I think there would have to be some guidelines with regard to how often a person gets to participate in a program such as this. The delivery of a program to the appropriate person would be terrific, but if for some reason they do not actually make it through the program, if they do not attain the skills or the right attitude necessary, do you give them one chance, two chances or three chances? There would have to be a cut-off point where you would say to this person, 'You have been given this opportunity and you haven't grasped it with both hands in the way we had hoped you would, so we're now going to give it to somebody else. You won't get another go.' Determining where that point in time is is going to be difficult, but I think it is important that that certainly does happen.

Past the point at which ideally a program such as this is put into place, I think it is very important that the community—and I use that word in an all-encompassing fashion—then accepts that adherence to the standard road rules and obligations of being a licensed driver in a registered roadworthy car must be applied across the whole landscape. I think that is a very important thing. I know from personal experience that, number one, that is not the case and, number two, that it is very difficult to make it the case. I do not underestimate for a second how hard that is.

But, I think if a program and an opportunity like this is put into place, to allow Aboriginal people on the lands to essentially lift their game, to get a training opportunity, to take that training opportunity and learn to drive responsibly both in a practical, hands-on way but also with regard to attitude, that once that has been delivered and once it is thrown out and accepted, then it would be appropriate to take a much harsher view with regard to the application of existing laws with regard to people driving unregistered cars or driving unlicensed. I think that goes hand in hand: you give an opportunity to get away from the difficult circumstances that there are at the moment, but then it is perfectly fair to apply the rules that exist at the moment, as well. I think that is a very important aspect that must be applied here.

It would be remiss of me not to touch very briefly on the coincidence with other non-Aboriginal people living in remote South Australia. I do not suggest that they get access to the same sort of program, because I do think that generally the opportunities to learn to drive that are available for non-Aboriginal people in remote South Australia are sufficient. I think there are other issues that need to be addressed. For example, it is exceptionally difficult for a person living on a remote station in South Australia to get their vehicle inspected and given the tick of approval if, for some reason, it is found not to be roadworthy.

It is a very difficult practice indeed for a person who, quite appropriately, finds that their Toyota ute or whatever it happens to be is not roadworthy. They have a sticker on it and they are given a little bit of time to sort it out, but it is actually not that simple to get it inspected and brought back up to standard. So, I think that is something that needs to be addressed, but, with regard to the training, I think the access for non-Aboriginal people in equally remote parts of the state to get a licence is actually sufficient. It is not easy, but we do not need a special program for those people. There are some other things that need to be improved for those people.

With regard to this training program, I think it is a very positive thing. I would like to just touch on the legislation that has recently gone through the house here with regard to the extra rules and regulations applying to L and P-platers. The house and the minister know very well my views on that. I certainly did support some of those and I certainly did oppose some of those additional obligations, but I guess it would very important to know that those additional obligations that have been brought out to apply to South Australia would also apply equally to all people on the Aboriginal lands, and I say again, all people on the Aboriginal lands who have had the opportunity to go through a program like this, or for whom it has been deemed that the program would not be appropriate for one reason or another.

For me, it is a fantastic program and opportunity and quite appropriate, but once the opportunity has been given, all regular obligations that would be expected to apply anywhere, from King William Street all the way to the top of the Stuart Highway, Mount Gambier or Port Lincoln, should then start to be applied on the Aboriginal lands, as well. I think this is going to be a very important thing.

I guess I would also just say from the bottom of my heart that I would encourage any young man or woman who gets this opportunity on the lands to take it, grab it, do everything you possibly can. If there is going to be a program where appropriate vehicles, trainers and testing are going to be available for you so that you can get a driver's licence and so that you can start to access many of the opportunities that come with having a driver's licence, whether you live in suburban Adelaide, country South Australia or remote South Australia, please take this opportunity with both hands. It is a very important opportunity, and I really do encourage anybody on the lands who has the chance to do it to do so.

I would also like to just ask this house and also people who would provide this program and the people who would avail themselves of this program on the lands to consider what might be an unintended consequence of this opportunity, as well. It is fantastic for people to get a driver's licence and fantastic for them to be able to improve significantly their chances of getting employment, because really, until you have a regular income, it is impossible for somebody's life to really become all it can be.

It does not matter whether you are a disadvantaged person in metropolitan Adelaide or a disadvantaged person in remote South Australia, that is equally true. However, what is not equally true is that it is very likely that, if a young Aboriginal man or woman accesses regular full-time employment while they live on the Aboriginal lands, they may well move away from the Aboriginal lands. I am not saying that is a problem, but I am asking everybody who considers this issue to think about that very clearly.

It may well be that an unintended consequence of this program is that some of potentially the best and the brightest who will take the opportunity and succeed through this opportunity, with the best intentions of trying to improve the life and opportunities of all the people living on the lands, might move away from the lands and decide to pursue a broader life away and off the community.

No doubt, for those people that would be a fantastic opportunity that they would choose and take voluntarily, and if they did that I would respect their decision. I would say, 'Fantastic. Please, do whatever you want with your life. Make it as good as it can possibly be.' However, it might be that some of the people who remain on the lands lose their family members, their friends and potentially some of the best and brightest. That might be an unintended consequence of this. I think that is something that needs to be considered very carefully as well.

I certainly support the intent of this program. I strongly recommend that, once it is in place and people have had the opportunity, people on the lands driving unregistered vehicles and/or without a driver's licence must genuinely face the same outcomes as people who are doing that anywhere else. We must also consider the possibility that, through opportunity for individuals on the land, they might choose to leave the land, and there are a whole range of positives and negatives that go with that.

The Hon. L.R. BREUER (Giles) (12:42): I, of course, rise to support this measure, as the APY lands have been a very big part in my life over the last 16 years as the local member. I have spent many, many weeks in the APY lands over this time and am still learning about the APY lands, the people, the culture and the issues. I have had concern in the past about driver's licences and some of those issues, because it has been very difficult for the people in the lands.

I have had a sort of love/hate relationship over the years with the people of the APY lands (Anangu) because I have represented the government, but I have always tried to do my best for the people there, understood their issues and worked as hard as I could, and it has certainly caused me a lot of grief in my time. I believe that so many of the issues can be sorted out quite simply, but bureaucracy often takes over. There are cultural issues and often legal issues, and tardiness prevents some of these things from happening. It still amazes me that this is the case.

However, I believe this measure is a very positive measure that will assist those people. Often there are a lot of problems through lack of understanding of the culture, the people and certainly of the isolation. Most public servants, ministers, journalists, etc. fly in and they do not understand how far away it is from both Adelaide and Alice Springs, which tends to be more of a centre for them rather than Adelaide. People do lack that understanding of the isolation of where they are actually living and the transport problems, etc. that occur because of that.

I have to say that in my 16 years in parliament I have certainly seen some great changes in what is happening there. While it is very confronting for somebody who goes to the lands for the first time at this stage, I can truly say that I have seen some immense changes and I am pleased that this has happened. I am not going to walk away and say that we have solved their problems, because certainly we have not, but I am heartened by the changes and by the attitudes in what is happening there are present.

I ask that those people who go there who become instant experts, after spending a couple of hours in the lands, back off, and that they always consult the people of the lands. They should always respect the elders who are there, they should respect the elected hierarchy there, and they should particularly look to and talk to the women, who are, I believe, the backbone of the APY lands.

Consultation is a very difficult process when you are working there, but it is achievable. People often think they can go there and solve things in one session, a couple of hours, but that is not the way things work in the APY lands or in Aboriginal culture. You need to sit down and you need to talk to them, you need to listen to what they are saying, and you need to wait.

You cannot do it quickly, and I think that is a mistake that governments have made for many years, particularly when working with communities like the APY lands. There is a different culture at work there. We make instant decisions because that is what we do as a Western culture; we make those instant decisions, but that does not work on the APY lands or any of the other Aboriginal communities that we have in this state.

I have known some wonderful people in the APY lands over my years, many of them now 'finished', as we say. These are Anangu people as well as people who have worked in the APY lands. When I first started those who worked in the APY lands were always accused of being 'missionaries, mercenaries or misfits'. That certainly was the case, and it caused many problems; however I believe this has changed now.

I see a whole new generation of people working there, people who do understand what is happening there and who are doing incredible jobs against all odds, because they are very isolated and are a long way from anywhere. They do not have things at their fingertips like we do, who are further south. There are people like Mark Weaver, who is one in particular that I will single out. He was a police officer (an ex police officer now) who is working in the lands. He does amazing work there, and he really does understand—

Mr Venning: Policeman of the Year.

The Hon. L.R. BREUER: Yes, he was a Policeman of the Year at one stage in South Australia. He is working up there and doing some amazing work. People like him, who do understand what it is all about, are wonderful. I have singled him out but I can name many, many others; he is just a great example of somebody who has devoted his life to the police force, worked in Coober Pedy with Aboriginal people and who decided to move into the lands. He has done some amazing work there.

With people like him, and others who are working there, I believe we can only go forward from now on. So I certainly support this sort of legislation, and I hope there will be other legislation like this that comes in. I believe it can improve prospects and, therefore, people's lives. Having a driving licence, etc., does make a difference to them. I say 'Ngapartji, ngapartji,' which sort of means 'You get back what you give,' and I think that is important for us to always keep in mind when we are working with the lands.

Working in the APY lands has been an incredible experience for me over the last 16 years, and I have certainly learned so much. One of my greatest honours was to become a Yankunytjatjara woman when I was given my Aboriginal name, worked with the women and went through the business there. I think that will always be my greatest honour during my time in parliament, apart from becoming the first woman Speaker.

However, I did get a great understanding of what goes on there. I hope I will be able to continue to work in the APY lands and with Aboriginal people. I think we really need to now seriously look to the future—what do they need, what else can we do to assist them—and go from there.

Mr VENNING (Schubert) (12:48): I want to commend the member for Giles for her fine speech. I found it most interesting. Driver's licences have been discussed many times in my time here, and I also commend the member for Bragg for her representation here this morning—and, indeed, on her wider role as the opposition spokesperson on transport and infrastructure.

I agree with the bill, and the need for it to help support Aboriginal people on the lands to obtain or regain a licence whilst ensuring driver standards and road safety outcomes are maintained. I have visited the lands on two occasions, and have found the place not only beautiful but also very challenging in relation to meeting the people there. It is a beautiful part of our state; we have not given these people some of our wastelands. It is certainly a magic place.

I have difficulty understanding why the average person cannot go there without a permit—I still have difficulty with that. I think it would help everybody if people could go there because they would appreciate the lands, they would appreciate the people there, and I am sure that the population at large would be a lot more sympathetic to what happens on those lands—likewise, with a bill like this.

I urge the people living on the lands to take the opportunity to avail themselves of the repercussions of this bill. We support this legislation and, in due course, our Aboriginal people, but with an amendment that there be a conditional exemption. The exemption will be conditional upon the completion of an intensive driver education course and assessment of competency.

As I think the member for Stuart just said, I would like to take the opportunity to say it is not just the people on the lands who have great difficulty in getting a driver's licence or renewing a driver's licence. When I got my licence many, many years ago, before most of you were born, I just did a driver's test with the local policeman at the Crystal Brook police station, and that was only three or four days after I had passed the questionnaire, which we all knew because it was the same questionnaire. You even knew the questions, so it was not that difficult. There was a minimal fee that was practically nothing.

I got my truck licence up-front, so I had the policeman sitting alongside me in a truck as I drove around the town. It was a big truck. It was a five-tonne truck, which was big in those days. I was like so many other country people who had come off the farm and had been driving for between six and eight years around the farm before sitting for the licence at the age of 16.

Today, these same people with the obvious driving skills have to go through the same driver education course as everybody else. I believe that applicants should have the opportunity to prove their proficiency first up, so they do not have to go through the whole course. Certainly, there are things in that course they should all do, particularly in relation to road safety, road rules and the competency of being able to use blinkers and things like that because, on the farm, those sort of things get missed out.

Certainly, they have to show competency in those things but, in relation to being able to handle a vehicle confidently, brakes and all those things, I think that there should be a shortcut for those people who can prove that they are competent. Many of these people live in an isolated area of our state, in similar areas to the lands, and they have the same problems as those mentioned in this bill. I will just talk about the difficulties that they can have in relation to getting a licence:

difficulties in complying with the GLS requirements, in particular the 75 hours of supervised driving experience;

the limited access to services;

the cost of progressing through the licensing system;

the cessation of business orders on client files with fines, which are often unrelated to driving offences, that compound to make payment of fines and removal of CRBs affordable;

difficulties in acknowledging a notice of disqualification within the required time;

difficulties in booking a practical driver's test; and

increased costs and complexities associated with obtaining a driver's licence in a remote community and other factors of isolation which cause them some grief.

The other problem with this is the cost of it. We encourage people to get a driver's licence. We want everybody to be licensed and registered, but consider what it costs today to get a driver's licence. This morning, I asked a young driver who had just got her licence what it actually cost her to get her licence, and I was horrified. A 16 year old had to pay $1,270 all up.

I think I have got this right. Once they passed the initial test, they got their L-plate. It costs $200 up-front to get the L-plate. Then they do the 75 hours of driving, of which 12 hours has to be with a qualified instructor at a minimum of $60 per hour—$720. What about those who go the full 75 hours? It would be unaffordable. To pass the P-test costs another $200, to go to P2 costs another $100 and to get the full licence costs another $50. My maths tells me that is $1,270. I think that is exorbitant.

It is quite exorbitant for a young person of, say, 16. Where do you think that money is coming from? It is coming from mum and dad. It is all very well if they have got a lazy $1,200 in their pocket. So, guess what happens? They either do not get their licence or they just do not drive.

A lot of the things we do in this place—okay, we choke ourselves with bureaucracy and all these rules but when it turns out to be practical a person living out in the donga thinks, 'Blow it; why bother? I'll go and buy an old VN Commodore for $800 and just drive it.' That may be okay on the farm, but when they drive in the city unlicensed it is not okay at all. We want them to be registered, we want them to be licensed and we want their vehicles to be roadworthy because, when you are driving on the road like I do, you expect that person to be safe.

No wonder we have a high proportion of unlicensed drivers in South Australia with these costs. I drive in excess of 60,000 kilometres a year and that is, in my time here, 1.5 million kilometres. I always trust that the person coming down the road towards me is competent, awake, licensed and insured. I believe that driver's licences on farms has always been a contentious issue with young farmers, 16 year olds, wanting to help with the harvest and drive the truck to the local silos.

It has always been a problem, and we have had to get exemptions and all sorts of things to allow a lad who is obviously competent to drive the truck (because usually it is only the father and son on that farm) to the local silo, which is usually only four, eight or 10 kilometres away. However, there is always a problem of making rules for everybody that really excludes them. Young farm workers and many young people coming out of school early have little choice but to go and work on a farm and they must be able to drive a truck. They are very much restricted as to what they can do on a farm if they are unable to drive a farm truck.

Over the years I have become a little concerned. We have always had the local police station do these tests, and other things like lifting defect notices in country communities in some instances. You now have to wait until the Regency Park people come around to lift defect notices or take them to Regency Park, and you have to get a licensed instructor to do the test when there is a police offer sitting there who is quite happy to do it. I know they are strapped for time, but I am sure in far-flung areas the police officer would be only too pleased to do that.

As in my case, there was no problem, and I think I have been a reasonable driver and have had no major accidents in my life—only one which was not my fault a couple of years ago, and I was lucky to get out of that. I think we have to be a little bit commonsensical about this. These issues have been raised in this place by myself, the member for Fisher and several others because it is all tied up with responsible driving and all doing the right thing.

Along with speed limits, drink-driving, of course, has very much been an issue for me in this place, particularly adding the drug-driving element of it. I am very pleased, in my last week in this parliament, to reflect back that parliament did eventually succumb to public need and agreed to introduce drug testing of drivers. We have seen, since that time, that it has been quite huge in relation to the defence that we did not think was there. I hope the government will be sympathetic and agree to our amendments. I commend this motion.

The Hon. M.F. O'BRIEN (Napier—Minister for Finance, Minister for Police, Minister for Correctional Services, Minister for Emergency Services, Minister for Road Safety) (12:58): First, I would like to thank the Hon. Ian Hunter, the Minister for Aboriginal Affairs and Reconciliation, for introducing this bill in the Legislative Council. It was my hope and intention to get this bill through the current parliament. The member for Bragg is correct that this proposition has been around for some little time.

I would like to acknowledge the presence of Judge Peter McCusker. Judge McCusker came to see me probably six or eight weeks ago with former premier John Bannon to put their case. There were three factors that enamoured me of this particular proposition. It was a seed that fell on fertile ground. The first was my involvement in the select committee on the juvenile justice system that reported in 2006. I notice the member for Bragg nodding her head; she was a member of that committee.

It was the first select committee that I served on and probably the first that the member for Bragg served on. What struck me about the particular select committee was the high rate of incarceration of young Indigenous youth in the juvenile justice system. I was absolutely staggered; I had no idea they had such depth, if you like, of contact with the juvenile justice system. That then extends into the adult system. Unfortunately, like Caucasian youth, there is generally a progression from the juvenile justice system into the adult system. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.


[Sitting suspended from 13:01 to 14:00]


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