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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Third Session (51-3)
2009-02-03 Daily Xml
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STATUTES AMENDMENT (TRANSPORT PORTFOLIO—ALCOHOL AND DRUGS) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 12 November 2008. Page 693.)

The Hon. S.G. WADE (15:52): I rise to speak on the second reading of the Statutes Amendment (Transport Portfolio—Alcohol and Drugs) Bill. To facilitate the timely consideration of this legislation, I intend to pose a number of questions to the minister during my second reading contribution and I hope that the minister will be able to provide answers to those questions in her second reading summing up. I will have some further minor technical queries in the committee stage.

This bill changes the law dealing with the testing of and penalties for drivers who are affected by alcohol or drugs. The minister's second reading explanation indicates that crash data shows that the percentage of drivers and riders killed with a blood alcohol concentration above the legal limit has increased from a low of 22 per cent in 1998 to an average of 33 per cent in the past five years, that is, 2003 to 2007.

Over the years, when the road toll is generally coming down it is most concerning that this element of bad driver behaviour seems to be stubbornly defying the trend. I ask the minister, given that her data is in percentage terms, whether she might be able to provide the council with the absolute numbers of drivers and riders killed with a blood alcohol concentration above the legal limit for each year since 1998.

This legislation is particularly focused on repeat offenders. The government advises that, over the five-year period of 2003 to 2007, 40 per cent of drivers and/or riders deemed responsible for an alcohol related fatal crash had previously been detected committing a drink driving offence on at least one prior occasion. In relation to drug abuse, on average, between 2003 and 2007, 24 per cent of drivers or riders killed in South Australia tested positive for THC, methamphetamines, MDMA or a combination of these.

The government's bill combines two initiatives: first, to implement the government's response to the review of the first year of the operation of the Road Traffic (Drug Driving) Amendment Bill 2005; and, secondly, to introduce a mandatory alcohol interlock scheme. I will deal with each element in turn.

In relation to the operation of the Road Traffic (Drug Driving) Amendment Bill 2005, the amendment act came into operation on 1 July 2006. It empowers SAPOL to conduct roadside saliva testing for the prescribed drugs of THC, methamphetamines and MDMA. The government progressed the legislation and subsequently expanded the scope of the testing only on the insistence of the Liberal opposition.

The amendment act required the legislation to be reviewed after the first year of operation, and for that report to be laid before both houses of parliament. Mr Bill Cossey was commissioned to prepare the review report, which found that, while the act had been effective, a number of improvements to the drug driving provisions should be made, and some of those proposals also involved amendments to the drink driving provisions. The most significant change relates to introducing a three-month licence disqualification for the first conviction by a court for driving with a prescribed drug present in the driver's oral fluid or blood, with a similar change for a category 1 BAC offence. The bill provides for a range of other changes to the law.

The second element of the bill is in relation to the mandatory alcohol interlock scheme. In October 2001, and under a Liberal government, South Australia became the first Australian state to introduce a voluntary alcohol interlock scheme for serious drink drive offenders. The government advises that the Road Safety Advisory Council has recommended the interlock scheme be made mandatory for serious and repeat drink-driving offenders. I ask the minister:

1. For each year since 2001, how many people have participated in the voluntary alcohol interlock scheme?

2. How many people is it estimated would have been subject to the mandatory alcohol interlock scheme if that scheme had been in operation since 2001?

3. Since 2001, what proportion of that class of drivers who would have been subject to the mandatory scheme actually participated in the voluntary scheme?

4. How many people is it estimated will be subject to the mandatory alcohol interlock scheme for the first five years of its operation?

5. Did the Road Safety Advisory Council recommend that the voluntary alcohol interlock scheme be discontinued?

6. Given that the scheme is only mandatory for certain classes of serious repeat offenders, why did the government decide to discontinue the voluntary scheme?

7. Is the government confident that there will be enough devices available to meet the projected demand?

8. What will occur if there are insufficient devices available to meet the needs of drivers subject to the mandatory alcohol interlock scheme?

The government indicates that a flexible payment system is proposed, which will mean that more affluent participants will subsidise the costs of those on low incomes, with provider costs for low income participants being reduced by 35 per cent. I should indicate that the Liberal opposition is concerned about this element and does not believe that the criminal justice system—or, for that matter, the road safety laws—should penalise people in proportion to their income. It is not an approach we take for other penalties, but this proposal is moving towards that principle. In relation to the flexible payment scheme, I ask the minister:

1. Will the participant financial contribution scheme be promulgated by regulation?

2. What are the anticipated costs for each participant?

3. How will the contribution of each participant be calculated, and what is the minimum and maximum contribution that participants might face?

4. Will the contribution be a debt to the provider of the device or a debt to the state?

When the government announced its intention to introduce the mandatory alcohol interlock scheme, it argued that it would be necessary to introduce mandatory carriage of licence to support the interlock scheme. The opposition vigorously opposed this proposal, believing it would be a fine for being forgetful and suspecting that it was driven by the administrative demands of government rather than road safety considerations.

Given that the government will go ahead with the mandatory interlock scheme without going ahead with the mandatory carriage of licence, this shows that it has misled the South Australian community. The government announcement of mandatory carriage of licence was a clear declaratory statement published in The Advertiser. It is one thing to be declaratory in areas within your control, but it was reckless of the government to declare what would be the law when changes would need to go to parliament.

Of course, the government's arrogance is not merely an insult to the parliament: it undermines road safety. People can never be sure what the law is if the government makes reckless statements in relation to what the law will be and, if they are not sure what the law is, they are less likely to comply with it. As we saw today and in past weeks, not only has the government failed to publicise changes to road laws when the laws have been changed but it publicises changes that have not been made. An example of the havoc that can be caused is seen in a transcript from radio station FIVEaa. On 16 January, Sergeant John Illingworth had to go on radio to clean up the Premier's mess. The transcript states:

...on 1st January, the Premier did an announcement in relation to the graduated licensing scheme for all of our learner and probationary licence holders. A lot of people actually thought that those changes came in on the 1st of January, and that's not the case. What did happen was they announced some of the potential changes to the graduated licensing scheme, but the legislation for that is not actually going to be introduced in parliament until the second half of this year, with an implementation date we anticipate early in 2010.

So, South Australia Police found that the government's priority for self-promotion was actually causing confusion in the road using public as to what were their obligations. I urge the government to be much more careful; government communication needs to give the highest priority to road safety, not politics and not self-promotion.

With those comments, I look forward to the minister, in her summing up, responding to the questions I have raised, and I indicate again that the opposition supports this legislation.

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (16:01): As members would expect, I rise to indicate that Family First sees this as a good initiative and, for that reason, is supportive of the legislation. However, we have a few concerns, which I will outline in my speech. Family First is a strong supporter of any legislation that improves, or seeks to improve, road safety. There are many mums and dads out there who have lost a child on the road thanks to drink drivers and drugged out drivers, and they want solutions to this problem. In fact, I am informed that some 33 per cent of drivers and motorcycle riders or the like killed on our roads are above the legal limit of alcohol, and some 24 per cent of fatalities tested positive to THC, speed or ecstasy post mortem, and that is far too high.

The concern I raised a moment ago is that it is possible, in our view, that this bill will actually result in a spike in driving whilst disqualified offending. I put that question to the minister, and perhaps she can address that issue in her summing up, that is, is there a way in this bill of preventing any increase in driving whilst disqualified? Having said that, overwhelmingly this bill implements positive initiatives, which is why Family First supports it.

In simple terms, this bill makes the alcohol interlock device mandatory, and it also implements many of the Cossey report recommendations into the drug testing trials. As I understand it, the alcohol interlock device has been around now for at least a decade, and it works somewhat like a car immobiliser, that is, a driver blows into the device, and it will beep the horn and flash the lights if any alcohol is detected in that particular vehicle.

The Hon. Carmel Zollo interjecting:

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD: Yes, I am aware of that, thank you. Apparently, as I understand it, in some cases the interlock device may even stop the car. As you would expect, there are hefty penalties for having someone else blow into the device, and that is obviously not the intention of the legislation. It is fair to say that this technology has probably saved dozens of lives over the years, and I for one am very glad that the police have this available to them as a tool.

Installing the interlock device was at one stage voluntary; that is, if you were convicted for drink driving and you had sufficient means, you would have to serve only half of the drink driving disqualification and could serve twice the remaining portion with an interlock device installed. Of course, you had to be fairly well off, because, as I understand it, the interlock device costs over $1,000 to install, and there are hefty monitoring fees in addition to that. The research from QUT in Brisbane says that the scheme is used mostly by offenders with a 'higher economic status'.

I believe that this legislation gets it right when it makes these devices mandatory. As I understand it, the Cossey report did not talk much about the interlock device. I do not know where the momentum has come from to make these devices mandatory (perhaps the manufacturers of the device have had some say in that) but, nonetheless, it is a good initiative, so long as the cost of the device does not mean that the uptake is low.

What I understand from the Family First briefing about these costs is that mandatory usage should result in cost savings. We are still looking at offenders paying about $1,200 per year for the device, which will mean that some drivers will simply not be able to take it up and, sadly, may therefore drive disqualified, as I indicated in my opening remarks. I guess that it goes without saying that chronic drunks are often not the richest people in the world, but the 35 per cent discount for pensioners will encourage the installation of the device for that group of people. I note the concerns raised by the Hon. Mr Wade a moment ago. I think he raises a fair point in that it is unusual for these measures to be pitched at different levels of expense, if you like, for different offenders.

Another element to keep in mind is that, in changing to a mandatory scheme, the discount in licence disqualification available under the voluntary scheme will now be done away with. This means that a driver will have to serve the full disqualification, which can mean their being off the road for three, four or, in some circumstances, even five years. After that time, the offender will still have to go onto an interlock device for many more years before having their licence fully restored—something that Family First thinks is a positive move.

The penalties for drink driving in South Australia are quite severe in some cases, and I am certainly glad that that is the case. Opponents to this state's drink driving regime, and the penalties associated with it, may say that the disqualification periods were first put in place in the 1950s, when the city was smaller and transportation was easier. However, in my view, as Adelaide has spread, cars have gone from being a luxury to a necessity, especially if you live in one of the suburban fringe areas. There is some truth to the argument that cars are now a necessity and that therefore a licence is also a necessity, especially for many people to get to and from work. However, drink driving is a very serious offence, and we should not shy away from that. As a result, serious disincentives need to be introduced.

Under this legislation, two readings of over 0.15 within a five-year period will see someone lose their licence for three years. As a rough rule of thumb, each standard alcoholic drink will put a driver up approximately 0.02 grams per 100 millilitres of blood and, depending on their metabolism, their reading will go down about 0.015 grams per 100 millilitres of blood per hour. So, a high reading of 0.15 (that is, a category 3 offence) means that the driver got behind the wheel after consuming approximately eight standard drinks within an hour. Family First does not have any tolerance for anyone who is prepared to drink at that level and then get behind the wheel of a car. To say that they have just had slightly too many when they have drunk to that level is absolute nonsense and, frankly, they should face severe penalties.

The real question revolves around the best way to control these dangerous drivers. Is it to take away their licence, or is it best to have an interlock device installed earlier in the disqualification? In effectively increasing the disqualification period before an interlock device can be installed, the government suggests that the best way to control dangerous drink drivers is to remove their licence for longer periods of time.

This is the concern: unfortunately, offences against the authority of the court are skyrocketing. OCSAR tells me that in 1988 some 1,701 charges of driving were laid while a licence was already suspended or cancelled, and this figure skyrocketed to some 3,876 offences in 2005. Unfortunately, this tells me that, in many cases, people are ignoring the law as it stands. Dangerous drivers are simply not complying with court-imposed licence disqualifications, and the question is: do we cater for that or pander to it? Absolutely not.

We tell our magistrates to imprison these offenders if their offending is severe enough, as they should if they follow the precedent set down in the case of Cadd. But I would like to have seen in this legislation a focus on putting offenders on an interlock device as soon as possible (which largely makes their driving safe), rather than simply telling them they cannot drive.

The second major element of the bill of which I am strongly supportive expands and makes permanent the current drug driving trial. In effect, most of the provisions relating to drink driving will now be mirrored with drug driving, apart from the interlock scheme, which will not be required for drug driving. We will see recidivist drug drivers facing longer periods of disqualification, and this is entirely appropriate.

In the first year of operation, the data we have suggests that some 10,097 roadside drug tests were conducted. An astonishing 294 drivers who were tested were found to have one or more of the three tested drugs in their system, and this figure equates to one in 34 of those tested. Of the same pool of drivers, only 147 (I say 'only', but significantly fewer than 294) were found with the prescribed concentration of alcohol in their system. It astonishes me when these figures seem to show that drug driving is twice as common as drink driving on our roads. Of course, these are very small statistics and it may not bear out that way, but I suspect that it probably will.

I am advised by the minister's staff that the new drug test will test for THC for five hours and be able to detect other drugs, that is, amphetamines and ecstasy, for 25 hours. Either one or a combination of these drugs is found in 24 per cent of drivers killed on our roads. Let us get them off the road.

Family First did have several queries of the government regarding the roll-out of this scheme in country areas. We are advised, and it should go on the record, that the training of traffic enforcement police officers for the expansion of driver drug testing commenced in February 2008, that country training of police officers commenced at the beginning of April 2008, that country training will be running concurrently with training in the metropolitan area and that a total of 260 traffic enforcement personnel statewide will be trained in drug driver testing once the expansion training is complete.

In addition to these members, apparently some 120 general duties members will be trained in rural areas, and as I understand it they are specifically targeting Port Lincoln, Whyalla, Port Augusta, Port Pirie, the Riverland, Mount Gambier and the areas immediately surrounding them as screeners only. These people have been trained to assist traffic enforcement personnel for testing in country areas.

As I have these assurances from the minister's office, Family First is pleased with these developments. In summary, we will support the second reading of the bill. We are not aware of any amendments at this stage, but we see this as a positive initiative, and anything that gets these people off the roads should be supported.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. J.M. Gazzola.

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