Gerard Murphy (Cork North West, Fine Gael)

I welcome the general objectives which the Bill seeks to promote, namely, shorter waiting times for driving tests and better standards of driving. However, one must question its necessity. The Department should have all the necessary requirements to achieve these objectives. It is typical that when an issue becomes too troublesome to handle, the immediate reaction of Ministers is to establish a quango with which to distance themselves from the problems and avoid direct accountability to the Oireachtas.

This Government starved the driving test section of the Department of Transport of funds which would have enabled it to establish a proper system. It also starved the Garda Síochána of resources to implement the penalty points system properly. The promised significant reduction in waiting times for driving tests has failed to materialise and in most cases the situation has worsened. We are now told that the driver testing and standards authority will be self-financing. According to the Minister, this new authority will greatly speed up waiting times for driving tests and introduce systems to improve drivers' competence greatly. It will apparently do so within a shorter period, despite that the Minister and his Department have failed to get such results previously.

For the new system to work, it must be properly resourced. The Minister should make it clear that if the authority is to be self-financing, the cost of a test will double or treble. A test could cost anything in the region of €100 and the necessary preparatory work and training between €500 and €1,000. This is not necessarily a bad development if it saves lives, but the Minister should spell out the implications of the Bill for the already hard-pressed car owner. Added to this is the commercialised system of speed traps and the increased insurance premiums for penalty points given for speeding on regional roads, although this is under review. The Government's mishandling of these issues has led to seriously increased costs for all motorists.

There is already concern among motorists and car owners about the operation of the private national car test. Are there systems built into the operation which guarantee substantial profit for the private companies? What safeguards has the Minister put in place to ensure this does not happen with privatisation?

These issues are of concern to ordinary motorists but not to a Government which does not understand the tight weekly budget on which many families must live. The system has been a fiasco for many years. The Government and the Department have willingly turned a blind eye to various infringements. An amnesty was introduced which led to a careless and haphazard approach on the part of the driving public to driving licence regulations. Who would blame them? They were taking their lead from the Government implementing the system. Faced with the implications of a European directive, the Government became indignant and intolerant of non-compliant drivers.

More difficult problems exist than the delays in driving tests. Some 120 provisional licence holders are in line for the test but, despite the introduction of the penalty points system, more than 200,000 provisional licence holders and many more with expired licences are in limbo. For years, the authorities' interpretation of the law was that if one held a second provisional or expired licence, one could still be fully insured. Most of these people are over 55 and live in rural areas with no public transport. I have raised this issue before and accept that it is difficult to resolve in terms of road safety. The Minister now has the opportunity to put the matter on an acceptable footing when issuing instructions to the new authority.

There has been a general acceptance of different driving licence categories from small scooters and motorbikes to cars to lorries and buses. Many experienced driving instructors believe a comprehensive training programme should be compulsory. As part of the many recommendations they have made for the regulation of their sector, they also believe that lessons should be broken down into driving modules such as motorway, national primary route, rural, day and night-time driving. People who pass a test in any one of these modules should hold a driving licence for that module. For example, a person who passes a rural driving test should hold a licence to drive on rural roads during daylight hours and a person who passes a rural driving test in addition to a night-time driving test could hold a category of licence which allows them to drive on rural roads both day and night. By completing training in any of the other modules, they can expand their driving experience and licence category to national primary roads and motorways and driving other vehicles. This system would ensure that all drivers were properly trained and tested for the category of licence they held.

Other countries have systems designed for this purpose. In certain parts of Germany, elderly people can obtain local driving permits. As a result of Japan's tradition of respect for the elderly, special laws are enforced to enable them to drive safely. We must look at a safe and secure way to allow these people, many of them elderly, who have driven on provisional and expired licences for many years to attain an acceptable level of driving for which they are trained and tested. The social consequences of ignoring this would be enormous, not only for the people themselves, but also for their immediate family and friends. The loss of independence will affect the entire family and community. Many retired grandparents provide invaluable assistance to their children and grandchildren. Most young married couples work and now depend on the support of their elderly relatives. The last time I raised this issue many of our well-heeled commentators did not grasp the enormity of the problem and I must accept that a solution from a road safety point of view is not easy. The concept of having different categories of licences is well established. By adding the concept of training and testing in modules we could have the beginning of a solution to a problem, which can have very serious social consequences.

The Minister seems determined to establish this authority, which if it is to be successful and well run will inevitably represent an additional cost on the motoring public. The authority must be properly resourced and if it is self-financing then the motorist or potential motorist must provide the money. If the Minister instructs the authority to come up with imaginative solutions that help to compensate for years of confusion, that will give everybody — especially those on long-term provisional licences and expired licences — a chance to get on the first rung of the driving ladder by introducing a modulated training and testing system mostly for older people, then some good will have been achieved. If it introduces a system of testing for young drivers that uses the most modern training to clearly demonstrate to them the dangers particularly of driving in hazardous conditions and it reduces the waiting lists for tests then although much more expensive it will be worth the effort.

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