Tommy Broughan (Dublin Bay North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 7:

In page 24, between lines 12 and 13, to insert the following:

“31. The Minister shall instruct all motor insurance companies to write to all present and future learner drivers stating that driving unaccompanied by a specified qualified driver and/or without displaying L plates invalidates the terms and conditions of their insurance policy and that any payment made to a third party in the event of a collision may be recouped from the learner driver and/or the main policy holder.”.

Amendments Nos. 7 and 12 attempt to deal with issues that have arisen with regard to drivers on learner permits and the serious level of deaths and casualties which have occurred involving unaccompanied learner drivers. Last year, some 3,200 drivers on learner permits were caught with no qualified driver present. To the end of October 2016, a very large number of penalty points - 10,000 - were applied to learner and novice drivers, which included 6,148 applied to drivers for driving unaccompanied. In amendment No. 7 I was trying to suggest a formula whereby the mere act of driving unaccompanied or without displaying L plates would invalidate the terms and conditions of the insurance policy. A key issue that would arise here is that many drivers on learner permits are named drivers on their parents insurance policies.

What I have asked the Minister to pursue in this regard will be very difficult.

Had we been heading for finishing the Bill tonight, I was proposing to ask the Minister for a view on it and then to withdraw it.

In amendment No. 12, I proposed to amend section 36 of the principal Act by inserting the section to provide that a driver with a learner permit, without an accompanied specified qualified driver should be deemed in law to be driving without valid motor insurance. The person could, therefore, be arrested by the Garda Síochána and charged with the offence of driving without insurance and the vehicle could be seized on the spot. The Garda Síochána has alerted us to the fact that there is no power to seize the vehicle in this case and that a driver on a learner permit caught in this situation ends up laughing at the garda and driving away unaccompanied. There seems to be a grave lacuna in the law. My Sinn Féin colleagues have tried to address it in other ways. This is one aspect of the issue we could have approached. It is a very serious issue, given that 87 unaccompanied learner drivers died between 2007 and 2012. A distinguished visitor to the Gallery, Mr. Noel Clancy, lost his wife and daughter, who were fatally injured by an unaccompanied learner driver this time last year. It was a colossal tragedy for the Clancy family at this family time of the year. The Minister needs to examine it very seriously and address it. In two amendments, I tried to give one way forward by giving additional powers to the Garda Síochána. There definitely seems to be a lacuna in the law in this regard and I urge the Minister to accept amendment No. 12.

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