Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)

I am glad to have an opportunity to speak on this matter. I disagree with the previous speaker. I believe learner drivers should be allowed to drive without someone accompanying them in the car. I live in a rural county and west of Ennis there is no Luas line, no DART and no public transport of any significance. It is costing youngsters in the region of €600 to €1,000 per month to stay in on-campus student accommodation. They simply cannot afford it and it is not available anyway so mom and dad buy a car and get a learner permit for their son or daughter, who then drives that car to and from college every day, sometimes bringing other students who live in the catchment area to the college campus with them. We are criminalising all of these young people with the requirement that they must have an accompanying driver in the car with them. It is unacceptable. There is no public transport network and this criterion is unacceptable. It is criminalising a lot of young people who just cannot have that college experience on campus. They are living at home and using their car to get in and out. If there is a smarter or more sensible way to approach this, it is to work in tandem with the insurance sector because many insurance companies require learner drivers not to exceed a certain speed. Surely that is the way to have controls on how they drive rather than this punitive rule requiring them to always have an accompanying driver in the car with them, which is not realistic. The Minister of State can imagine that, if we were to really apply the spirit of that law in a rural area, the mom or dad would have to take time off work to drive their child to college and sit in the car while they attend eight hours of lectures before driving home. It just does not work in practice. The reality is that we are criminalising many young people every day with this.

I suggest that we look at a secondment system to get driving instructors into driving tester roles. I was a primary teacher for many years and, when there were gaps in our sector, people were seconded out of the classroom into the inspectorate or other roles supporting the education sector. In recent years, there seems to be a trend of testers leaving the role and going into private driving instruction. I am sure the hours are better. Perhaps the pay is better. I do not know the reasons but I am sure the Minister of State's officials can gauge that. To second some of them out or to require testers to move beyond their county and test across county boundaries in another town 30 or 40 miles away, as others have suggested, would free things up. The waiting lists in Clare are very long. This is very punitive in rural areas where we do not have the DART, the Luas or other public transport.

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