CONTENTS
Monday 4 October 1993
Graduated licensing
STANDING COMMITTEE ON RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT
*Chair / Président: Huget, Bob (Sarnia ND)
Vice-Chair / Vice-Président: Cooper, Mike (Kitchener-Wilmot ND)
Conway, Sean G. (Renfrew North/-Nord L)
Fawcett, Joan M. (Northumberland L)
Jordan, Leo (Lanark-Renfrew PC)
*Klopp, Paul (Huron ND)
*Murdock, Sharon (Sudbury ND)
Offer, Steven (Mississauga North/-Nord L)
*Turnbull, David (York Mills PC)
Waters, Daniel (Muskoka-Georgian Bay/Muskoka-Baie-Georgienne ND)
*Wilson, Gary (Kingston and The Islands/Kingston et Les Îles ND)
*Wood, Len (Cochrane North/-Nord ND)
*In attendance / présents
Substitutions present / Membres remplaçants présents:
Martin, Tony (Sault Ste Marie ND) for Mr Cooper
Daigeler, Hans (Nepean L) for Mrs Fawcett
Also taking part / Autres participants et participantes:
Hope, Randy R. (Chatham-Kent ND)
Ministry of Transportation:
Clifford, Linda, manager, road safety research office
Hughes, John, director, safety policy branch
Levine, Paul, manager, road safety policy office
Domoney, manager, graduated licensing operations
Clerk / Greffière: Manikel, Tannis
Staff / Personnel: McNaught, Andrew, research officer, Legislative Research Service
The committee met at 1556 in committee room 1.
GRADUATED LICENSING
The Chair (Mr Bob Huget): I call the committee to order. Mr Hughes is here from the Ministry of Transportation, along with a couple of colleagues seated at the bench and a couple in the audience as well. There were a number of questions outstanding, as I understand it, from committee members, and Mr Hughes and his staff are here to answer those questions, so I'll turn it over to you, Mr Hughes.
Mr John Hughes: Good afternoon, committee members. I had asked at the last day of the hearings that before you deliberated too far and too long on any of your recommendations and your report, perhaps we could attend and field any questions and be given a chance to give the ministry perspective on why things had evolved to the point they had in the proposal.
If I could just take a few minutes first, we've got a couple of new faces here and I think probably every one but one is familiar to the committee members. I'm the director of safety policy for the ministry. Paul Levine, on my right, is the manager of road safety policy. Bob Domoney is the manager of the graduated licensing project and is responsible for trying to make graduated licensing actually happen.
Linda Clifford is our manager of road safety research, and she's also taking the lead for the ministry on the development of the advanced driver's test. I know there was a fair amount of discussion and questions around that, so we thought it might be helpful to have Linda here today if the committee members wish to pursue that line of questioning any further. Of course Joe Walker, who you've seen at the hearings, is a policy officer who has been the arms and legs of all the policy work that's been done on graduated licensing over the last few years.
I thought I could start with a couple of clarifications. Several things came up during the hearings where we weren't sure whether the committee was clear on what is in and what is not in the regulations, so I'll just clarify a couple of matters.
First of all, the counting of experience towards the accompanying driver's four years of experience: Our intention and the way the regulations are drafted are such that this experience counts from the minute the learner driver comes into the system. So for someone who had two years in graduated licensing and then another two years' of experience, that would be a total of four years' experience. Experience starts from day one on the system as a learner driver.
A couple of the witnesses implied that a very small percentage of learner drivers under the current system actually take a vision test. This is not true. Everyone who qualifies for a learner's permit under the current system as well as under the proposed system does take and will have to take a vision test. I just wanted to clear that one up.
On this question about the accompanying driver and the freeway driving, the regulations are drafted to state that a learner driver at level 1 may drive on a 400 series highway if the accompanying driver is a professional driver instructor. By taking driver education and driver training in level 1, they will be allowed to get some training on the 400 series highways if accompanied by a professional instructor.
I had expected that we would be here to sort of field questions and make any comments on any items of interest to the committee, but perhaps I can make a couple of introductory general comments, if I may.
First of all, you've heard a lot of suggestions from the various witnesses, all representing different points of view in the road safety community. The thing I want to emphasize is that I think you're going to end up with the same dilemma the policymakers had as we developed this model, and that is, just where on that balance of mobility versus safety do we want graduated licensing to fall?
The thing I want to emphasize is that the proposal we've come up with is an integrated proposal. It recognizes the strong points of graduated licensing; that is, minimum time periods and decreasing levels of restrictiveness and exposure to risk. Those are kind of the cornerstones of graduated licensing models and proposals around the road safety field.
But ours goes beyond that. It recognizes the need for driver training and driver education and has an incentive built in. It has the advance test, which is, I think, fairly unique in terms of an inclusion in this kind of model. It includes changing our demerit point system to identify and treat problem new drivers earlier than our current system does. What I'm trying to emphasize here is that it's an integrated, balanced approach and one thing shouldn't be looked at as a substitute for something else. I think we need all those things in the proposal.
I'm specifically raising that because a lot of people at the hearings raised the idea of mandatory driver education as a substitute for something else in the model. I think there's a place for driver training and driver education, but I think it's just part of the package and I don't think it replaces any of those other elements that are part of the package.
I guess the last thing I would like to say is that we have prepared a fairly detailed description of what we heard as being the issues and problems and questions brought up as part of the hearings. We've tried to give what we see as our analysis of the pros and cons and our position, and those will be given to you after the session today so you'll at least have that documentation of our analysis of most of these issues and how we feel about them.
I want to now throw it open to answer any questions or hear any concerns you may have.
Mr David Turnbull (York Mills): John, I believe I know the answer to this. I believe you're now thinking in terms of restricting front-seat passengers to only one, that being the accompanying driver?
Mr Hughes: We're not thinking of making any changes on our own to this model. Any changes that are made now will be, I guess, as a result of the hearing process and recommendations that might be forthcoming from this committee. But I think that from a strictly safety point of view, the suggestion that several people made at the hearing for one front-seat passenger only -- that being the accompanying driver, obviously, in level 1 -- has merit from the staff point of view.
Mr Turnbull: What do you feel about level 2? Do you not think that restriction should be extended?
Mr Hughes: In level 2, I think the same reasoning still applies. Of course, it would not have to be an accompanying driver, but certainly more than one passenger in the front seat would tend to crowd a still-learning driver. So again from a safety point of view, we see some merit in the suggestion.
Mr Turnbull: The extension of that argument is the problem with having a lot of particularly young kids in a car. After hearing the various presentations, the coroner's presentation particularly, do you think we should perhaps be restricting still further in level 1 the number of people who can be in the car?
Mr Hughes: From a personal point of view, that would be my preference and I think the staff's preference. But again we're getting into that tradeoff, and we recognize, particularly in level 2 when the person need not be accompanied any longer, the fact that people need to drive people around for certain reasons.
In level 1, I guess the idea of mobility isn't as much an argument because the accompanying driver's always there. For any of those restrictions in level 1, if the person's obeying the law, they've got that accompanying driver, so the accompanying driver, if there is a need to get from A to B or to carry a certain number of passengers or to do something that's outside the bounds of the restrictions, can always take the wheel and therefore it's not a mobility problem.
Mr Turnbull: Okay. The other thought I had -- it was mentioned a few times -- was the question of penalties for people who violate the terms of graduated licensing and whether you've further thought about the idea of some penalties, perhaps demotion, for example, from level 2 down to level 1.
Mr Hughes: The question of penalties: I've explained, I think, a couple of times during the hearings that our philosophy going in here was that a learner driver is a learner and will make mistakes. We've designed this proposal to allow for mistakes of learning, and in fact the demerit point system is being revised so that a first offence will bring a warning letter and a second offence will bring a group counselling session.
The idea of more punitive measures in the way of suspensions or perhaps demotion back from level 2 to level 1, as you suggested -- I think, in discussing this, we've softened our position a little bit. We've heard people arguing, particularly in level 2 when a learner driver has now had eight months' or 12 months' experience, that there perhaps is a place for a little more punitive approach to driving errors, given that you expect people would know how to do the basic skills and will have been tested to be able to do the basic skills by the time they get to level 2, punitive measures in the way of suspensions or adding to the minimum time period or something like that.
I think the problem with bringing people from level 2 back to level 1 -- there are a number of problems, not the least of which is the administrative complexity of trying to do it -- is there's a time lag. If a person is charged with something, say a month before they exit level 2, that's not liable to show up in court for several months later and then the actual conviction on the record even later than that. You've got a question of people having sort of graduated already out of a level and then having to force-fit them back. I think we prefer, from an administrative point of view, simply dealing with them in a suspension or addition to the minimum time.
Mr Turnbull: I understand that rationale when you're talking about where they've made maybe a stupid error -- I guess we've all at some point made stupid errors when we're driving. What I'm thinking about is where they've clearly violated the terms of it; for example, driving with a blood alcohol level of less than 0.7 but certainly more than 0.0 in that level 2. I know the rationale that if you somehow got out of the system because it has only gone to court afterwards and you've now got a job as -- God help us -- a bus driver, you lose your employment. But by the same token, there is an overriding safety consideration that, if they're the kind of person who's prepared to violate those terms, you're not protecting the public safety.
Mr Hughes: It's an age-old argument, this kind of degree of severity, and I guess the balancing act here is how severe you make the treatment so that it hurts but it doesn't hurt enough that people are kind of encouraged to circumvent the system -- drive suspended, or whatever. That's a question we wrestle with all the time in matters other than just things like graduated licensing, the whole spectrum of penalties under the Highway Traffic Act. I don't have a clean answer. I just think you have to remember that if you go too far people will ignore whatever penalty you've imposed and carry on. It has to be meaningful but not so severe that you encourage illegal behaviour.
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Mr Turnbull: Do I have time for another question?
The Chair: You've all kinds of time, David.
Mr Turnbull: What about the thought of 0.0% blood alcohol content for the accompanying driver?
Mr Hughes: Again, that's obviously something that from a safety point of view we love. I guess the only caution we throw up is that we think that would be open to a constitutional challenge in that you're treating the mature driver population, different groups, differently. You're saying it's okay to drive with 0.05% BAC but not okay to be an accompanying driver who's capable of taking the wheel. There's a certain inconsistency there.
Mr Turnbull: Surely the same argument would also apply to the 0.05.
Mr Hughes: With the exception that we have a learner driver.
Mr Turnbull: Okay. I realize that it is technically possible for the police to suspend your licence if you're over 0.05, but if you're right at 0.05, I'm just not quite sure as to whether the same constitutional argument doesn't come into play there.
Mr Hughes: All I'm saying is that the police can impose the 12-hour suspension at 0.05 or more. Therefore, we're saying that for the driving population marginally under 0.05 is all right. It's not a level of impairment that we're concerned about enough that we feel you shouldn't be behind the wheel. That's the way the Criminal Code and the HTA reads. All I'm saying is that it's inconsistent to apply a different standard to the accompanying driver. But from a safety point of view, if you take the argument to the point that you're saying that this person not only has to be capable of driving but also has a learner driver under his or her care or protection, then perhaps the argument's valid. All I'm saying is that it's very likely to be challenged.
Mr Turnbull: Have you had a legal opinion as to whether the constitutional argument could apply at 0.05?
Mr Hughes: Yes. This point came up in terms of the development of policy, 0.0 BAC or 0.05 BAC for the accompanying driver, and the legal opinion from the Attorney General's area was that we should go with the 0.05.
Mr Turnbull: That would not be subject to a challenge or it is unlikely to have a successful challenge.
Mr Hughes: It's not going to be subject to a challenge in terms of discrimination. You've got to remember that the whole drinking and driving area is a very sensitive area legally. The case law has been built over time based on different challenges, and we get very nervous, particularly the Attorney General's staff get very nervous, about making changes that may cause more challenges to the way the law reads.
Ms Sharon Murdock (Sudbury): Just to continue on that point, I would think that you would have a section 1 argument in terms of what was good for the population. Having listened to the presentations for the one week that I sat on the committee, I was thinking that if we are advocating no drinking and driving, even though the Criminal Code allows 0.08, we should be looking at that if you're taking out a learner, then you shouldn't be drinking either, at all.
Mr Hughes: I think there's an argument there. The advice we have is that it's open to a challenge, and very likely a successful challenge.
Ms Murdock: Okay. I just wanted to get back to something you had said: 8 to 12 months in terms of experience. I'm wondering how that will be determined. I know that it was raised as well by some of the presenters about whether it was from the date you applied for and got your level 1 or whether or not it was going to be based on number of hours of driving or number of kilometres driven.
Mr Hughes: The proposal is for a 12-month minimum from the time of level 1 licensure, reduced to eight months with driver ed. This whole question of number of hours logged or number of kilometres logged was a suggestion that came forward at the hearings. It's not in the proposal.
Ms Murdock: No, I realize it's not in the proposal.
Mr Hughes: Do you want me to comment on that?
Ms Murdock: Yes, because how would you know how often this person had driven?
Mr Hughes: Right, that's the difficulty. It isn't in the public document -- the flyer and the booklet -- but our intention under the proposal has been that as part of the development of the graduated licensing model we will be preparing and developing a package that will go to the learner driver and the accompanying driver, and in that will be a voluntary logbook with some guidelines on how many hours or how many kilometres and what different kinds of experiences and in what sequence, that sort of thing, which the accompanying driver and the learner driver should work through. That's to supplement driver education, because whatever it is, 15 hours behind the wheel or 20 hours behind the wheel as part of the driver ed program, is clearly, in our view, not enough. Basically, that should be the formal training and then that should be supplemented by practice.
But the problem with some kind of mandatory minimum time or minimum distance of course is the validation of it. There's just no way to realistically be able to validate whether or not the person indeed did achieve the required number of hours or kilometres.
Ms Murdock: To change subjects entirely, will the vision test include night vision?
Mr Hughes: The vision test to get into level 1 will be --
Ms Murdock: The straight one that you do when you go in?
Mr Hughes: -- the same one we have now. There's a separate issue about the vision test and whether it should be changed, but it's really an ongoing research question as opposed to something that we're going to change as part of graduated licensing.
Ms Murdock: One of the suggestions, which I personally thought was a really good one, because I drive from Sudbury to Toronto every week and back, and oftentimes do so at twilight or at night -- actually, I prefer night driving. What I was told by every group that came before us is that it's the most dangerous time to drive; hence the reason it's not included in level 1. I understand that.
There was a suggestion that in level 1, for the first eight months, on the presumption that you haven't taken a driver's ed course, you would drive daylight hours only; for the last four months or whatever time frame, you would drive sunset to midnight; and then only in level 2 would you drive 12 to 5, for the first period of time with an accompanying driver. I was wondering if you had given any thought to that graduation rather than cold turkey.
Mr Hughes: There are a couple of points to be made around the dusk-to-dawn restriction, which has been suggested as part of the hearings and previously.
First of all, in some parts of Ontario it would be very difficult to do any practice driving at certain times of the year under those conditions. Given the length of daylight and people being at school or at work, there wouldn't be many daylight hours for them to practice.
The second thing again is this whole question of where on the spectrum do you want to fall. The midnight to 5 period is statistically the worst, and that's why we've zeroed in on that. Sure, if you go earlier than midnight or later than 5 you capture a longer period of time and statistically, perhaps, a little more dangerous time than daylight hours. Again, it's a question of degree and practice and training and what's a reasonable requirement. That's why we settled on midnight to 5.
Ms Murdock: Lastly, to Ms Clifford, one of the groups that came before us was the bicycle association. They brought up the whole concept of ensuring that in the tests we're going to be aware of the bicycles and people who ride bicycles on the roadways. I was wondering if you had looked at that as a possibility to be included.
Ms Linda Clifford: Certainly in the second-level test there will be questions on the knowledge component dealing with road sharing, so not just bicyclists but pedestrians as well and large vehicles such as trucks and buses. In the actual road test portion it's something that the examiner will be looking for, but we can't always guarantee there will be a bicycle in the path or alongside the driver when we're testing. It also is there in some of our earlier testing as well in terms of our knowledge tests.
Ms Murdock: The other suggestion was that level 1 tests should be more comprehensive. I personally think they should be too.
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Ms Clifford: I believe what will result when the level 2 test is finalized is that we will have a modular type of test which will allow us at the ministry, if we choose, to slide some of the modules down to our level 1. Right at the moment, our main objective is to deal with level 2. If all the modules are needed at level 2, next year or two years from now we'll tackle level 1. But there is a possibility that there will be some changes to level 1 as a result of this research.
Mr Hans Daigeler (Nepean): Mr Chairman, I don't have any questions to the ministry officials; I have a question to yourself. This is a rather unusual committee.
Mr Paul Klopp (Huron): Speak for yourself.
Mr Daigeler: It was certainly unusual in the sense that I think it was very fruitful and very interesting and, I think, overall not partisan. But it was also unusual in the sense that we weren't looking at any legislation; we were just looking at proposed legislation. So my question really is, what is the plan for the committee now? What is the next step? Normally, the committee at this stage would look at the report of the researcher, contact the researcher to prepare something and then perhaps bring in the ministry officials again for some reaction or questions. Frankly, at this point I'm less interested in the views of the ministry than in the views of the committee.
The Chair: Absolutely. The reason for the ministry's appearance today was to answer some unanswered questions that were left over after the last session of public hearings and to clarify some issues that were also outstanding. After today, I fully expect that the committee will look at the summary of recommendations as prepared by research, and also as prepared by the Ministry of Transportation, and prepare a report along with those recommendations. That's how I would expect that process to flow and that the preparing of that report and recommendations would start on Wednesday.
Mr Daigeler: That's fine.
Mr Turnbull: You referred to a logbook, but that would be on a voluntary basis. Do you think there's going to be any compliance with that?
Mr Hughes: I think that for those who are well-intentioned and have an accompanying driver or an instructor who is serious about trying to turn out a reasonably competent and safe driver it will serve as a guideline. For example, for a parent who can't afford the $500 in the Toronto area for driver education and wants to give it a try on their own to teach their child to drive it will be a lot better than what we provide now, which basically is very little in terms of how do you bring that person along.
Mr Turnbull: Would it be reasonable to mandate that anybody who wants to get out of level 1 in eight months must maintain the logbook and get the driving instructor to sign off on it?
Mr Hughes: I think you would have difficulty getting the driver instructor to validate any more than the number of hours that the driver instructor was in the car. You're just going to get into a situation where, if you're really serious about wanting to require some kind of minimum, it will be treated as a joke by people who don't want to do it and don't do it, but they will manufacture their own logbook. I just don't think it really has any teeth or any meaning.
Mr Turnbull: Have we determined now as to whether there will be a minimum amount of hours of driver education to allow somebody to exit at eight months?
Mr Hughes: Driver education does have a minimum standard number of hours behind the wheel now. The curriculum that we okay has a minimum number of hours.
Mr Turnbull: So nobody can go into driver education and then step out of it a week later --
Mr Hughes: A driving school can't be accredited, as I understand it, unless its course includes the minimum prescribed number of hours. Paul or Bob may want to add to that.
Mr Paul Levine: The driver education course that is accredited now includes 25 hours of classroom instruction and a minimum of 10 hours of practical behind-the-wheel driving for the new driver.
Mr Turnbull: And we require some sort of certificate to prove that they can get out after eight months?
Mr Levine: Yes.
Mr Hughes: Let me get back on that one. We feel that once graduated licensing is in place, there will be two reasons for people to want to get accredited driver education: One will be to get the reduction of four months in level 1, the minimum time period; the other will be to get the insurance discount. We didn't want to get into a situation where some courses would be accredited for one purpose and some for another. So we have a small committee of the ministry, the insurance industry and the driver education industry working, and we're coming up with one set of accreditation standards so that persons can be confident that if they take an accredited course, they will get the benefit of both the reduced insurance premium as well as the reduction in the minimum time period.
Mr Turnbull: Turning to the 400 series restriction in level 1, we heard quite a few people suggesting that there are some areas of the province where, while theoretically there is an alternative road, there isn't really a viable route. Have you turned your attention to that and given it any further thought?
Mr Hughes: Yes. I think, maybe just to clarify that one, the 400 series, by definition, always have an alternative route. The alternative route may be a little more time-consuming and inconvenient, but if it's just a question of needing to get from A to B in a certain period of time, then the accompanying driver can always drive the 400 route. If it's a question of getting practice and experience, that's when we want the learner drivers to get that practice and experience on the alternative route before they venture on to the 400 series.
Mr Len Wood (Cochrane North): Just briefly, a follow-up on David's question. I'm 16 years old. At what point in my learning and going through the process of getting a driver's licence would I be able to have complete control over being able to drive on express-lane highways or 400 series highways?
Mr Hughes: Under this proposal?
Mr Wood: Yes, under this proposal.
Mr Hughes: Sixteen years and eight months, assuming that you put in the eight months at level 1 and passed the driver's test after eight months.
Mr Wood: And after 12 months if there was no driver education.
Mr Hughes: That's right; after 12 months without driver education.
Mr Wood: But he'd still have to be chaperoned in some way?
Mr Hughes: No. Level 2 is unchaperoned.
Mr Gary Wilson (Kingston and The Islands): Just to zero in on one aspect of that which concerns me: If the person doesn't go through driver ed, he or she has to keep at level 1 for the 12-month period. Is that right?
Mr Hughes: Yes.
Mr Gary Wilson: So then they have to keep off the 400 series roads under that arrangement as well.
Mr Hughes: Yes.
Mr Gary Wilson: That means when they go into level 2, they get to drive unsupervised and can go on 400 series roads. So my concern is that they actually are going on 400 series without any experienced driver necessarily. They might happen to have, but they don't have to have an experienced driver.
Mr Hughes: That's right. Under the current system --
Mr Gary Wilson: No, but I'm just thinking that's not an improvement when the 400 series --
Mr Hughes: The improvement is that they've had 12 months of driving experience before they venture on to the 400 series highways. Under the current system, without driver education you can venture on to 400 series the first day you get your driver's licence.
Mr Gary Wilson: But I guess what I'm concerned about is that we've highlighted the fact that the 400 series is definitely different from the others because we have this arrangement. But that means that they'll be driving on the 400 with some experience, perhaps, but not on the 400 series. To put it more specifically, it would seem to me the ideal would be to have an experienced driver with you when you're on the 400 series because it is that much different.
Mr Hughes: That's what we're trying to encourage, although we're not imposing it. We're trying to encourage that because we know that many of the driver education courses include a little bit of instruction on freeway driving even now. We're assuming that if this proposal goes into place, all of the driver education community will include that in its course of instruction.
We also feel, I think, that there will be probably a variation of driver education developed for people at level 2 who wish to take perhaps a few of the more advanced things around the advanced driver's test. So that remains to be seen. We're just anticipating that the driving school industry will recognize the business opportunity there and start to market something.
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Mr Gary Wilson: But still in your mind there's a serious enough difference between the 400 series and other roads to make sure that --
Mr Hughes: The reason we identified the 400 series highways is simply, first of all, that one in six learner drivers have collisions in the first year of driving. We recognize that on the 400 series highways, with the speeds involved, the potential consequences of a collision on the 400 series of highways are a lot more severe than under the more restricted conditions that level 1 imposes.
Mr Gary Wilson: Are there more collisions on the 400 series for novice drivers?
Mr Hughes: Statistically on a per-kilometre-driven basis for the whole the driving population, no. In terms of collisions per kilometres driven, there are fewer accidents, but again, the consequences: There are more serious injuries and more fatalities as a result of collisions on the 400 series.
Mr Gary Wilson: Yes. I understand that, but I guess again it comes back to them making sure that drivers on the 400 series are as accomplished as possible.
Mr Hughes: Yes. But what we don't know and can't know under our current data availability is that -- we believe there aren't a lot of learner drivers on the 400 series of highways. That could be simply a reflection that it's more experienced drivers who are on the 400 series, by and large, but there's no way of knowing that statistically.
Mr Klopp: I'm just going to get your feeling. I know we touched on curfew before, but one of the things I heard in the hearings was that people were wondering how come in level 2 there are no more curfews. If I go on the premise that a lot of the accidents are happening after 12 o'clock and you're young and wild -- and we're talking mainly of the young and wild people here -- or young people. We can be wild when we're old; I've done that a couple of times.
I really wonder what the premise would be. I really think the idea is good to have a curfew, keep the curfew restriction on level 2 from 12 to 5, with the proviso that you can get a work permit. I think most people going back and forth to work, even if they work at a hotel, which I did -- you really don't have time to have that many beers before you leave at 2:30 in the morning. In fact, you're probably ready just to go home.
I also think that if we're looking at the 16-year-olds, the 17 and 18 group here especially, the peer pressure is a problem. I think one person even came out and said that the government would take the peer pressure off by saying it's the government's fault that I can't -- "I've got to have the car home by midnight" -- for one more year.
Mr Hughes: From a safety point of view, absolutely. The reason there isn't a curfew and a few more restrictions in level 2 is a concession to the mobility side of the equation, the need for mobility, the need to be able to hold part-time jobs or attend school functions or whatever.
If there's a wish to toughen up level 2 with a curfew -- and I did testify the first day of the hearings that I did feel personally that level 2 was a little too soft and I would like to see more incentive for people to want to get out of level 2 by taking the advanced test -- it could be toughened up a bit. I certainly see that, if there's a desire to have the curfew, even though we're a little leery about exemptions and exemption procedures because they can be abused, that might be the place for an exemption procedure. But certainly not in level 1; I wouldn't want to see any exemptions. I don't think we would.
If you're going to recommend an exemption procedure, say for a curfew, it has to be administratively simple, because it can be a nightmare trying to administer something like that. One successful way of doing it -- and they do this in New York state, where they have a curfew on certain age drivers -- is that the onus is on the learner drivers to carry paper which attests to the fact that they have a job or school business or something that requires them to be driving after midnight, or whatever the hours of the curfew are in New York state. Administratively, we would want to see that the onus is on the driver and not on something to be registered with the ministry, because you're talking about an administrative nightmare.
Mr Klopp: That, I guess, ties in with -- and I understand that. That's what we always talk about: The more lines you have in it, the harder it is to sell, and also to cost for working.
It was just whispered in my ear that if somebody has a piece of paper, I could be your buddy and sign it. I think in a way, when a police officer does stop you, though, if you're drunk, it doesn't matter if you have a signature from your priest that you're doing work at church; you have another problem on your hands. But if you're sober and you pull out a piece of paper, albeit it's as fraudulent as heck, she's signed it. But the police officer, without -- "Okay, you're sober and you have this thing that says you work somewhere. You go on your way." But if you don't have any piece of paper, the officer says, "You're not supposed to be out after 12 o'clock," and quite clearly that is the case here. That maybe leads into my second question.
Mr Hughes: If I can just say one thing, we're certainly agreed on what you're saying, but there are ways to at least try to minimize the potential for fraud. You can require something to be on original company letterhead, to be dated within the last six months, or something like that. There are criteria that could be applied to that.
Mr Klopp: To make it simple. I'm all for that. That goes back to the second part of the question with regard to the licence. We talked about having a thing in the back that says you're a student driver or a new driver. School's out for me, personally, and we'll talk about it over -- I've mixed emotions. Somebody brought up about how you keep it that a police officer or a person of the law can very easily tell that you're a level 1 or a level 2, and then when you're permanently a full-time licence. I was wondering if there was any way that you could use it right in your licence itself. Everybody's is blue, I guess, right? Standard, this card here, blue or whatever? Could it maybe be the first one you get when you sign up is like an orange card, and the second one's a green card, and it very clearly --
Mr Hughes: My understanding is that we are developing a system that will do that. Bob, you may want to elaborate on that.
Mr Bob Domoney: The colours have been used in different jurisdictions to denote probationary or underage individuals. In our case, our expectation is simply that we'll put the licence class on the document. If you're a level G1, you're obviously an automobile driver in level 1, so you can tell by the licence class. We'll be making those changes.
Mr Klopp: You'll still buy all the same coloured paper but you'd have a little type in there.
Mr Domoney: Well, yes. The policeman will know from the document whether you're a level 1, level 2, motorcycle or automobile driver.
Mr Wood: Just briefly, I know Paul has talked about young drivers, and I get a little bit concerned not so much where young drivers are concerned, but novice drivers, first time for one reason or other. Perhaps a woman has a serious illness in the family and has to take over more responsibility and needs a driver's licence. I think we heard presentations during the committee that a larger percentage of people are not necessarily young drivers; they're novice drivers who, after they've finished their college or university education, have decided: "I couldn't afford a car before. I wasn't even worried about having it. Now I need it." That's not a large group, but it is a certain percentage of people. I want to make sure that we're not putting any undue hardship on these people. For example, if a woman never had to have a driver's licence for any reason whatsoever and all of a sudden her husband had a stroke or something and she needed transportation to get around, we're saying that there is a certain period of time. I just want to throw that out to you. I know you probably don't have an answer for it.
The other comment I would make is that in some parts of the province, like where I come from in Kapuskasing, in order to get experience on four-lane highways or expressways you have to travel 350 miles either way before you're going to get any experience on four-lane highways. It could be three, four, five years or whatever after the person has their driver's licence before they can end up on those four-lanes, unless they're a novice driver and all of a sudden get a driver's licence as quickly as possible, which would be the eight months, and then can go on those particular highways.
It's just things I throw out: that 75% of the province is not necessarily the same as the other 25% that is heavily populated in the urban areas. There are different situations that exist. You can't change the rules, I guess: one rule for one part of the province and another for the other part of the province.
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Mr Hughes: On the question of older new drivers, I would just reiterate that one in six 40-year-old first-year drivers have accidents, collisions, just like one in six 16-year-olds. We expect that there's a slight softening of the statistics because of maturity and less propensity to take risk, but it's still a very clear trend in new drivers of all ages; very clearly a higher collision rate in their first year or two of driving.
I don't have an answer. Certainly there's the potential that the restrictions applied through the graduated licensing system may tend to have more impact on an older new driver than a younger one, but we do know that we can't base anything on age -- legal advice to that effect is pretty strong -- nor would we want to in this case, I think. From a safety perspective, we're concerned about all new drivers, and I guess we just have to acknowledge that yes, there will be some short-term pain.
The other thing is that once graduated licensing is on the street, people may be aware that perhaps there is more need to have that driver's licence in their pocket instead of waiting until they actually have to have it; they may get it a little earlier. Also, by and large the population, particularly the female population, is starting to be licensed at an earlier age than, say, 10 years ago or 20 years ago. We expect that there will be fewer and fewer situations where one spouse, the surviving spouse, would all of a sudden have to get their driver's licence. Of course, there will still be situations like that.
Mr Wood: There's no doubt -- I've been reading the press clippings that have been coming out -- that 15 and 15 1/2-year-olds and 16-year-olds are lining up very quickly to get in under the wire before next spring or next summer.
Mr Hughes: There are two in my house.
Mr Wood: I know one person made the comment, "My 14-year-old daughter is not very happy with you, but I'm pleased that you're making those decisions to move ahead."
Mr Hughes: I'm not real popular at home either.
Mr Turnbull: In terms of that question that came up about people going over the border to Quebec and getting their licence, have you addressed yourselves to the issue of how you can stop that?
Mr Hughes: I don't think we have a solution to that. I think we recognize that it will happen in some cases and that there isn't a whole lot we can do to control it, other than recognizing a reciprocal licence. In terms of graduated, we'll still require two years' experience to be able to get full licence privilege in Ontario, but of course, for a short term a person could simply live in Ottawa and get a licence in Quebec and drive on that.
Mr Turnbull: I would like to suggest that one possible deterrent might be that anybody who has an accident in Ontario and is driving on a Quebec licence will get health care out of the Quebec purse. I don't think we should pay anything out of OHIP if they're driving on a Quebec licence. I realize it's not your ministry --
Mr Hughes: You're starting to get into areas that I'm not very expert in.
Mr Turnbull: I think that kind of crossover would provide a deterrent.
Mr Klopp: If I may come in, isn't it illegal for someone to be in the wrong address? I know I moved from RR 2 to RR 3; it's right across the road, but I had to go --
Mr Hughes: It's clearly illegal if you're a resident of Ontario, but you could have a relative in Hull say you live there; there are ways to get around it. I'm not sure of the insurance ramifications of that either; I'm not sure whether your insurance is valid if you do that.
Mr Turnbull: That's one way for sure: You cannot say, "I'm a resident of Quebec for my licensing purposes, yet I'm a resident of Ontario for medicare purposes."
Mr Wood: What about Manitoba?
Mr Turnbull: The same holds true. Perhaps that is something you might want to, ministry to ministry, talk about.
Mr Hughes: We'll try to follow up on that and see what we can find out fairly quickly. It's just that there will several ministries involved from the insurance and health angle.
Aslo, we hope that with Ontario showing leadership in this area, the rest of the jurisdictions will follow. We know a couple of the others are indeed looking at graduated right now, including Manitoba, and we hope that maybe five years from now everybody will have graduated licensing.
Mr Turnbull: I think Bob had something he wanted to mention.
Mr Domoney: Clearly, as John mentioned, it's illegal for a resident of Ontario to apply and obtain a Quebec licence. The dilemma we face is that there's no real definition of residency. The practice we've used as a rule of thumb is, where do you live most? Some people live part of the time down in Florida, part of the time, say, in Toronto and they might have a cottage up north where they spend the summer, so where is your residence?
Mr Turnbull: Presumably, my definition would be reasonable: if they are going to that administration for health care benefits. Much in the same way as the seniors are squawking about the changes that have been made to Ontario legislation in terms of what will be covered down in Florida, if somebody is driving on a licence from another administration, then that should be --
Mr Domoney: If it was determined that that licence was illegal, I think I recall the insurance industry saying that if they're not licensed their insurance doesn't apply; their liability does, but not their collision.
Mr Turnbull: I think there's an important educational process you've got to go through so that people don't try that loophole.
Mr Gary Wilson: I'd like to return to that question of driver instruction. I think you raised it earlier, in passing; I'd just like you to elaborate on that. The idea was, is it a good idea for everyone to have some form of driver instruction?
Mr Hughes: Are you talking about driver education? Formal driver training and education?
Mr Gary Wilson: Driver education, exactly; a course.
Mr Hughes: There was a lot of lobbying for mandatory driver education at the hearings. We have not in the past, and do not with this proposal, support mandatory driver education. It's a complicated business.
Just a couple of facts that may be of interest to the committee members: Driver education as a road safety initiative is very difficult to prove; it's very difficult to prove that it has a significant safety benefit. That doesn't mean we don't think it's a good idea and that it doesn't work. It's just difficult to prove.
The Americans, some time ago, spent $12 million on a study trying to evaluate and authenticate the safety value of road safety education, and they couldn't prove it one way or the other. What limited supporting evidence there is shows that it achieves its best results when it's undertaken voluntarily; in other words, you get people there who want to be there and learn and listen and do accordingly. That's one thing.
The second thing is that the province of Quebec, a few years back, introduced mandatory driver education and a couple of years later withdrew the requirement for mandatory driver education because it couldn't prove it. We don't think there's any point in trying to prove it one way or the other in Ontario, if the Americans spent $12 million and couldn't prove it and if Quebec couldn't prove it worked.
What we're saying is, let's encourage it through the incentive, through the insurance discount. The fact is that almost two thirds of the people who get their licence now do take formal driver education and training, so it's not a great leap to assume that with the extra incentive of the four-month credit graduated licensing provides, that two thirds will probably go higher. That means that the small proportion of new drivers who don't take driver education will probably be, for the most part, those people who either can't afford it or where it's very difficult for them, in a remote part of the province, to have access to it.
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Mr Gary Wilson: The only thing I can think of that might affect that would be the standards of the schools. What do you think of the standards? Are they adequate?
Mr Hughes: I think it's an industry like any other industry. There are good people and bad people, and it's a consumer issue to try to find the good people if you're the consumer. We do have processes and systems in place to try to ensure that there are minimum standards, but driver training is a very personalized thing. There are good teachers and bad teachers. I guess the industry as a general rule is trying to improve the standards, but as I say, it's like anything else: You have to be a good consumer.
Ms Murdock: I was very impressed with the Ontario coroner's presentation and quite intrigued with the statistics he came forward with, not only for the 15-to-19-year-olds but for the 20-to-24; taking into consideration that one only covers, as Bob pointed out, a three-year period of drivers and the other a six-year period of drivers, so the stats shouldn't be skewed out of whack for that.
But the thing that really struck me in his presentation and then is also in New to the Road: Young Drivers and Novice Drivers, by the Traffic Injury Research Foundation of Canada, is that the number of passengers who were injured or killed in crashes was almost equal to and in some cases greater than the number of drivers who were injured or killed in crashes. We were told not to use the word "accidents," because they aren't.
Obviously, I would say he would have a fairly strong view of the world and have some credibility in the field. In terms of his recommendation that there be no passengers in the vehicle at all during level 1 except for the accompanying driver, I'm wondering how the ministry feels about that from a policy point of view.
Mr Hughes: One of our earliest generations of models for graduated licensing had a restriction on passengers which was something along the line that you were allowed one passenger plus family members.
The ideal scenario for level 1 is that this person comes in, gets his level 1 learner's permit and signs up for driver training; the individual or the individual's parents recognize that 10 hours behind the wheel of driver training is not sufficient and that it should be supplemented with practice and experience. Limiting the number of passengers to zero means that on normal family outings you are removing the opportunity to get practice and experience under those controlled conditions. If you make it so onerous that it's very difficult for the person to get behind the wheel and get practice and experience, then you're defeating the purpose of level 1.
Ms Murdock: I appreciate that, particularly in relation to the family aspect. But you could almost envision it when the coroner was explaining about how you turn the radio, crank it up, and you're throwing popcorn from the back seat to the front seat and you're checking out the girls walking down the main drag or whatever. You could almost see it happening in terms of hitting the telephone pole next. But I appreciate your comments and I'll keep them in mind.
The second thing is that we were handed this exhibit. You probably addressed this in the second week; unfortunately, I was substituted on another committee so I was unable to continue with graduated licences. I was disappointed. You may have already addressed this, and if you have I apologize in advance.
Graduated licences will be amendments to a number of acts but specifically to the HTA, right?
Mr Hughes: Is there anything other than the HTA involved?
Ms Murdock: Well, regulations.
Mr Domoney: There will only be amendment to the Highway Traffic Act, plus regulations under the Highway Traffic Act. We don't intend to amend other acts at this time. I did provide the clerk with a copy of the housekeeping items; you'll notice it's all HTA and HTA regs.
Ms Murdock: Right; sorry. We also got a letter handed to us from people in regard to senior drivers. I don't know if you have a copy of that letter.
Mr Domoney: I have it in front of me.
Ms Murdock: It would require an amendment to the HTA as well, if you were going to put a restriction, or a requirement to test -- well, not over 55, but certainly under 80.
Mr Domoney: The current regulation covers testing of seniors, so it wouldn't be an amendment to the Highway Traffic Act necessarily. It could be an amendment to the regulation, depending of course -- assuming you have authority under the act today, you get into a question of the Human Rights Code. Back in 1981, when the Human Rights Code came into force, we had to put "notwithstanding" clauses into the act, so we'd have to check to see whether an amendment to the act is required.
Ms Murdock: But it could be amended by regulation, without even having to go to the act?
Mr Domoney: What's in the regulation could come out. Adding to it might be more difficult.
Ms Murdock: Changing it?
Mr Domoney: The current regulation allows us to test seniors over 80 annually. We could easily amend that by taking it out without amending the Highway Traffic Act. If we wanted to put something else in like --
Ms Murdock: Like 70?
Mr Domoney: Then it would be a "notwithstanding" clause, I believe.
Mr Hughes: The bottom line is that if we're going to change the way we treat senior drivers and deal with them, we have to make some kind of change, either legislative or regulatory.
Ms Murdock: The problem I have is that within my own riding I see people of differing ages -- I can think of within my own family -- who really should not be on the road. There's nothing you can get in terms of a doctor's certificate saying they've had a seizure or anything that could get them off the road, if you get my meaning, yet they should be tested on a regular basis. I'm not saying they can't drive; just that they should be tested more frequently.
Mr Hughes: The whole policy question of senior drivers and how we deal with them is under some review within the ministry. It's not that we aren't aware that senior drivers are overrepresented on a per-kilometre-driven basis -- and they are -- but the fact is that they don't drive very much statistically and the sheer number of accidents or collisions and injuries in those age groups is smaller than you would expect. But on a per-kilometre-driven basis, yes, they are more susceptible to collisions and also, because of age, more susceptible to injury and death as result of those collisions. It's something we're concerned with and something we are looking at, but we haven't treated it as part of the graduated licensing proposal. We're treating it as an independent issue.
Ms Murdock: I don't have any other questions. Thank you very much.
Mr Klopp: Just to tie in with our colleague Mr Turnbull on the Quebec and Manitoba borders: I realize one of our colleagues in the House brought it up, and I respect that we bring up every issue; I'm just wondering how big an issue it is. I don't come from a border town, though; I'll have to qualify that. I just wanted to make sure we're going to get clarification on what our legal status is on the whole issue of someone going across a border and make sure we have the right information for us to deal with. I guess that's what Mr Turnbull was asking you to do, and I just wanted to make sure that's what we're after.
Mr Hughes: When do you meet next? We'll try to get you something written.
Ms Murdock: Wednesday.
Mr Hughes: This Wednesday? We'll see what we can find out in two days.
Mr Klopp: My colleague brought up the young drivers all in a car and trying to keep so many out. I still think a lot of it goes back to the curfew. When you get four people in a car all coming home from work or, if they have to be home by midnight but it's after midnight because they were letting loose a little more than they should have, then they get in a very serious accident. I think that goes back to the policy of curfew, not how many people are in the car. That's just my gut feeling anyway.
Mr Hughes: When we first started working on the policy, certainly we were aware of the crazy overrepresentation in all the statistics of new drivers, particularly young new drivers. When we analyse it at the next level of detail, we find that midnight to 5, alcohol involvement, and a larger number of passengers, multi-passenger collisions, those three factors, seem to be more present than the norm in terms of new driver accidents. That's why we've focused in on those three things with our restrictions. There are other things as well, but those are the big three in terms of the contributing factors.
The Chair: Thank you very much. Further questions, Mr Turnbull? I would assume Mr Daigeler has no further questions either.
Thank you very much, Mr Hughes, and thank you to your colleagues for joining us again today. You've been very helpful during the whole hearing process and everybody that the ministry has had assigned to these hearings has been quite helpful. Pass the word on to those who need to know.
There is a document being distributed that is the ministry's summary of the issues raised at the graduated licence hearings. I would ask members to accept that and combine that with the summary that is being done by Mr McNaught. We will use those two documents as the basis to start our discussion on Wednesday in terms of drafting a report, if that's acceptable to everybody.
Ms Murdock: On Wednesday we're going to --
The Chair: We're going to start drafting a report. We are adjourned until 3:30 Wednesday.
The committee adjourned at 1702.