Bennett David: Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Bennett David: Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
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DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) 
: 
 Today we are discussing the Land Transport (Road Safety and Other Matters) Amendment Bill. First of all I want to acknowledge that we are fortunate to have a Minister of Transport who has a desire to progress road safety in New Zealand and who is making a difference to the roads of New Zealand not only by building good roads but also by establishing effective rules and regulations around how we use those roads. 
For a decade a Minister in this Parliament has not taken the opportunity to put some decent rules in place that make some difference. Labour members come to this Chamber here tonight and spout on about how we should be doing this that and the other thing but when they had their chance they never did it. What they are saying does not ring true because if we look at the fundamental policies of this legislation we will understand why this legislation is framed in the way that it is. 
The fundamental policy of this legislation is to look at at-risk drivers and then look at the youth who are part of that at-risk group. If we look at at-risk drivers in respect of alcohol we see that they are well above the blood-alcohol level of 0.08. Those are the real at-risk drivers because they put other drivers on our roads at risk and that is what the Minister talked about in relation to the British experience. The focus was on the real danger not on the political expediency that Labour is trying to promote here today. 
Young drivers are a big part of this policy as well. If members look at what we are doing they will see that it is a two-pronged approach. We are looking at the driving age and we are talking about how we can make young people safer on the roads. I congratulate the Green Party a party that promotes itself on supporting young people. It has seen that it is in the best interests of young people to have the minimum licensing age raised from 15 to 16 and the implementation of new rules on the drink-driving limit of young people as encapsulated in the legislation. 
This legislation has two parts to save young people on the roads. The first relates to the minimum licensing age. Moving the minimum licensing age from 15 to 16 gives young people a chance to survive on our roads. Second reducing the alcohol limit for young people to zero will save more young lives on New Zealand roads and that is the important part of this legislation. This will lead to saving young people’s lives on our roads in New Zealand and we should be very very mindful of that. 
Opposition members have talked about the Australian approach. They say that Australia dropped the blood-alcohol limit to 0.05. But we should look at the driving age there. People would not even be driving at 16 in Australia. In its graduated system people are probably 17½ or 18 before they actually drive. So to have that approach we have to look at the other tests done in Australia and compare apples with apples; we should not compare one part with another without taking into account the fullness of its system as one of the previous Labour speakers had done. 
This legislation is good legislation. It is there for road safety purposes. It is practical legislation that enables us to look at what other options there may be in the future. But it is legislation that will work. It is legislation that will make a big difference in saving our young people’s lives on the roads and it also looks at those high-risk drivers that we need to be taking into account in the future. This is good legislation. It is for road safety. It will save lives and I congratulate the Minister as it passes through the House. Thank you.