Joyce Steven: Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Joyce Steven: Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:658;Page:6957] 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister of Transport) 
: 
 I move  
That the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill be now read a second time 
. I thank members of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee for their work on the bill. In particular I acknowledge the work of the chair David Bennett. 
Chris Tremain 
: Excellent hair. 
Hon STEVEN JOYCE 
: It is an excellent hairstyle. 
The Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill addresses dangerous driving and the antisocial use of vehicles. This year we are looking to take major steps to further improve the road safety of this country. It is important then that we do not allow extremes of dangerous behaviour by some road users only because the police and local authorities do not have the power to stop it. 
This bill will give the police and road-controlling authorities appropriate powers that more accurately reflect the danger and disruption caused by illegal street racing. Several incidents this year including the attack on a lone police officer and the attack on an aviation security officer by illegal street racers and their supporters have made it clear that the need for these powers is overdue. 
The bill will enhance the powers of police courts and road-controlling authorities to tackle illegal street racing and the antisocial behaviour that goes hand in hand with it. The bill empowers road-controlling authorities to make by-laws restricting cruising—the circling of streets in a way that disturbs local residents and has a negative impact on many businesses. The bill also increases penalties for failing to stop for police failing to give details of a driver registration plate offences and graduated driver license system breaches. 
The bill contains provisions for dealing with the problems caused by illegally modified vehicles. The police will be given additional powers to direct a vehicle to a testing site when an officer believes it has been modified illegally. Vehicles ordered off the road for excessive exhaust noise will be made to undergo an objective metered noise test. This bill also makes impoundment mandatory for vehicles involved in illegal street racing or sustained loss of traction such as burnouts. Those who lose their licenses because of disqualification or demerit point suspensions will have their licences cancelled and they will have to pay a reinstatement fee to get their licenses back. This will ensure that other road users are not paying for the actions of a few. 
This bill was referred to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee in June of this year. The committee received 126 submissions on the bill and a number of changes have been made in response to those submissions. The definition of “cruising” in the bill is amended to mean “driving repeatedly in the same direction over the same section of a road …”. This makes it clear that driving up one side of a road and then down the other would not constitute cruising. 
A change has also been made to remove the power of a road-controlling authority to permit street racing. This provision was unnecessary as road-controlling authorities already have the power to close roads for street racing events. The by-law powers in the bill were amended to allow a road-controlling authority to prohibit cruising not just to control or restrict it. 
Amendments have also been made to allow by-laws that specify the section of road or roads on which cruising is to be prohibited restricted or controlled and to set the period of time that must pass between each time the driver drives on the specified road to avoid being regarded as cruising. A road-controlling authority would be able to amend by resolution the specified roads and the times at which the prohibition applies. The bill has been amended to empower the Minister of Transport to amend or replace these by-laws; currently the Minister is able to review and disallow by-laws. 
There are minor technical amendments to the provisions for the driver licence reinstatement fee. These technical amendments are necessary for the effective operation of these provisions. For example driver licences of suspended or disqualified drivers will be cancelled by operation of law. 
Currently when drivers are disqualified they are supposed to surrender their photographic licence cards. This does not always happen and those who retain their licence cards continue to use them after disqualification. The amendments to the bill will see all licence cards being cancelled automatically when they are required to be surrendered. This amendment clarifies that any licence card whether surrendered or not is no longer valid. The driver will have to pay to have his or her license reinstated once the period of disqualification has ended. 
Changes have also been made to the vehicle seizure and impoundment provisions. An amendment will require a person to provide his or her driver’s licence number to an enforcement officer if requested as well as other personal information that can be asked for. These amendments bring section 96 of the Land Transport Act 1998 in line with the fines collection regime. 
A consequential amendment has been made in relation to the need to update the driver licensing register when a driver is forbidden to drive. Currently the register must be updated every time police forbid someone to drive. In some cases the period for which a driver is forbidden to drive is very short and may have ended before the register is updated. For this reason an amendment has been made to remove the requirement to update the driver licensing register. The information will still be recorded on the New Zealand police system. 
The bill has been amended to clarify the ownership of personal property in a confiscated vehicle. Storage providers have expressed concern that former owners of unclaimed vehicles have demanded that their unclaimed personal property be returned many months after the vehicle was confiscated. The amendments allow for the ownership of any personal property in an unclaimed vehicle to be transferred to the storage provider at the same time that the ownership of the vehicle is transferred to that storage provider. 
Alongside this bill I will be soon considering the content of Safer Journeys the road safety strategy for the next decade. This strategy will be seeking to significantly improve the safety of all our road users with a particular emphasis on our young people. The initiatives in this bill provide a strong platform for improving the safety of our young drivers by ensuring better compliance with the graduated driver-licensing system and by tackling dangerous behaviour like illegal street racing. 
On average there are 137 crashes a year that result in injury or death and are caused by illegal street-racing activity. Three-quarters of these crashes involve young people aged 15 to 24. We are working to cut the numbers of young people being killed and injured on our roads and this bill is an important step towards this goal. 
I again thank the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee for its work on the bill. The bill will send a strong message that our streets are no place for antisocial and dangerous behaviour. It will help to ensure that householders and business owners are free from the excessive noise and intimidation that often comes with illegal street racing. This bill is important in setting boundaries around the type of behaviour we are prepared to tolerate on our roads. I commend this bill to the House.