KAP backs bid to boost qualified truck drivers
KATTER’S Australian Party candidate Clynton Hawks is calling on the major parties to support an initiative of the Queensland Trucking Association aimed at boosting the number of experienced truck drivers on the roads.
The QTA’S Jobs Ready Program aims to assist employers to attract new entrants into a trucking career, but also to bridge the gap where the quality of training and lack of opportunity to gain experience as a heavy-vehicle driver is a barrier to getting a job.
QTA is proposing a pilot funded by the next Australian government, estimated to cost $1.5m, to initially train 150 heavy-vehicle drivers, with a forward plan to allocate an additional $5m to extend the training for 600 positions.
“The problem many transport business operators face is finding experienced drivers. Some companies would rather let a vehicle sit idle than put someone a bit wet behind the ears in charge of heavy machinery which might cost upwards of half a million dollars,” Mr Hawks said.
“Newly qualified drivers lack knowledge of even the most fundamental heavy-vehicle driving skills.
“Licence qualification only
requires them to be able to drive forward. They come to get a job and they can’t go backwards, they can’t back a trailer, and they can’t change gears. That’s a problem because many transport companies still operate mainly manual fleets.”
Mr Hawks said insurers would be interested in the QTA initiative, as getting insurance at reasonable rates for inexperienced drivers was a barrier to employment and one of the factors keeping transport costs high in Australia.
Mr Hawks, himself a qualified heavy-vehicle operator, said he’d been fortunate to have come from a family of transport operators.
“I learnt just about everything I know about driving a truck from my dad.
“Not everyone has a dad in the trucking business, so the Jobs Ready Program is the next best thing.”