'Get them driving in a skilled way' - more licence test changes urged

The Institute of Driver Educators says people who learned to drive safely with a professional instructor were good citizens on the road. Photo: 123rf

Driving teachers are happy Waka Kotahi is tackling wait times for learners licence tests but they want the agency to encourage more people to learn with professionals.

From Monday, there will be a 10 working day stand-down period for people who fail the test twice in one day.

The re-sit fees were scrapped in October, prompting an increase in the number of people sitting the theory test.

Mark Revill-Johnson from the Institute of Driver Educators said the change would help demand.

"We're absolutely in favour of the initiatives that remove barriers and that's what the removal of reset fees was designed to do, but we're a lot more in favour of initiatives that encourage people to take help from professionals to get them driving in a skilled way, in a safe way."

People who learned to drive safely with a professional instructor were good citizens on the road, Revill-Johnson said.

Revill-Johnson said he hoped the change would motivate people to study rather than hope for the best.

"The purpose of the test is to ensure that you understand the road rules before you actually get out driving the real world. So I don't think putting a stand down period will change whether somebody would pass the test or not, the only thing that would change that is their preparation for sitting the test."

It was encouraging to see the transport agency make tweaks to the licensing system because test wait times have blown out, Revill-Johnson said.

The Automobile Association also welcomed plans for the stand-down period but said it did not go far enough with waiting times to take the test tripling in some areas.

Principal advisor Terry Collins on Saturday said the change to remove re-sit fees in October had the best of intentions, but they were dealing with the fallout as more people were repeating the test, taking up available booking slots.