Bunbury families reignite calls for more resources to help reduce driving assessment wait times

Families frustrated by driving test failure rates and resourcing issues at the Bunbury Department of Transport have reignited their calls for State Government intervention. Shadow transport minister Shane Love met concerned parents, students and driving instructors at a public forum on Monday night, when the community aired its grievances about the current system. Learner drivers in Bunbury are forced to wait longer than anywhere else in regional WA to book a test, facing a delay of two to three months when they make an appointment. The South West city also has the lowest pass rate outside the metropolitan area. South West MLC James Hayward, pictured, organised the meeting and said it helped him gain a clearer picture of the issues learner drivers faced. “Parents all had the same stories, telling of the angst and distress this was causing their families, saying it was soul-destroying for their children who were continuously failing tests,” he said. “It is clear that there is something fundamentally wrong with a system when so many are failing.” A Department of Transport spokesman said an extra assessor had been “temporarily relocated” to Bunbury on June 21, opening up about 130 new practical driving assessments on the online booking system. “This resulted in more PDAs becoming available in Bunbury at various times over July, August and September as some learner drivers who had PDAs booked in that period secured earlier assessments, freeing up their original booking for other candidates,” he said. The spokesman said the PDA pass rate for Bunbury was similar to that of the metropolitan centres and students who failed the test often went in underprepared. But Brent Price, from Easy Pass Driving Lessons in Bunbury, said at the meeting he was adamant local instructors were sending students into the assessment with the best possible preparation. “If you think for driving instructors it is all about money and all about lessons, I can assure you it is not,” he said. “We would not take them until they are ready, because it reflects poorly on us, it is unethical, and it is a waste of their time and their money.” After hearing families’ woes, Mr Love said while the most important thing was to ensure young drivers were properly assessed to ensure their safety and that of others, having young people go in expecting to fail was a “cultural problem”. “These failure rates have increased throughout the State in recent years, so it isn’t only in Bunbury, although there seems to be a cultural problem where people are going in expecting to be failed, before they’ve even arrived,” he said. “There needs to be a consistency in the tests that take place so they know that where they go, they are going to be assessed on the merits that have been provided. “To hear of appointment times running out for seven or eight weeks is also unacceptable.”