Australia lags behind the rest of the world when it comes to motoring laws and regulations. Let's catch up.
Principles
As a political party, Liberal Democrats WA believe that:
- People should be allowed to express their creativity by modifying their vehicles
- The role of vehicle laws and regulations should be to provide a standard for which modifications are safe
- The metric for determining which modifications are safe should be left in the hands of qualified engineers, and not politicians or department bureaucrats
Plan
In Government, Liberal Democrats WA will:
Affordability
- Attach third-party car insurance to licences, rather than vehicles, so that drivers can have multiple cars under one policy
- Reduce taxes, tolls, and licensing fees for motorcycles to no greater than a quarter of that for vehicles
- Create a temporary licensing regime of 90 dollars for 90 days, to attract major events such as Race Wars
- Expand the discounted rego scheme - that's available to owners of classic cars who are a member of a car club - to include all owners of classic cars
Choice
- Bring Western Australia in line with other states and territories and consistently apply the national standards for licensing modified vehicles
- Bring motorcycle licensing in line with car licensing, and remove arbitrary restrictions on engine capacity and power-to-weight ratio
- Allow the parking of motorcycles on footpaths where it doesn't endanger the thoroughfare of pedestrians
- Create refuge areas for motorcycles in front of cars waiting at intersections to facilitate the faster flow of traffic
Discussion
Let's talk about some key issues:
Variable speed limits
Australia has relatively low speed limits compared to other countries, and we are unique in not having a variable speed limit
German autobahns have no speed limits. And French autoroutes and Italian autostradas have limits of 130 km/h, both of which fall to 110 km/h in the case of rainy conditions
Italian autrostradas even increase their speed limit to 150 km/h in the case of newer and straight roads
The 85th percentile rule
The majority of Australian motorists are careful and competent, and for that reason, speed limits should reflect their behaviour
This would involve adopting the '85th Percentile Rule', where speed limits are set at the speed at or below which 85 per cent of all travels travel
There is no better arbiter of what's a safe speed limit than the speed at which most drivers navigate a particular stretch of road
Radar detectors
The evidence shows that drivers are more likely to slow down if they know that there’s a speed camera lurking on the horizon
Radar detectors provide drivers with a greater degree of situational awareness, and thus an appreciation of the risks around them
Banning radar detectors is yet another attempt by the government to get their grubby hands on more revenue for the state's coffers
Australians have a right to express their creativity by modifying their cars. The Government should only get involved if and when a particular modification is deemed to by unsafe by engineers
Aaron Stonehouse MLC, Leader of Liberal Democrats WA