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Union wants court changes
Page 6
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A CALL for the establishment of a new breed of court specialising solely in traffic matters I come from Transport and General Workers Union national organiser Jack Ashwell.
The new courts would deal only with offences relating to road traffic law and they would be manned by "people well versed in all aspects not only of law but of road traffic and transport," says Mr Ashwell.
And the scheme is part of a new TGWU campaign on licensing and the law being fought by the union.
Mr Ashwell has also said that he wants to see the complete separation of the hgv licence and the car driving licence, so that offences committed by the lorry driver in a car would not count towards the loss of his hgv licence, as at present.
"We do not condone for one minute breaches of the traffic law, but we do feel that the justice of some of the findings and sentences could be improved on," said Mr Ash well.
He wants to get away from a situation in which a driver can find his case sandwiched between other and completely different kinds of cases on the court lists.
Mr Ashwell's traffic courts would have as their judges people who would have a knowledge of transport operations and the law — much the same as a licensing authority.
He says that the TGWU will be pressing Transport Minister William Rodgers to make the changes that the union fe are necessary in transport 1, islation.
Mr Ashwell wants him to up a Royal Commission overhaul the whole questi of Transport and the law.
A new system of penalt should be introduced, says Ashwell, that would me that, instead of fines, a m would serve a sentence "community punishmen such as service in a casua ward where he would see results of road accidents.