TOUGH TRAINING
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• There is nothing wrong with forcing applicants for an articulated HGV driving licence to do six months or more in rigid vehicles as a sort of "probationary" test. Commercial Motor has long maintained that the current FIGV driving test system is archaic to the point of being irrelevant.
The Department of Transport is surely correct when it says this week that "few companies now would expect a newly-qualified artic driver to drive a full-size, fully-laden articulated vehicle without prior experience of driving rigid lorries." We believe that the Department and the European Commission's proposed directive should go even further by demanding that HGV driving test applicants take the test in a laden 38 or 40-tonner. Practical tests such as roping and sheeting and safe loading would also be helpful.
Far too many operators complain to Commercial Motor that the newly-qualified Class One drivers they get turning up on their doorsteps have to be taught all over again before they can be let loose on the open road. One of the country's most prominent tipper operator regularly says that the HGV driving test is worse than useless. "Why learn to drive in a nice, clean, unladen rig with a synchromesh box when I run filthy, hard-working vehicles with crash boxes?" he asks.
If the haulage industry is serious about overcoming current and anticipated HGV driver shortfalls, it has to invest more heavily in training and in testing. If it really wants a relevant HGV testing system, it should approve of these European Commission plans.
Of course the thorn in our collective flesh is going to be the lowering of the HGV licence threshold from 7.5 tonnes to 3.5 tonnes. Pay rates are going to have to rise sharply, and the truck rental companies are going to be hammered hard. The message is simple, HGV drivers are going to be better prepared, and probably better trained — but they are going to cost more. Be prepared.