mmg.com.au

A Cobram director of Australia’s only national trucking industry association is relieved the standardisation of driver fatigue laws finally became effective yesterday.

The new laws eliminate differences in systems of counting time between states for heavy vehicle driver fatigue management.

The trucking industry needed a year to convince South Australia and Victoria to adopt the same system of counting time used in NSW and Queensland.

Brian Hicks is one of 11 directors of the National Road Transport Operators Association, which formed in 1994 to represent freight operators.

The Brian Hicks Transport and Hicks Hunter Transport owner said common sense had prevailed in introducing the new laws.

‘‘They are a great thing and should never have been the way they were,’’ Mr Hicks said.

‘‘The continuity is the main point, so we don’t have to change laws once we cross the river.’’

Under the old laws, NSW and Queensland counted driving time from a major rest break to determine if a driver had worked the correct amount of hours in a 24-hour period, while the time could be taken from any rest break in South Australia and Victoria, leading to confusion and potentially exposing drivers to multiple fatigue breaches.

The National Transport Commission proposed the change, which the Australian Transport Council agreed to in June this year.

For more information about the new laws, visit www.vicroads.vic.gov.au