DRIVING LICENSE FEES

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20031, 1 September 1939, Page 4

DRIVING LICENSE FEES

NO SHARE TO COUNTIES ROAD INSURANCE LEVY (Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, this day. Although councils are not to share in the annual fees paid for drivers’ licenses, the Minister of Transport, the Hon. R. Semple, told the Hohse of; Representatives last evening that these bodies had been generously treated by the Highways Board under his administration. By the taking over from the counties of over.4ooo miles of main highways, they had been saved in eight years over £800,000..

Mr, Semple added that he was always against the counties having to carry the burden of main highways which were used by other than their own ratepayers, but he did not think they should ask that drivers’ fees should go to help them in balancing their accounts, for no other country in the world favoured that practice.

The whole of the drivers’ fees in Australia went to the Government to be used' in traffic control.

He believed that the driver .who paid the fee would be glad to know that it was to be used as an insurance for himself and all other road users by making the roads safer. He was satisfied that the essence of road safety lay in proper traffis control. Though New Zealand’s accident figures were low, there was great room for improvement. It would come through the strict enforcement of the regulations. No county council should put pounds, shillings and pence ahead of human safety.