Teaching young drivers

One of the most famous in Australia was the late Peter Brock, who did plenty of wild and wicked things during his early days on the road including rolling his early-model Holden more than a couple of times. Brock was lucky because he had the talent to survive, and also began driving when the roads were far less crowded than they are in 2010.

Far too many of today's beginners do not have Brock's advantages . . . The road toll among Australia's youth is rising and so is the incidence of anti-social behaviour in cars, even among young women who now show many of the same aggressive signs as boys when they get behind the wheel. Everyone is looking for a 'silver bullet' solution to the problem, but nothing about road safety is ever as simple as a single test, or a single course, or a single set of limitations on rookies.

Instead, experts in road safety - Brock himself before he died, driver trainers across the country and many other experts - agree that the key is education and attitude. Personally, I only survived my first few years on the road thanks to a driver training course run by the late Peter Wherrett. He was a pioneer in the business but cracked heads and cut people down to sized, emphasising the need to treat driving as a serious business.

Mark Skaife sees it the same way. He describes driving as a 'life skill' and something that everyone has a responsibility to do well. Talk to another of today's leading driver trainers, Ian Luff, and you get a clear picture of what needs to be done. He has 28 years experience in driver training, having begun with Wherrett, and is now focussed on young drivers with a program called 'Drive to Survive'. It's now being picked up at many schools in NSW and is focussed on teaching the right skills and attitudes.

"A thinking driver is a surviving driver," says Luff. "The whole methodology behind the program is about taking speed off the streets and teaching young kids the right attitude. It's about adaptive change, helping kids change to more pro-active behaviour on the road."

Luff has some great examples. "It's like the drill that puts the hole in the wall in the wrong place. People want to blame the Makita, not the person holding it," Luff says. He is not a fan of government crackdowns and simplistic advertising campaigns with snappy slogans.

"Look at the sign that says 'wet paint, don't touch it'. Everyone just has to touch the paint. It's the same with 'Wipe off 5' and 'How fast are you going now?" "If you really want to make a change in behaviour, you have to have education and you have to start young. Give kids the skills they need, but also the knowledge to make the right decisions when they're behind the wheel."