MOOSOMIN - Saskatchewan Trucking Association executive director Susan Ewart, says there is room for all drivers on the road to improve their ability of safe driving, including truck drivers and others.
There has been a lot of discussion about safety in trucking since a recent World-Spectator article in which a driver trained and licenced in Manitoba told a judge in Moosomin that he was travelling at 115 km/h in an 80 km/h zone on his first trip as a commercial driver because he was unable to properly slow his truck as he had not been trained to drive a semi with a full load and didn't know how to properly slow his rig.
“For the most part I believe the majority of semi drivers are really safe because think about it, that’s their primary job for being on the road," said Ewart. "Their job is the open road, and those commercial drivers are professionals because they have a lot of hours behind the wheel.”
“Good companies should not be sending a brand new driver out on the road without some training and support before they’re let out on their own,” Ewart says.
“I think about how every day I drive with them on the roads in the city and when I go home, and I always think to myself that person has a family also that they want to get home to. You know, I think sometimes it’s you and I in our cars that creates more problems for truck drivers because we don’t give them the space that they need, or we figure we can wiggle around them and maybe we shouldn’t be doing that, more awareness and education in the driver curriculum, think about a young driver learning, there should be more education for us as the regular motoring public, about driving with semi-vehicles.”
Currently Saskatchewan has a mandatory level training (MELT) program which is four weeks long. Ewart says the training is broken down into in class training, in yard and first hand experience training.
“We want to make sure that drivers are well trained today and that there’s better training standards, so we provide input and assistance with subject matter with SGI when they were developing the curriculum. We want to make sure that the industry is accountable.”
Although the association works with SGI on the MELT program, Ewart says SGI overall handles the training that goes towards preparing licensed truck drivers.
“We were part of the group that was developing the program, we knew specific areas that need to happen but we’re not involved with the driving schools,” she says.
“Let’s say there was change to some curriculum, SGI would provide that information to the driver training schools. We give our opinions because obviously we’re an advocacy organization about things that we would like to see or things that could be enhanced, or if that the drivers coming out of the training is better than before, that sort of thing.”
With Saskatchewan’s mandatory training for licensing truck drivers meeting the minimum training requirement of 121.5 hours, Ewart says it’s a start into improving the overall standards for mandatory training.
“I think there’s always room for improvement, I don’t think that less education is better. I think the trucking industry feels there should be more, but it’s a start.”
“We have to start somewhere, but we recognize that we want to ensure that the education is there. That there’s a level of professionalism and that those drivers coming out, are ready for employment and then the carrier would take it from there, with additional training. So it’s definitely a start, but there’s more that we can do to enhance the training.”
“Do I think anyone who graduates after four weeks is ready to go drive a LTV absolutely not because they can’t. There’s rules and criteria around that, you have to drive for so many kilometers, you have to have so many years of experience, the same with dangerous goods. There’s companies in that space, you can’t drive vehicles unless you have so many years of experienced driving.”
Ewart says the Saskatchewan Trucking Association continues to work with Saskatchewan Government Insurance on how to improve training for truck drivers.
“I think those are conversations we’re always going to have with SGI on how to increase the training standards, how do we make sure that drivers are coming out with the best knowledge and education that they possibly can. I think that will be a continuous conversation for us.”
“Those things go a long way and we have a huge driver shortage today not only in the province but across the country. I think one of the ways through this is education, and improving the image of the industry and showing how vital the service of being a truck driver is to our local economy and that of Canada. I mean the last two years people have recognized that being a professional truck driver is a valued career and we certainly support them.”
