He Has to be Joking!!
Posted: 07 Aug 2022, 16:46
So the Transport Minister Grant Shapps is looking towards allowing car drivers to drive HGV's without having to take a test or hold the appropriate license so as to relieve the shortage of drivers in the haulage industry.
To my mind he has got to be stopped, driving a 38ton articulated truck is not like driving a bl**dy car!! I have taken 7 Ministry of Transport Driving Tests on various classes of vehicles passing all first time, when I took my HGV's they were an hour and a half on the road with around 20 minutes on the maneuvering area where you had to negotiate a number of cones such as reversing etc, then I had a fifteen minute question and answer not only on the highway code but also safety features regarding operation of an HGV. I did actually take a lorry driving test before the HGV Test came into force and that was only a 30 minute test with one reverse around a corner which allowed me to drive the equivalent of an HGV 3, then the new HGV Tests came into being but I did not qualify for what was then known as the Grandfather Rights otherwise known as Acquired Rights i.e. if you drove an artic or rigid continuously for over six months then you were exempt and allowed to continue driving without having to take the new test and I did not qualify.
To allow car drivers behind the wheel even if they are given X amount of time behind the wheel under instruction I consider that placing a car driver into the cab of a 38 Ton articulated vehicle is totally wrong. Equally, there is a medical to take and due to my disabilities as well as having 3 heart attacks there is no way that I would want to step into a cab now or even be allowed to.
Most HGV's have automatic gears but when I drove them I had crash gear boxes and in some cases no power steering at all, just muscle power but throughout my time driving up and down the length of Britain Scotland and Wales negotiating through small villages with a 40ft trailer is no mean feat. Even when on Grimsby Fish I had to reverse my 40ft trailer parallel onto a pontoon between 2 other trailers and had do this without assistance and did this first time every time with only six feet between the front and rear trailers to play with after making the maneuver!! A car driver would not be able to do that without scraping the sides of the trailers!!
If car drivers were to have a six week course then maybe, but they must have a medical then there is the question of hazardous goods such as petrol the carriage of acids etc. They must take a Hazchem course in the classroom with exams to be able to handle correctly hazardous materials as for instance various acids can interact if the trailer has not been prepared properly resulting in dangerous situations.
https://www.hazchem.ie/
I dread this ever happening.
Regards
Nigel.
To my mind he has got to be stopped, driving a 38ton articulated truck is not like driving a bl**dy car!! I have taken 7 Ministry of Transport Driving Tests on various classes of vehicles passing all first time, when I took my HGV's they were an hour and a half on the road with around 20 minutes on the maneuvering area where you had to negotiate a number of cones such as reversing etc, then I had a fifteen minute question and answer not only on the highway code but also safety features regarding operation of an HGV. I did actually take a lorry driving test before the HGV Test came into force and that was only a 30 minute test with one reverse around a corner which allowed me to drive the equivalent of an HGV 3, then the new HGV Tests came into being but I did not qualify for what was then known as the Grandfather Rights otherwise known as Acquired Rights i.e. if you drove an artic or rigid continuously for over six months then you were exempt and allowed to continue driving without having to take the new test and I did not qualify.
To allow car drivers behind the wheel even if they are given X amount of time behind the wheel under instruction I consider that placing a car driver into the cab of a 38 Ton articulated vehicle is totally wrong. Equally, there is a medical to take and due to my disabilities as well as having 3 heart attacks there is no way that I would want to step into a cab now or even be allowed to.
Most HGV's have automatic gears but when I drove them I had crash gear boxes and in some cases no power steering at all, just muscle power but throughout my time driving up and down the length of Britain Scotland and Wales negotiating through small villages with a 40ft trailer is no mean feat. Even when on Grimsby Fish I had to reverse my 40ft trailer parallel onto a pontoon between 2 other trailers and had do this without assistance and did this first time every time with only six feet between the front and rear trailers to play with after making the maneuver!! A car driver would not be able to do that without scraping the sides of the trailers!!
If car drivers were to have a six week course then maybe, but they must have a medical then there is the question of hazardous goods such as petrol the carriage of acids etc. They must take a Hazchem course in the classroom with exams to be able to handle correctly hazardous materials as for instance various acids can interact if the trailer has not been prepared properly resulting in dangerous situations.
https://www.hazchem.ie/
I dread this ever happening.
Regards
Nigel.