Driver licensing cut: Gisborne road safety funding slashed by half

"Disappointed” and “sobering” is how Gisborne District councillors felt when they learnt their road safety funding would be 56% less than requested. 

In April, the council submitted a funding bid of $1.255 million from the 2024-27 regional road safety fund. 

However, in August, it was advised it would be allocated only $554,000. 

The council has been forced to cut back what it planned to offer, including scrapping a programme helping residents gain their driver’s licence. 

The council initially planned to address the region’s poor road safety from “inadequate levels of driving skills and reckless behaviour”, a council report said. 

During an extraordinary road transport meeting last week, councillors re-evaluated the list of programmes on offer due to the reduced funding, and some questioned why driver licensing had been cut. 

The Ngā Ara Pai Driver Licence Programme was originally on the list to receive $250,000 over three years. 

In 2023-24, it helped people get 183 learner licences and 51 programmes the council expected to offer included individual funding pools for fatigue checkpoints, safety around schools and congestion relief, motorcycle awareness safety, rural township activities, cycle education, a drive to the conditions campaign, a driver’s licence programme, and various road safety pushes. 

Now on their reduced list is $150,000 for a recidivist drink-driving programme, $164,000 for road safety promotions — split between different partners in the Road Safety Action Planning Group (RSAP) — and $240,000 for community road safety funding. 

Councillor Debbie Gregory said like everyone else, she was disappointed with the lack of funding but was happy with the revised programme put forward to NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi. 

Cr Rob Telfer said he would rather have the driver’s licence programme as a priority while Cr Larry Foster said seeing licences being reprioritised was concerning. 

“Learning and restricted licences are so important for this region because you can’t get a job or do anything without a licence. We do have a lot of unlicensed drivers driving around the place as well, which is another area to be addressed,” he said. 

Council chief executive Nedine Thatcher Swann said staff had advised that several other driver licensing programmes were operating in the area. 

NZTA regional relationships director Linda Stewart said from a national level, “driver licensing is a high priority for the Government”, which includes an accelerated programme to recruit more driver testing officers — another 70 across the country — by the end of this year. 

Due to the great work done by a community driving testing officer’s trial in Tairāwhiti, there was a commitment to continue to work with the region to continue ongoing funding to support that initiative, she said. 

“While how we are funding road safety outcomes overall is changing, our commitment to regulatory work and driver licensing is beginning to ramp up now, which is positive,” she said. 

Cr Ani Pahuru-Huriwai said it was “quite sobering to look at the significant number of programmes that we can’t offer any longer because of the cuts”. 

It was just a question of whether that was a council job, she said. 

The problem was a lack of testing officers, and there was now a concentrated effort to train officers. 

Before the trial there could be a wait of three to six months to get a test, she said. 

Some of the programmes the council aims to offer will still be possible. 

However, these will be through contestable funding, which means the amounts will be allocated upon applications from different community groups, schools, and iwi/hapū through community road safety funding. 

Additionally, the list might be achieved through the RSAP, which is made up of many partners, including the council, NZTA, the police, Fire and Emergency NZ and St John.