Personality

CH ANGE T I M E FOR

BILL MCKINLEY IS THE CHIEF OF STAFF AT THE AUSTRALIAN TRUCKING ASSOCIATION AND DRAWS UPON HIS EXTENSIVE EXPERIENCE AS A POLITICAL ADVISER IN HIS ADVOCACY ON BEHALF OF THE ROAD TRANSPORT INDUSTRY. MOST RECENTLY HE WAS INVOLVED IN THE ATA’S SUBMISSIONS TO THE NATIONAL TRANSPORT COMMISSION’S REVIEW OF THE HEAVY VEHICLE NATIONAL LAW.

PM: What opportunities does this review present? BM: This review is a chance for us to go back to first principles and fix many of the problems with the Heavy Vehicle National Law and the way our industry is regulated. The ATA campaigned very hard for this review. We pushed very hard to get the right terms of reference and the right people on the expert panel. As well as being about safety, the review needs to have a very strong productivity focus. The productivity of our industry is going down when it should be going up.

PM: What is the ATA proposing? BM: The new safety duties in the law need to stay, including the requirement for directors and executives to be diligent in managing safety. Below that, we support two different streams of regulation under the HVNL to suit the diverse range of operators in our industry: either through safety-based accreditation schemes such as NHVAS or TruckSafe, or prescriptive regulation.

PM: How will that operate? BM: In the safety-based accreditation stream, many of the current prescriptive requirements should not apply, because an operator’s system would be verified by audit. This stream would recognise the efforts of operators that adopt a systematic approach to safety, possibly by using proven technology solutions.

Bill McKinley.

On the other hand, in the prescriptive stream, which for many operators would make perfect sense, you would have simplified and more flexible prescriptive rules. The structure of the law would need to be changed to deliver this vision. There would also need to be corporate governance and accountability reforms.

PM: What changes would be needed to the structure of the law? BM: By contrast with the aviation, rail and maritime laws, the HVNL is an enormously large Act which takes years to change even if everyone agrees to change it. There is a seemingly endless list of ministerial guidelines which the NHVR management or even its Board cannot change. The Board is only allowed to make minor amendments, such as fixing clerical errors.

PM: What needs to change in the details? BM: To make a reformed HVNL work and to get to where we all want to be, which is a flexible and responsive system of regulation, we need to get Ministers to focus on the general direction of the law and we need to give the Regulator (NHVR) the appropriate powers and accountabilities to do what it needs to do in the implementation of it. This can only be achieved by reforming the corporate governance of NHVR. I want to emphasise that this is not a criticism of anyone at the NHVR. This is about applying the same sort ofapproach that is applied to aviation, maritime and rail regulation to the NHVR.

PM: Who should sit on the NHVR Board? BM: Normally, you’d expect a public sector governance board to have between six and nine members. The NHVR has only five and there is no requirement that any of them have recent industry experience. The way the NHVR is governed and

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held accountable has got to change. This will mean more discretionary power for the NHVR to set standards, which is the only practical way it can be done without having to keep running back to Ministers. At the same time, the Regulator has got to be accountable for those decisions. We need stronger parliamentary scrutiny. The problem with the endless ministerial guidelines, including the guidelines that determine things like access, is that Parliaments never see them and Parliaments don’t get to disallow them on those rare occasions when they might want to do that.

PM: What about jurisdictional conflicts? BM: We need common requirements for the people who have powers under the law. The NHVR can direct enforcement officers in the way they exercise their powers, but it can’t direct the police. Exercising any power under the HVNL should be done in accordance with the Regulator’s instructions.

PM: How does the ATA look at future enforcement? BM: There needs to be a new approach to enforcement which focuses on

“We pushed very hard to get the right terms of reference and the right people on the expert panel. As well as being about safety, the review needs to have a very strong productivity focus. The productivity of our industry is going down when it should be going up.”

Bill McKinley Australian Trucking Association, Chief of Staff

actual risks. It should not have a zero t olerance approach to minor paperwork errors in work diaries and it must not focus on over-regulating risks that operators can’t physically control or can’t legally control such as the effluent and load restraint issue for livestock carriers.

PM: How does accreditation and compliance fit into the ATA’s proposals? BM: We see the NHVR’s role as being the regulator of accreditation schemes, which would include NHVAS and TruckSafe. Those schemes would then accredit individual operators. Operators in any approved accreditation scheme would be entitled to appropriate exemptions from the prescriptive rules.

PM: What’s next? BM: The fatigue, access, and safe people and practices papers which are out for consultation now really start getting into the day-to-day issues that cause so much grief for our members. We are working with our member associations to make sure we get high quality submissions that reflect a consensus ofour industry into the review.

PLAYBO OK S I LV ER L I N I N G S

Situated in the north-western region of the vast state of Western Australia, the Pilbara is an iron ore rich region covering 502,000 square kilometres and with a relatively sparse population of close to 60,000 people. Much of the iron ore mined in the area is trucked to Port Hedland – Australia’s highest tonnage port – by roadtrains. Among the throng of prime movers, the Pilbara Heavy Haulage Girls (PHHG) units, strikingly finished in their pink livery, stand out as beacons heralding what can be achieved when steely resolve along with copious quantities ofhard yakka come together in pursuit of a noble cause. Prime Mover caught up with Heather Jones after she was presented with a new Volvo FH16 prime mover at Reddacliff Place in the heart of Brisbane’s CBD. The new truck, looking resplendent in ‘Pilbara pink’, was handed over by Volvo Trucks Australia Vice President of Sales, Tony O’Connell, on 17 May during the Brisbane Truck Show. As part of Volvo Group Australia’s (VGA) goal to encourage the involvement of women within the trucking industry, the organisation commenced a partnership with PHHG in 2016 to support its driver training initiative in Western Australia. She was drawn to road transport having been passionate about fast moving vehicles at a younger age. “I was always a bit of a tomboy – I used to race motorbikes and liked fast cars so for me it was a logical progression to also learn to drive trucks,” Heather relates. Speaking with Heather, her humility and graciousness are two qualities that are immediately evident. Her driving ambition to help others, as she relates it, was born out of her own experiences of adversity in the past. After getting married and having two daughters, a few years later Heather found herself single again and looking for work. “A friend of mine said, ‘as long as you don’t let the girls out of the truck you can drive for me’, so that’s what I did for seven years, with the girls travelling with me in the truck and home schooling them along the way.” This job was based at Karratha in the Pilbara where the cost of living is very high, so eventually Heather decided to move back to Perth where she owned a house and therefore didn’t need to pay exorbitant rent. The next challenge was finding a company that would allow her to take her daughters with her in the truck. Finally, she found an owner-operator who was willing to oblige. “I drove for him for a couple of years until the girls were ready to attend high school,” she says. This opened up much more variety in work for Heather but also brought into sharp focus the fact that training for drivers was sorely lacking. She says it has always amazed her that a truck driver starting a new job was simply handed the keys and sent on their way. HEATHER JONES, FOUNDER AND CEO OF DRIVER TRAINING OUTFIT PILBARA HEAVY HAULAGE GIRLS , HAS A VISION TO HELP PEOPLE FROM ALL WALKS OF LIFE BECOME TRAINED IN THE ART OF MULTI-COMBINATION TRUCK DRIVING, SO THEY CAN GO ON TO REWARDING CAREERS IN ROAD TRANSPORT. WITH THE GENEROUS AND ONGOING SUPPORT OF SPONSORS INCLUDING VOLVO GROUP AUSTRALIA, PHHG IS WELL-PLACED TO CONTINUE DOING THIS. LAUDABLE WORK.

PLAYBO OK

Heather Jones.

“Obviously if you’re a truck driver you know everything about tippers, tankers, flat-tops and floats because you came out of your mother’s womb with an MC licence in your back pocket, didn’t you,” she jokes, recalling the time when she was first charged with driving a Kenworth when her sole prior experience was with European prime movers. “I’d never driven a truck with the yellow and red brake release buttons before and when I pushed one in the other would pop out and I’m thinking how the heck am I going to get this going?” With no-one around to ask, Heather resorted to the truckies’ lifeline – channel 40 on the UHF radio – for advice. It was a watershed moment that left her determined to do whatever she could to ensure others would not have to go through these sorts of unsettling experiences due to a lack of training. Meanwhile, in 2005 Heather started her own haulage company called Success Transport. “In 2010 I returned to the Pilbara and continued on with my business with one truck and two pilot vehicles,” she says. “Then in 2016 we added Pilbara Heavy Haulage as the training arm of our company. Training new drivers and bringing people into this wonderful industry is a life-long passion and I really love helping those who perhaps would not otherwise be given the opportunity to succeed as a driver.” She goes on to say that some of the company’s current projects include working with Aboriginal people and people who have made poor life choices and done time in prison. “We also do a lot of school visits and especially disadvantaged schools,” she adds. “I’m also really looking forward to working with women in their 40s who have found themselves homeless due to divorce or domestic violence.” Another of PHHG’s recent success stories involved Heather working for two months with a hearing impaired woman to help her gain a heavy vehicle licence and become employed in the industry. In conclusion, Heather says the assistance of Volvo Group Australia has been instrumental to the success ofPHHG. “VGA has been absolutely awesome and the company is supporting us with a project that we’ll let you know about later on,” she says. Watch this space.

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