Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. Within a two-year period, your second offence would be a 24-hour suspension. A third offense in that same period would be a seven-day suspension and a fourth offence would be a 30-day suspension. The individual, because they are not impaired, would be allowed to drive their vehicle home.
Thank you. So, if you got pulled over with your second offence in two years, you are basically given a 24-hour suspension and the officer would tell you that you have to go home. I guess some of the questions I would have if that was me and I was in Yellowknife, obviously going home is a little shorter distance than someone driving back to Hay River. Would I have a day or two to get back home before I serve my 24-hour suspension or not? How does some of that practicality side of it work?
The suspension doesn’t come into effect until 24 hours after the violation.
I am just wondering: if it is like a demerit system, after you have done it for so long a period then it doesn’t… If I get one every five years then the second one doesn’t affect me after two years. Just like the demerits, it would come off the system, or can the Minister clarify that?
There are three demerits for each violation. Three demerit points and after two years, within the two-year period, if there are no additional demerits then it would come off the books.
The Minister indicated in his opening remarks about school zones and construction zones. If it was my second offence and I was doing texting or distracted driving for the second time, would that be more than a 24-hour suspension or would it be bumped up to the three-day suspension because I was in a school zone, for example?
The demerits would be the same; the suspension would be the same; the fine would be doubled from $322 to $644.
I’m not disagreeable to this process. I think we need to take distracted driving out of the hands of the drivers in the Northwest Territories. My question to the department is how do we expect this to roll out and do we have a campaign or an advertising campaign to go with this so that people understand and know that there is more severity to the program than we currently have? I know we rolled it out when we doubled the fines. There was a bit of an advertising campaign and it got a little bit of play. Are we expecting that with this type of increase in the suspension area?
Thank you, Mr. Bouchard. We’ll go to Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We, of course, will take advantage of this opportunity to promote the dangers of distracted driving with this, assuming this legislation is passed today. We will work with law enforcement agencies to promote the new laws and then we will have a public awareness campaign as part of that as well.
We will continue with our other campaigns that we have as well. Some of those are national campaigns that we are part of and some of them are our own advertising. We’ll just continue to generally promote the dangers of distracted driving.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Continuing on with general comments on Bill 60, I have Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would encourage the department to investigate certainly the right approach and certainly I would say contact someone who understands good communication when we consider an updated campaign on distracted driving.
One of the issues I notice with people is that they still tend to hold their phone in their hand, and really what I think is a bit of an issue here is people are misinterpreting, in some cases, probably a very small percentage in all honesty, but misinterpreting what distracted driving really is.
Where people have learnt that using your cell phone is certainly holding it to your ear and talking on it normally while you’re driving and you still see people doing that, but occasionally what you do, if not more often, I see people drive around and they’re holding their cell phone in front of them while they’re talking. I can only assume they have it on speaker phone as they’re driving along and having it in front of them is best to describe it as maybe holding it in front of them in a manner that it’s just above the steering wheel.
I think, really, what my suggestion would be to the department is to take these types of things into consideration and explaining and maybe through some type of advertisement on saying, well, this is what distracting is, the cell phone in your hand, type of thing, and helping folks understand that this doesn’t change the argument that, well, I’m not holding it to your head now, it doesn’t apply. There are a fair bit of things they need to consider that folks need to be updated and I think it could be a case of misinterpretation, the fact that they don’t appreciate the complexity of it, or they don’t appreciate how simple, really, that message is, which is once you have the cell phone in your hand you now fall under the umbrella of distracted driving.
I just wanted to provide some thoughts on that.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The department is proposing to define use, so use would be holding, operating or touching a restricted electronic device.
Well, I’m glad to hear that. It doesn’t surprise me from our earlier discussions, of course, that we had heard that those types of things are issues. I think I remember reading or hearing about the case in the Yukon where you’re arguing definition of what distracted driving is and what constitutes on the phone and definition on there, and that’s kind of what I’m really getting at, is that it’s great that we have a definition on the books but sometimes folks in practical sense don’t view it that way. So really what I’m suggesting is I encourage them through a public awareness campaign of some sort to show folks what’s right and not right. I’ll wait for the Minister’s comment and then I’ll change subjects.
Those are good points. I thank the Member. We will take that into consideration when we’re rolling out the new act.
Thank you for that, Minister. The other area that I have concern, although I have to admit it didn’t necessarily garner committee support, but it still doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter to me even less, which is the fact that I’m not convinced that the way we are proposing to change the distracted driving offences is the right direction when it comes to how we suspend.
I think, in my opinion, we should increase the value of the demerits, and once you’ve reached the limit of your demerits because these offences have now become very steep, that alone by de facto suspends your licence rather than leaving it down to judgment calls and about suspending people within a certain amount of time and telling them to give, well, you can drive home, but we’re going to pursue with paperwork.
I think we should let the process decide on its own. If someone is caught, I think the demerit process is you lose three demerits if you’re fined under the distracted driving, and I believe, if memory serves, you get a total of 15. If that’s not 100 percent correct, it doesn’t really matter, because the point I’m making is I suggest we bump it up quite a bit, because a couple fines and all of a sudden you now have to appear before a judge and explain your behaviour and why you cannot comply with the rules of the road. The way it’s intended now is that, I think, after your second one all of sudden you’ve got some explaining to do, as they say. I look forward to how that types out in translation or in the Hansard tomorrow.
The point is that I hate the thought of the subjectivity into it. I really like the cut and dry. I know the department heard my grievance in committee that day we had had the hearing, and I know that the likelihood of that being all of a sudden, miraculously, hey, wait a minute, we should change. That isn’t going to happen. I’m probably expecting a unicorn sooner to run through the Assembly any moment now and that ain’t gonna happen. I just wish it was different, and in my opinion I think it’s become more of an administrative issue, that it’s more of a headache as opposed to the way I’ve suggested that it just be attached to increase.
The other thing is, in my opinion, if distracted driving really matters that much, and it does, as we’ve seen all the research and we hear more and more about people who can’t comply, and we hear about the dangers and the type of behaviours and nightmares that it leads to, then maybe we should have the demerit points that reflects that social change.
We proposed, in the bill, suspensions because suspension and demerits go well together. In the bill, a specific offence on distracted driving will net you a suspension plus demerit points. If an individual does have a fifth distracted driving charge in a two-year period, they will be suspended indefinitely. I think they would use all their demerit points. What I can do is maybe ask Russell or Steve to add to this.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. We’ll go to Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the comments from the Member. There were a number of different options and ideas that we looked at. We did look at all other Canadian provinces and into the US states and what they’re doing to try to combat this problem, which rules are changing and becoming more strict, fines are increasing, suspensions, et cetera, and yet the problem still appears to be growing, so we need to be proactive to make sure that we address it as forcefully as we can.
We looked at all the different options and decided that a suspension would be the way to go for this. Working with law enforcement, we already do provide these types of suspensions related to drinking and driving, so it was appealing to the law enforcement community because they were aware of what’s happening. We also like the fact that it’s tied directly to the immediate conviction or the immediate problem of distracted driving, and it’s not demerit points where you can get demerit points for speeding or for distracted driving or any number of things, and if you get too many then you have to get called in and go through a review. But we liked the fact that the suspension was directly related to the distracted driving offence.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It`s not my intent to continue this all night, so I’ll just be quick. I know there’s no willingness on the department to make that change and we have to be very clear, distracted driving at the time is equal if not worse than drunk driving. I`m not a scientist and I`m not going to try to explain which one’s worse, I’m just going to say equal, for safety’s sake.
At the moment that particular individual stopped, the crime itself has been stopped, they’re no longer impaired in the sense of mental impairment of driving has been taken away and I think that’s probably some of the reasoning behind why they’re allowed to drive home and park their car until their suspension type of thing or philosophy built behind it.
I pointed out the social ill or the nature of it is that there was a time that drunk driving was not, I’m not going to say it was okay, it didn’t have the stigma it does have today. Distracted driving is the same way, it’s just I’m not convinced the department sort of sees it through the demerit point process that it observes and waiting for someone to have five fines before they have to visit a judge to explain that they’re driving in a manner that is just equal if not worse than drunk driving. I think my point is if the demerit points were increased, they’d be visiting them either after the second or third offence. So that’s the only other thing.
The last comment I’ll make very briefly because I see my time has run down, and it’s not necessarily a question, I’m just glad we’re giving the registrar some authorities to make some changes in regulations around abandoned vehicles. The only issue I’ll raise there is that I’ve had people here who have had concerns about trying to repurpose, revitalize old vehicles that have been written off, lost, found in the dump or whatnot, and for them to be able to reissue registration so they can put a little life back into a rebuilt old vehicle. The way I understood it was they would have that ability to do that. So that’s the only other area of concern and I assume they’ll want to reply, but unless it’s earth shattering, I’d probably leave the Minister with the final comment. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. There was a bit of a question in that first part and I’ll allow Minister Beaulieu to reply.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We would look at that. Right now we’re moving forward with the three demerit points, a suspension of fines, and the main purpose of the act is to stop distracted driving. It’s not to punish people, it’s to stop distracted driving. So, if we had no distracted driving, the act would be a good act.
What we’re doing is we’re putting forward a bill that we think is going to do that at this point. If it doesn’t work, then we’re prepared to look at other options as well.
For the abandoned vehicles, I’ll ask Mr. Loutitt to take that. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. Mr. Loutitt.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. We’ve looked at the abandoned vehicle problem and we’ve met with our stakeholders, including yourself, and took suggestions and then went to the jurisdictions and looked at what the problems were. We found this to be a fairly unique northern problem. In many jurisdictions you can call a company to come and pick up your vehicle and give you money and take it away. In the North, where these vehicles are being abandoned, we looked at this as an opportunity to not only work with the towing companies to dispose of the vehicles but also the opportunity to change the ownership so that the vehicles can be fixed up, repaired and put back on the road safely. I think it’s a good example of us working with stakeholders to come up with a good solution and we’re going to build a regulation around it. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Loutitt, and again I congratulate your folks on doing that. Committee, general comments. I have Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I just have a brief comment that I want to make. I’ve been pushing for eight years, not so much lately because we’ve had a change to the Motor Vehicles Act, but certainly in the 16th Assembly I pushed very hard to get some change to the Motor Vehicles Act relative to distracted driving and I’m very pleased to see that we are increasing the fines and adding suspensions. With the change that was originally made, it was almost as if people just totally ignored it and we had almost as many people driving distractedly as we had before we made the original amendment to the Motor Vehicles Act. So, whatever we can do to bring it down the better, and I’m really pleased to see these amendments in here. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. There was more of a comment there, but I will allow the Minister a formal reply. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to thank the Member as well.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. General comments. Is committee prepared to go clause by clause?
Agreed.
Committee, there are 50 clauses to this bill. Is committee prepared to take them in groups of 10?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. I heard concurrence. Thank you, committee. Again, we’re going to defer the bill title until we’ve finished clause-by-clause. We’re going to start at clauses 1 to 10. Is committee agreed?
---Clauses 1 through 50 inclusive approved
Does committee agree that Bill 60, An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act, is ready for third reading?
Agreed.
Committee, we’re going to have to do that over again because your chairman forgot the number. So, Bill 60, An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act, No. 2, as a whole.
Agreed.
Does committee agree that Bill 60, An Act to Amend the Motor Vehicles Act, No. 2, is ready for third reading?
Agreed.
Thank you, committee. Bill 60 is now ready for third reading. Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. Thank you, Mr. Loutitt, Mr. Neudorf and Mr. Chutskoff for joining us this evening. If I could get the Sergeant-at-Arms to please escort the witnesses out of the Chamber. Thank you. Mr. Bromley.
Thank you. I move we report progress.
---Defeated
Order, committee. Committee, we’re going to continue on with House business. Bill 61, An Act to Amend the Public Airports Act. With that, we’ll turn it over to the Minister responsible, Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m pleased to introduce Bill 61, An Act to Amend the Public Airports Act, which proposes to address six areas in legislation aimed at improving how we operate airports throughout the NWT and to clarify sections of the Public Airports Act.
The bill proposes to increase the duration of leases on Commissioner’s public airports land from 20 years to 30 years so tenants will be able to amortize leasehold improvements over longer periods. Such extensions will provide consistency with maximum amortization periods typically offered by lending agencies.
The bill proposes amendments that prescribe new procedures through which an airport manager would be able to take possession of unclaimed property left at airports for storage, sale or disposal.
The bill also proposes amendments to provide enforcement officers at the airport with authority similar to highway transport officers to enforce the Motor Vehicles Act, the Public Airports Act and other regulations that apply to public airport land. To achieve harmonization with the Motor Vehicles Act, the bill proposes the maximum fine for offences under the Public Airports Act to be increased from $2,000 to $5,000. As well, the regulation of traffic and pedestrians on public airport land will be addressed under the Motor Vehicles Act, allowing for several repetitive provisions to be removed from the Public Airports Act.
Finally, the proposed bill will improve the act’s clarity and rehabilitee. Thank you.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. We’ll turn our attention to the chairman responsible for the standing committee for reviewing the bill. Mr. Hawkins.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Standing Committee on Economic Development and Infrastructure certainly worked tirelessly on its review of the public review of Bill 61, An Act to Amend the Public Airports Act. We did that on September 16, 2015.
Bill 61 amends the Public Airports Act to increase the maximum lease duration for Commissioner’s public airports land to 30 years, specified disposal procedures for unclaimed property and synchronize the regulations of traffic and pedestrians with the Motor Vehicles Act.
The bill also makes consequential amendments respecting enforcement to the Motor Vehicles Act.
The committee appreciates the amendments that align the language of the various statutes under the Department of Transportation. Members also appreciate the reduction of red tape and clarification of the department’s authority. The committee looks forward to the implementation of clear and effective procedures for enforcement and for storage and disposal of unclaimed property. Following the clause-by-clause review, a motion was carried to report that Bill 61 to the Assembly as ready for consideration in Committee of the Whole.
This concludes the committee’s general comments on Bill 61. Individual Members may have additional questions or comments as we proceed. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Hawkins. We’ll turn it over to the Minister if he has witnesses to bring into the House. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do have witnesses.
