Land Transport Regulations Changes Benefit Farmers
February 16th, 2009
A year of lobbying by the Agricultural Transport Forum (ATF) and FedFarmers has led to the exemption of tractors and agricultural vehicles from the 2007 Land Transport Rule: Work Time and Logbooks. An amendment to the rule allowing tractors and other agricultural vehicles to be driven on a class 1 (car) license, providing they do not exceed 30kph on roads, came into force on 15 January 2009. The exclusion will remove an organisational headache for farmers and rural contractors particularly during harvest season as well as removing an administrative burden. ATF chairman, Roger Parton, says, “The inclusion of tractors and related vehicles within a rule designed to prevent fatigued truck drivers driving on the open road was always an anomaly and caused immense problems for the agricultural sector.”
Logbook rule exemption. As a result of this decision, tractors and other agricultural vehicles like harvesters, weighing up to 18 tonnes, can be driven on a class 1 (car) license providing they do not exceed 30kph on roads. As the work time rules do not apply to vehicles driven on a class 1 license, the effect of this change will remove tractors and agricultural vehicles from the work-time and logbook rules. While driving on roads is sometimes a necessity, the fact is the bulk of the driving done by these operators is off-road and poses very little risk to motorists. FedFarmers’ transport spokesperson, Donald Aubrey, says, “Restricting the time a farmer or contractor could spend in the tractor seat made it impossible for agricultural operations to be legally carried out.”
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