A campaigning family has welcomed a recommendation that tourists lose the privilege of driving in New Zealand unless they can prove they have adequate experience behind the wheel.
Coroner Richard McElrea made the recommendation in his findings on the death of Timaru man Grant Roberts, who was killed by a tourist driver on the Lindis Pass in 2012.
Mr Roberts' son, Sean Roberts (10), has spent this year fighting to have New Zealand law changed to prevent tourists from driving on our roads without passing a driving test.
He launched a petition, which received 32,000 signatures. It is now with Parliament, before a select committee.
Sean said the coroner's report, which the family received on Monday, was pleasing.
''I'm very happy about that,'' he said.
Sean's mother, Mel Pipson, described the findings as ''what we wanted''.
''It's the best we could possibly hope for. The law hasn't been changed. We'd like to see it changed but the recommendations back up everything we've asked for.''
Mr Roberts (43) was killed on November 26, 2012 while riding his motorbike home from the Burt Munro Challenge in Invercargill. He was in a convoy of bikes.
They were travelling north when Mr Roberts and Dennis Michael Pederson (54), of Tauranga, collided with a southbound Nissan vehicle on State Highway 8, in the Lindis Pass. Both men died at the scene.
Chinese student Kejia Zheng (20) was disqualified from driving for two years and ordered to pay $10,000 in emotional harm for causing the death of the men and injuring two other people in the crash.
Zheng, who had arrived in New Zealand the day before the crash, hit gravel on the side of the road and over-corrected, causing the crash.
In his findings, Mr McElrea said Zheng lacked driving experience. She had ''a maximum'' of one month's driving experience after gaining a full licence on December 13, 2011, in China.''
She had minimal experience at driving at speeds near 100kmh and no driving experience of any kind in the 10 months to noon on 25 November, 2012, one day before the crash,'' he said.
A *555 call about her driving was made to police before the crash. The complaint related to an apparent lack of awareness of the road rules and inability to judge the time and distance needed to overtake safely.
Police did not manage to catch up to the reported vehicle.
Mr McElrea said police would have had ''limited powers'' to deal with the driver if they had caught up with them, because they could not have proved the offences had been committed.
Sean believes the coroner's findings will bring him one step closer to what he wanted to achieve.
His project all started with one question, he said.
''I asked my Mum a couple of days after [Dad] passed, why don't [tourists] have to sit a [driving] test? It built up from there, just trying to get it recognised, really.''
Sean is grateful for the support he has received from around the world.
Mr McElrea said the NZ Transport Agency, and other government and industry groups, were also doing their bit by ''enhancing'' safety among overseas drivers.
In summing up, he made a series of recommendations. They included giving police more powers to deal with unsafe drivers and preventing overseas visitors from driving if they had inadequate or no driving experience.
He questioned whether New Zealand domestic driving law should continue to cover all overseas jurisdictions.
Mr McElrea recommended overseas visitors undergo a driving competency assessment before they entered into any rental vehicle agreement. - Timaru Courier
by Alexia Johnston
