Pablo Rodriguez Canada’s new Minister of Transport
The Honourable Pablo Rodriguez was named Canada’s new Minister of Transport in the July 26th cabinet shuffle.
Rodriguez, long-time Member of Parliament for Honore-Mercier, serves as Prime Minister’s chief Quebec
advisor and organizer. He recently helmed the passage of the contentious bills C-11 and C-18 through Parliament as Heritage Minister.
“Well this is a face new to transportation!” says Philip Fletcher, president of the Truck Training Schools Association of Ontario. “We welcome a veteran politician, with a Heritage background to assume the role of Minister of Transportation. The ground transportation industry looks towards the leadership for strengthening and solidifying supply chains from coast to coast, especially the traumatized Western ports who have just finished a working strike.
“Goods movement is still a difficult journey through differing models and with input price increases that providers cannot easily project. We count on stability and forward preparation from the federal government when it comes to ground transportation, especially when 61 per cent of goods still travel by truck.”
Travis McDougall, co-founder of Truckers for Safer Highways (TFSH) notes the coincidence of Rodriguez’ appointment with the two petitions TFSH have launched in the past week, calling for standardized and consistent Entry Level Training requirements for Canadian Truckers.
“We at Truckers for Safer Highways look forward to a new face in the federal role of Minister of Transport. We are hoping the new Minister will be more willing to take action to improve the trucking industry mandates and regulations surrounding the training of new drivers.
“The most common comment seen on social media when a truck crash is posted online is ‘again!?!?’ or ‘happens every day !'”How has the public noticed such a problem but two levels of government have failed to notice there is a problem?” McDougall asks.
“Truckers for Safer Highways will be calling for a federal Mandatory Entry Level Training program for all new commercial drivers, a program that is the same and unified across the country. If a driver can be licensed in Ontario or any single province and be permitted to drive all over Canada and the United states they should be prepared to do so. This is not currently the case,” McDougall points out, noting that to be licensed in British Columbia, a driver must demonstrate they know how to “chain up,” while Ontario drivers are not required to do this – which leads to problems when new drivers need chains on slippery B.C. roads.
“This must change. We cannot continue to wait for governments to see the dangerous situations we are facing on our highways. People are dying in preventable collisions often due to lack of training and poor judgment choices being made by drivers that have been put in unfair situations they were not properly prepared for.
“The good news is we can turn this around. Changes can be made and improvements can happen to work towards improved safety and put an end to the regularity of tragedy.
“We hope to meet with the new minister very soon to discuss these and other important issues. We congratulate him on this important new position and wish him every success,” McDougall told Road Warrior News on July 26th.
