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The tantalising aroma of sausages, bacon, onions and hash browns fills the early hours of both mornings of the competition. His police uniform looks somewhat incongruous for a grill cook, but he’s only too delighted to sort out breakfast every day of the competition for contestants and volunteers, as he has done for some years. Acting senior sergeant Johnson is in charge of the Commercial Vehicle Investigation Unit for the lower North Island, and is more accustomed to pulling over offending truck drivers than cooking snarlers. “We do a lot of this sort of industry liaison work at these field days. At the end of the day it is as much about education as law enforcement.” The CVIU is mostly involved in setting a couple of the challenges for the event and judging competitors, but barbecues and smoko room visits are all part of the job of educating the industry for a safer environs for both workers and the public, says Johnson. “Better to have the vehicle leave the yard safe than have us pick it up on the road. We always advocate the ‘walk around’ inspection of the sort of thing pilots have to do before a flight. That’s what my guys do out on the road – walk around the truck checking for faults – and if we can spot something, it could have been spotted back at the yard.” There’s 128 national staff in the unit and 30 percent of the vehicles they drive are unmarked. Most offences involve speed and overloading, worn or damaged tyres and bad brakes, although, Johnson says modern trucks have so many auxiliary braking systems, brakes are not the issue they once were. If things look too grim, the truck gets a pink sticker which means it must be taken off the road until it is fixed and a new warrant applied for. More common are the green stickers for faults that need attention. The biggest infringement he can recall was worth $33,000 (company shifting a house), but the average fine is between $1500 and $2000. Log book falsification is not difficult to detect when you know where to look, says Johnson. Fuel dockets, loading receipts and wage records, will tell them much about a driver’s shift. “They might bullshit their log book, but they are always straight with their wages and bonuses.” Johnston and his team have a low tolerance of companies who push their drivers past the legal hours. “I will go to the ends of the earth to take them out of the industry,” he warns. “It’s not fair to those companies who spend big money on providing the right and lawful conditions with their vehicles when they are undercut by contractors who cut corners and put people at risk.” Contractors and licenced commercial vehicle operators will have to get prepared to come under a new Transit rating programme that will kick in sometime next year. It will be based on the fitness of the company’s vehicle fleet through certificate of fitness passes and rejects, and road stop inspections. The categorising is aimed at improving the general conditions of the heavy fleet and making the road environs safer, says Johnson. “While certificate inspections are every six months, a truck is capable of clocking up 20,000 in a month. A lot can happen in this time.” While a lot of companies do an excellent job maintaining their vehicles, the rating system will sort out those taking risks. “Especially when things get tough for the industry and repairs and maintenance are usually the first areas to take a blow.”
Contractor Vol.32 No.3 April 2008 |
Brian Johnson (pictured left) handles the breakfast barbecue as if he has been chef’ing all his life.