State Government Says It Will Match Part Of Opposition Plan To Crush Hoons' Cars After Third Offence

[PIOTREK]

Hoon war has broken out in state political ranks with the government announcing it will move to crush unroadworthy or dangerous cars if hoon drivers are caught on a third offence.

Earlier today, the opposition announced if it was elected in November it would crush hoons' cars after three offences, and would increase the impoundment penalty for a first offence from two days to 30 days.

The Brumby Government's full anti-hoon policy will be released later this year, but Transport Accident Commission Minister Tim Holding said some cars would be crushed.

"Our Government will implement a new regime for repeat hoon driving offenders, which will result in repeat hoon offenders having their cars confiscated to be sold or crushed," Mr Holding said.

Earlier this week, Premier John Brumby said he would seek advice on road safety issues and said everything was on the table – including crushing cars.

It is unclear whether that advice has been received.

Eighteen months ago Police Minister Bob Cameron said the idea of crushing cars was "irresponsible" and populist.

Mr Holding said cars could be sold to cover debts if a driver was driving someone else's car, and remaining proceeds would go towards road safety. Only the most dangerous or unroadworthy cars would be crushed to send a message.

The government will also look at increasing the impoundment penalty for a first offence from two days to seven days.

Opposition Leader Ted Baillieu said it was time to crack down on hoons who put people's lives at risk.

"Victorians need a strong zero tolerance approach to hoon driving," Mr Baillieu said.

"This means tough laws which increase impoundment times, force hoon drivers to take safe driving training, and forfeit and crush vehicles of the worst repeat offenders."

The Opposition's police would introduce new anti-hoon laws, including:

- A 30-day impoundment for a first hoon offence, and requirement that a safe driving course is completed by offenders;

- Up to three months impoundment for a second offence;

- Crushing of vehicles for a third offence after parts are stripped and sold.

Mr Baillieu said the money raised from selling car parts would help the program run as cost neutral, with any excess money put into the TAC and Police budgets.

He said the tougher laws would act in a similar way to current anti-hoon measures where police can apply to courts to have vehicles confiscated.

Mr Baillieu said a key part of the program would be driver re-education.

Edited January 22, 2010 by P1OTR

[eMsta]

about time they did something, to teach these dickheads a lesson

[PIOTREK]

Looks like the government are taking a reactive approach again! I still don’t understand why they don’t to something to be proactive. All stake boarders have stake parks have fun in, after the government realised that they need to take some sort of action. Yet motoring enthusiast have nothing provided by the government. Clearly there is a high demand for some public area where cars can be driven in a control environment. This is an initiative that could be leveraged from overseas, where it has been proven to be successful.

I do the right thing and go to the track for 300 bucks a day and don’t thump my car on the streets now days. Its pretty expense and if it was free or heavily subsidised (even I find it expensive!) I’m sure many people would go for a free quarter mile run and worry about been caught by police officers and loosing their licence. There are “those types” that will still continue to be w*&nkers on the roads but I’m sure that majority of people will be wise enough to do it at the tracks.

Like guy from Mill Park was drunk, 6ppl in the car, so this clearly would not help him. Not sure what would really!

He crushed his own car, so maybe this law should be introduced but don't take it over the top!

Edited January 22, 2010 by P1OTR

[Birds]

Car crushing is so ridiculous. It's the biggest scare tactic, knee jerk reaction to hooning and all it says to me is childish vindication and sticking the tongue out at someone who's done wrong by the law. Waste of resources...just sell all the cars instead of crushing some of them. Same effect...person loses their car, but we don't lose a heap of metal that actually has value to it.

On the brighter side of this we can look forward to some cheap second hand modificatons if they start selling them in bits

Agree 100% with you Peter, we need proactive action on it and for a long time I've campaigned the need for dedicated environments to remove the immaturity from the roads.

[toygtr]

What a load of fuc!ing shit.

If they ever go to crush my car, i will hunt down the motherfuc!ers and kill them.

Too much heart ache, time and money has gone into my ride.

Even tho i drive responsible its up to the disscresion of the copper, and if they want you, they are going to get you no matter what. Dont like this one bit.

[West]

Instead of crushing it, just auction it for the Royal Children Hospital or some charity. Its the people that control the car, the car didnt' speed itself so why crush it instead of making good use out of it.

[RBPOWA-(TJ)]

Hoon war has broken out in state political ranks with the government announcing it will move to crush unroadworthy or dangerous cars if hoon drivers are caught on a third offence.

you thing that would include shit bomb ford XD's .... old kingswoods puffing out smoke driven by 70yrs olds ?

or just every skyline with an exhaust ?

they should make a statistics like they do with cars stolen.

should be cars given warning to and have a tally. would it be a surprise what car would have the most numbers ?

[Taso84]

This is another exapmple of the govt specifically targetting certain members of society. If they are serious about this then the law should extend as follows:

Same rule for hoons as for drinkdriving - impounding and crushing fro drink drivers.

Impound and crushing laws for mobile phones: If u are caught using a mobile while driving, then u get it confiscated dor 3 days and on 3rd offense the phone gets crushed.

End of the day, they can go to extreme lengths with laws to target certain members within out society. End of the day, all this creates in tension within society. We have something good here in Aus. If you goto other countries around the world you will see some hoorrific examples of isolated communities, ghettos and class warfare. These kind of laws are leading the way to that. If your going to make those sort of draconian laws then you have to do it for all offences across the board.

Drink driving is no safer and no less safe than hooning type offences. Reason why they will never crush pples cars for drink driving - coz even Judges, police officers and politicians are somethimes caught doing it. People wanna protect themselves 1st and foremost.

You guys that are making these laws let me remind you of one thing. Although you say you are trying to protect us from ourselves, we are not fooled, you want to isolate target us then so be it. Don't forget this though, that one day it is you that will be retired/pensioners and us that will be running the country.

[mistamidget]

+1, great post,

Also, I'd rather be on the same road as a hoon than a drunken driver. Tho' I think the track is the place for hooning not public roads.

This is another exapmple of the govt specifically targetting certain members of society. If they are serious about this then the law should extend as follows:

Same rule for hoons as for drinkdriving - impounding and crushing fro drink drivers.

Impound and crushing laws for mobile phones: If u are caught using a mobile while driving, then u get it confiscated dor 3 days and on 3rd offense the phone gets crushed.

End of the day, they can go to extreme lengths with laws to target certain members within out society. End of the day, all this creates in tension within society. We have something good here in Aus. If you goto other countries around the world you will see some hoorrific examples of isolated communities, ghettos and class warfare. These kind of laws are leading the way to that. If your going to make those sort of draconian laws then you have to do it for all offences across the board.

Drink driving is no safer and no less safe than hooning type offences. Reason why they will never crush pples cars for drink driving - coz even Judges, police officers and politicians are somethimes caught doing it. People wanna protect themselves 1st and foremost.

You guys that are making these laws let me remind you of one thing. Although you say you are trying to protect us from ourselves, we are not fooled, you want to isolate target us then so be it. Don't forget this though, that one day it is you that will be retired/pensioners and us that will be running the country.

[RBPOWA-(TJ)]

oh yeah and another thing, just saw it on the 10news.

they should think of the small business, wreckers, they could make some mad dosh, plus the GST will go straight back to the government anway.

auction whole cars off non-working if thats the rule, people are loosing there business cause so much competition, if the could buy these non working cars for a bargain price, money goes to Charity or

what ever, and the can keep up with the competition out there with out shutting up shop

[bozodos]

I think that if they want to impose these BS laws (thankyou tabloid media outlets who encourage this crap with beatups) then Police accountability should be tightened up a lot too, ie none of this bullshit VicPol pull 'threatening' to give defects out or dubious at best defects / fines.

A good example of how they are assholes when it comes to trying to intimidate modified car owners is thus; when I had my VN one morning I did a U-Turn and the diff locked causing one of the wheels to start audibly squealing. The cop who tore down the street and started blasting me was only mollifed and called off the tow truck when I cracked it and said "where are the skidmarks then?!" and started taking photos of the road.

This wasn't an isolated incident either. The hoon laws have done fark all here, one of the state's apparent hoon capitals. I see cars going down the highway at well over 100km/h as soon as the police finish their patrols.

All this is going to do is increase the number of pursuits, cause hey if I knew that my car was going to be crushed, I wouldn't be stopping, what would be the point of that!? The Liberals with their see through "me too"ism and blatant attempts at vote grabbing are absolutely pathetic, and I'd hope that people are smart enough to see through some of the ridiculous statements made by them recently.

[_Ryan_]

What about a better driver education and training program?

We had a bit of an office discussion, and everyone was coming up with reactive suggestions, all I can say is, Better training and education for drivers(more than just a defensive course, integrate it into school.), and maybe look at raising the drinking age.

In the herald sun today(trash) they asked people on the street about raising the speed limit, and most older women seemed to say it was a bad idea, I am assuming due to kids dieing in the media- did they not realize that these drivers were far over the speed limit?

If drivers are going to have an accident where speed is a factor(not road condition), it doesn't seem like the limit is the issue, as they are happy to exceed it anyway!

My thoughts anyway.

[mistamidget]

Isn't that what politicians do?!?!

The Liberals with their see through "me too"ism and blatant attempts at vote grabbing are absolutely pathetic, and I'd hope that people are smart enough to see through some of the ridiculous statements made by them recently.

[R31Nismoid]

I think its time car club's unite over this and stage a big protest.

If anyone is seriously interested let me know and i'll think about drawing something up and contacting other clubs around the place.

Someone that has some good political/lagal skills, would be a bonus

With Police abusing their power in some instances, there will be wrongful impoundment cases and all sorts of things.

It's time car enthusiasts made our feelings loud and clear about ridiculous laws.

How the FK can they sell your car, if someone else is hooning in it. What a load of shit.

[MRSAMO]

Someone that has some good political/lagal skills, would be a bonus

And good spelling

[R31Nismoid]

meh.

[mistamidget]

+1 again,

I'm sick of having the label hoon attached to, as quite rightly pointed out, we car enthusiasts. I'm up for standing outside Spring St and making a presence felt.

There are too many examples of the system picking on people who basically are not doing the wrong thing. Being a skyline owner should be a joy not a sentence.

I think its time car club's unite over this and stage a big protest.

If anyone is seriously interested let me know and i'll think about drawing something up and contacting other clubs around the place.

Someone that has some good political/lagal skills, would be a bonus

With Police abusing their power in some instances, there will be wrongful impoundment cases and all sorts of things.

It's time car enthusiasts made our feelings loud and clear about ridiculous laws.

How the FK can they sell your car, if someone else is hooning in it. What a load of shit.

[sneakey pete]

Ick, car crushing, no fun.

It certianly would be horrible for police to be able to take your car away for 30 days due to alleged hooning. I guess you guys should all get some kind of in car video so you can prove yourself innocent.

I weep whenever i read the comments sections of newsites like the herald sun. I mean, jesus people are dumb.

Edited January 22, 2010 by sneakey pete

[MRSAMO]

Australia would try to do what the US is doing for illegally imported cars, except in America they would actually use some of the cars for police work. That said, it would be a complete waste of money disposing perfectly good cars if they can be used to serve more useful purposes.

Don't fret guys, its after the 3rd offence, so if you accidently hoon then there's still hope for you to unhoon LOL

[RBPOWA-(TJ)]

that knox cop pettet or how ever you spell his name, would have a huge grin on his face right now.

if you dont drive a prius your a hoon is his eyes!

stock r35! all the advertising its had its now a HOON CAR