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Home / New Zealand

Matt Greenop: Fair way to go to smooth out bumps

NZ Herald
1 Feb, 2013 04:30 PM2 mins to read

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 Photo / Getty Images
Photo / Getty Images

Photo / Getty Images

All of the gnashing of teeth around changes to the Warrant of Fitness system is now irrelevant, there's nothing left to say and the once-yearly WoF for young(ish) cars will go ahead. It'll be interesting to see how it pans out - the doomsayers reckon it'll be carnage, but I don't think we'll quite see the apocalyptic effect that some say it will.

They said the same about the give way rule change, and that went by without the world coming to an end. Of course, some do like to point out the sky is falling occasionally, and there are a couple of areas that we still really need to get our proverbial ducks in a row on.

First are diesel road user charges or the Bulls**t Travesty Tax as we like to call it. Aside from subsidising a bit of the bill for big trucks the only thing it really achieves is confuses the marketplace about buying diesel passenger vehicles for private use.

Pay it at the pump, leave business users to sort it out using a modified version of the current scheme.

The other one is the quad bike - a handy farm machine, granted, and also a bit of fun if you know how to use one safely. But every year we seem to sit back and read horror stories about people getting badly hurt because they don't know how to use them properly.

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It's high time that a well-sorted training programme was put in place to make farm children (and in many cases farm adults) learn to use quads responsibly

We're not talking a full time degree in not crashing quads here - a few hours with the right person doing the talking and there'll be quite a few less country funerals.

And then there's Simon Bridges and his 'new measures' to curb speeding on our roads. It's still all a big surprise, so we'll reserve judgment on that one for the moment.

Anything else, wise readers, that we need to get sorted? It'll give some of the WoFflers something to do this year.

Discover more

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Warrant changes are you for or against?

29 Jan 04:30 PM
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Quad bike crash girl expected home today

30 Jan 10:57 PM
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Dire stats fuel WoF debate

31 Jan 04:30 PM
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Tech swap coming up

06 Feb 04:30 PM
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