PROVISIONAL DRIVING LICENCE HOLDERS AGED 17 TO 21 (Particulars)

Mr Ng Kah Ting asked the Minister for Communications if he will give (i) the number of applicants for provisional driving licences in the 17 to 21 year age group as at the latest convenient date; (ii) the number of accidents, fatal or otherwise, involving motor vehicles driven by provisional licence holders and licence holders within that age group in 1971, 1972, 1973 and the first nine months of 1974; and (iii) the number of owners of classes 2 and 3 motor vehicles who are in that age group.

The Minister of State for Communications (Mr Chai Chong Yii) (for the Minister for Communications): Mr Speaker, Sir, a person applying for a provisional driving licence is first required to apply for a test in the Highway Code. As at 30th September, 1974, the number of applicants for the Highway Code test was 69,700. There is no breakdown by age for this group of applicants. As the number of Highway Code tests that can be conducted in any one month at present is about 10,000, there is a waiting period of about seven months.

After passing the Highway Code test, the applicant is issued with a Provisional Driving Licence (PDL). As at 30th September, 1974, the number of PDLs issued to the 17/21-year age group total- led 34,819. Breakdown by age is as follows: - Age PDL Holders 16 years 387 17 2,987 18 6,165 19 7,480 20 8,682 21 9,118 Total 34,819

As the Traffic Police does not maintain breakdown statistics of traffic accidents according to provisional licence holders and for the years 1971 and 1972, perhaps the Member for Punggol licence holders, neither breakdown figures according to age groups were maintained for traffic accidents will be satisfied with the following breakdown figures for the various categories of traffic accidents by drivers of the age group 17 -21 years as indicated below*.

• Following are the figures: - Serious Slight Year Fatal Inujury Injury No Injury Total 1971 - - - - 1,147 1972 - - - - 642 1973 29 205 409 2,114 2,757 1974 16 103 218 1,356 1,693

As particulars of age in respect of the ownership of a vehicle are not required for registration purposes, it is not possible to give the statistics as requested by the Member for Punggol as to the number of owners of Classes 2 and 3 motor vehicles who are in the 17/21-year age group. However, the hon. Member may be interested to know that as at 30th September, 1974, there were 84,452 Class 2 motor vehicles (i.e, motorcycles and scooters) and 143,019 Class 3 motor vehicles (i.e, motor-cars and station wagons).