It comes after the Victorian Government announced learner permit and licence testing could resume across regional Victoria.
The first priority under the staged resumption will be to re-book tests for those in regional Victoria whose appointments were postponed in March due to the initial coronavirus restrictions.
Brian Crockett of Echuca Driving School said the announcement was a much-needed boost to his business.
“The best part is that my students and I now have a goal which we are working towards,” he said.
“When tests were on hold it sometimes felt like the students were doing a lot of practice for nothing.
“All driving schools love seeing our customers get their licence and get out on the roads.
“I’ll be back in the full swing of business.”
Drive Right Drive Training’s Jeff Ebert said he was looking forward to welcoming back some of his Echuca-based students.
“I've been fortunate to have had enough work to keep me busy the past few weeks,” he said.
“There have been tests in Moama running on a weekly basis so that has been a good way to keep pushing forward.
“I'll have some tests to catch up and the sooner those make ups are completed the better.”
Member for Murray Plains Peter Walsh said now the “very overdue” decision to resume licence testing in regional Victoria has been made, “it is not good enough to tell people they can make appointments once the backlog is cleared”.
Mr Walsh said instead of treating regionals as second-class citizens, the Andrews government should commit more resources to fast-track the testing, not slow it down.
“A lot of our young people have been very patient about this but now the switch has been turned back on there should be plans in place to make up for all the lost time instead of taking the slow road,” Mr Walsh said.
“Testing has been on again, off again – and to an extent that is understandable – but our would-be drivers should not be further penalised by being linked to a Melbourne lockdown timeline instead of our own.
“Surely VicRoads has been planning to make the best of this for everyone involved – it’s not as if they didn’t know it was coming.
“If it had been my responsibility, knowing how important it is to all those young people, I would have been looking at the total numbers on hold and coming up with a staffing solution to fix it, and fix it fast.
“City decision-makers still don’t get the importance of licences for country people – there are no trams to jump on up here.”
Regional customers with a postponed appointment will be contacted by VicRoads directly to reschedule their test in the order of cancellation.
New appointments will be available once the backlog of postponed tests is cleared.
VicRoads is also investigating options to increase access to online registration and licensing services.
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