Carol and Lyle Brons, the parents of athletic therapist Dayna Brons, who died in the Humboldt Broncos bus-truck crash, are commending the trucking industry’s calls for more safety and training oversight of truck drivers while at the same time petitioning regulators across Canada to move quicker in adopting safety recommendations.
“We’ve heard that many trucking industry associations have been requesting more government oversight of the industry for the past decade,” Lyle, a former truck driver, told media this week. “We commend those groups of responsible, skilled drivers and operators for advocating for safer roadways.”
The parents launched the petition, which closes May 14, over a year ago. The initiative echoes proposals by the Canadian Trucking Allianceand the provincial trucking associations to improve highway safety across the country by implementing national mandatory entry-level training (MELT) for truck drivers. CTA’s 10-point action plan includes MELT as well as national mandatory speed limiters, among other rules and initiatives.
“We wish more than anything that it didn’t have to take the deaths of 16 Broncos players and staff, and life-changing emotional and physical injuries to the 13 survivors, before the federal government took notice and announced it would look at implementing nationwide MELT legislation by January 2020,” Carol added. “We miss Dayna every day, and it pains us knowing that this tragedy could have been prevented had there been more regulations in place to ensure Class 1 drivers are properly trained and monitored.”
With more than 7,000 signatures, the petition calls for the Class 1 licensing process to be considered a nation-wide skilled trade; the National Occupational Classification Code to be modified to provide funding for training; the implementation of MELT; and to require licensing bodies to collect and store information on training providers and each commercial driver.