The biggest problem with the DCPC is that it was badly thought through, and badly introduced. Firstly, any idiot could set up as a"trainer " and deliver p#ss poor courses just to make money. Now the the big rush is over, that might settle down. Secondly, there was little point on giving it to people that already new most of the stuff in it.
However, the basic idea is fundamentally sound. New drivers enter the industry with a better understanding of how it works, and old hands take one day out per year to catch up on new legislation and information.
Terry T:
I wonder, upon leaving the EU, which is almost guaranteed if we’re given a referendum, would we return to domestic regs ?
BoJo has already stuck his oar in to the EU regs so it’s a possibility I reckon. Tachos might be a problem unless they can be reconfigured somehow to match our regs. Can’t see us migrating back to log books.
Why would you want to? At least with tachos you get to have a break whether your gaffer likes it or not. Chuck them out and we’re back to the bad old days, cowboys would multiply like flies on a dung heap.
Bear in mind also that to do as you suggest would also mean that European drivers would have to be exempt from them as well when they’re working over here.
Leaving the EU isn’t a forgone conclusion, Boris Johnson is just as pro europe as Bliars son Cameron, he just waffles better and makes disapproving noises at the right moment, the referendum arguments and media spin will be loaded in favour of staying and the voters will fall for it, just like Ireland after the NO votes were ignored, should we unthinkably vote for exit does anyone think it’ll be accepted without a fight?
It’s what people want, they keep voting in pro eu parties so presumably most people are happy with it.
TBH i couldn’t give a monkeys whether we have the DCPC or not, it’s just another hurdle and anything that helps reduce the numbers of licence holders available for £7 a bloody hour rip offs has to be a good thing.
It won’t be scrapped, not a chance, boxes ticked, taxes raised on the money merry go round, it’s here to stay.
Got a phone call from a friend a few weeks ago,asking me to come out of retirement and come back driving.He needed Drivers because three drivers had not wanted to do the DCPC.due to there age.I asked him if it was bad,His reply was that it will get worse. This guy has been in transport for a very long time,so he knows the business.He’s a worried man.Me, no chance.Did 38yrs the good days are gone. We are all in a handcart on our way to Hell.
now there is a different problem to my own
i object on the grounds that us old hands should of been given granddad rights and never have to sit the dcpc
funny how they let us have 5 years only grandad rights, they knew dam well if they made it law imitatively then all the trucks would stop rolling as no one would have them so they said we will let the old drivers have 5 years only as they needed us
the old guys should of seen this and said no we will not train for a cpc and then they would of been stuck with only the new guys coming into the game who had to do it,
if only the lads would of said no we are not going to train then over time there would of been a huge headache that would of forced the government to make a u turn and award grand dad rights to us all who were older drivers
the new breed already have to take different tests ie a theory test and different classes of trucks as they can not go right up to class one so if those guys had to take a cpc as well i guess that would be there route
but to treat the experienced guys who have passed test in manuals and driven every sort of boxes and combinations around and tell them they will not longer be able to drive them after september was like a red flag to a bull for me and many other drivers my age many now only drive part time as like me they have found other ways to make money
so yes things could of changed if the drivers who were being forced to take a cpc told them were to go and refused to do it
but like always they do as the boss tells them its the same old with drivers they will moan like hell and do nothing about it when it comes down to it hence i got out, i can not work alongside such a bunch of cowards and back stabbers that is now pretending to be hgv drivers, hell if you so much as smoke in a cab someone is grassing you up bunch of women some of them. but they now have there cpc cards so they must be real drivers
desypete:
now there is a different problem to my own
i object on the grounds that us old hands should of been given granddad rights and never have to sit the dcpc
funny how they let us have 5 years only grandad rights, they knew dam well if they made it law imitatively then all the trucks would stop rolling as no one would have them so they said we will let the old drivers have 5 years only as they needed us
the old guys should of seen this and said no we will not train for a cpc and then they would of been stuck with only the new guys coming into the game who had to do it,
if only the lads would of said no we are not going to train then over time there would of been a huge headache that would of forced the government to make a u turn and award grand dad rights to us all who were older drivers
the new breed already have to take different tests ie a theory test and different classes of trucks as they can not go right up to class one so if those guys had to take a cpc as well i guess that would be there route
but to treat the experienced guys who have passed test in manuals and driven every sort of boxes and combinations around and tell them they will not longer be able to drive them after september was like a red flag to a bull for me and many other drivers my age many now only drive part time as like me they have found other ways to make money
so yes things could of changed if the drivers who were being forced to take a cpc told them were to go and refused to do it
but like always they do as the boss tells them its the same old with drivers they will moan like hell and do nothing about it when it comes down to it hence i got out, i can not work alongside such a bunch of cowards and back stabbers that is now pretending to be hgv drivers, hell if you so much as smoke in a cab someone is grassing you up bunch of women some of them. but they now have there cpc cards so they must be real drivers
Good riddance to bad rubbish. This industry is better off without you. I bet you whined about driving licences, HGV driving licences, log books, tachographs and digital tachograps too.
I am glad that at least some of you saw the point that no young driver was going to pay for training then not work, hence the only result of all those with grandfather rights refusung to do the DCPC would have been the end of the careers for those drivers! And all the young drivers handsomely paid and people clamouring to do your job.
Conor:
What makes me mad is the fact that all these gobshytes who say that it wasn’t needed are usually prime examples of why it is.
Where’s this fact from then?
Go do any DCPC, listen to the gobshytes in the classroom banging on about it at the start of the day then listen to the absolute crap they come out with which is complete and utter rubbish throughout the day and listen to the wrong answers they give. If it truly were not needed they’d all give correct answers.
robroy:
You make this sweeping generalization that anybody who disagrees with the dcpc or has the opinion of it holding a hidden financial agenda is either thick or in this case a ‘gobshyte’
Please tell me what this financial agenda is? I keep hearing the same old crap about it being allegedly done to get rid of older drivers but that makes no sense as they’re not excluded from doing it. It certainly isn’t to lower pay in the industry because that’s gone up as a result of the DCPC. So what is this financial agenda?
Conor:
What makes me mad is the fact that all these gobshytes who say that it wasn’t needed are usually prime examples of why it is.
Where’s this fact from then?
Go do any DCPC, listen to the gobshytes in the classroom banging on about it at the start of the day then listen to the absolute crap they come out with which is complete and utter rubbish throughout the day and listen to the wrong answers they give. If it truly were not needed they’d all give correct answers.
And do you think the fact that they’ve sat in a classroom for 35 hours means they’ve actually learned anything?
Conor:
What makes me mad is the fact that all these gobshytes who say that it wasn’t needed are usually prime examples of why it is.
Where’s this fact from then?
Go do any DCPC, listen to the gobshytes in the classroom banging on about it at the start of the day then listen to the absolute crap they come out with which is complete and utter rubbish throughout the day and listen to the wrong answers they give. If it truly were not needed they’d all give correct answers.
And do you think the fact that they’ve sat in a classroom for 35 hours means they’ve actually learned anything…‘‘useful’’?
Fixed that for you…
Roads’ll be safe for nuns carrying baskets of kittens again when us old uns are off the road
DCPC, as i said before it doesn’t worry me one bit, we got paid to sit on our ample arses for 35 hours and the course was paid for too.
It was useful in the respect that an exchange of views between drivers sensibly umpired by a trainer that knows his onions is a decent exercise in itself, there were one or two numpties in attendance at the first session but it takes about 30 seconds to suss them out, mind you the first trainer wasn’t up to much (telling experienced blokes all about brakes to slow gears to go and how much better it is) and our company ditched that lot pronto, the new company from second session on have been far more professional, good knowledge, lots of common sense spoken (they reckon brakes to slow gears to go is bollox too), anything they couldn’t answer at that time or needed written clarification, they found out the answers and replied via our company trainer within a couple of days.
Did i learn much, well about how i go about my work and my driving practices, no not really, but got a few points cleared up about driving hours and regs.
If it’s caused a few disillusioned souls to pack the job in, maybe it was time they went anyway.
You don’t need to go to a DCPC course to find a handful of wingeing plonkers. I’ve worked with, and still do, blokes who if you paid 'em a £grand a week to lie in bed would still moan and winge about it, how hard done by they are etc.
Us, the industry as a whole, everyone is better off without them…plus as a bonus it’s another bum less to put on the seat, supply and demand dictates wages to a high degree.
muckles:
And do you think the fact that they’ve sat in a classroom for 35 hours means they’ve actually learned anything?
Yes. Its impossible not to unless you’re asleep for the entire duration.
Juddian:
Did i learn much, well about how i go about my work and my driving practices, no not really, but got a few points cleared up about driving hours and regs.
So you even admit you did learn something. Everyone who has done a DCPC will have regardless of whether they want to admit they did or not.
muckles:
And do you think the fact that they’ve sat in a classroom for 35 hours means they’ve actually learned anything?
Yes. Its impossible not to unless you’re asleep for the entire duration.
I beg to differ, you can put somebody into a classroom, tell them useful information, show them videos full of useful information, but you can’t make somebody who doesn’t want to listen and take on board that information learn it.
And those drivers are the ones you were talking about, the loud mouth, know it all. they will leave having spent the days disrupting the course, thinking that everybody else is totally impressed with their superior knowledge and how they put the instructor in their place. Because they think they already know everything, nothing that contradicts that will be accepted as fact, you can argue the toss with them all day and they’ll still leave believing they’re right.
It’s rare I agree with Conor on anything but he does have a point. From what I saw with my own eyes on the CPC sessions it was all the really old [zb]s that have “been driving 40 [zb] years, there’s nothing you can tell me about this job” that didn’t have a clue about the current tacho regs and even less of a clue about the RT(WT)R. Comments like “well, I was always told you could split your breaks into three 15s” and “well, I thought after you’ve had your two 45s you only ever had another hour left, regardless of how much driving time you’ve complete up until that point” plus all the other myths about rest periods and access to a bed etc. So if the CPC sessions have taught them something and put them straight then it’s a good thing as it’ll mean I won’t have to endure their incorrect bull[zb] in RDC waiting rooms.
I do still think the whole thing is largely pointless without a written test to pass at the end of each module, though.
Conor:
What makes me mad is the fact that all these gobshytes who say that it wasn’t needed are usually prime examples of why it is.
Where’s this fact from then?
Go do any DCPC, listen to the gobshytes in the classroom banging on about it at the start of the day then listen to the absolute crap they come out with which is complete and utter rubbish throughout the day and listen to the wrong answers they give. If it truly were not needed they’d all give correct answers.
Yep, we know everyone’s an idiot but you.
If you can’t take the keys to a truck, put a load on the back of it, and drive from A to B safely without incident. The solution isn’t 7 hours classroom training a year it’s a different job.
robroy:
You make this sweeping generalization that anybody who disagrees with the dcpc or has the opinion of it holding a hidden financial agenda is either thick or in this case a ‘gobshyte’
Please tell me what this financial agenda is? I keep hearing the same old crap about it being allegedly done to get rid of older drivers but that makes no sense as they’re not excluded from doing it. It certainly isn’t to lower pay in the industry because that’s gone up as a result of the DCPC. So what is this financial agenda?
It was done with the aim of encouraging younger drivers into the industry, it’s all there in black and white in the original EU directive.
No study was ever done that identified any need for additional training for existing drivers nor does the original directive make any reference to it.
Despite what you keep claiming (ie that everyone is an idiot but you) the UK has one of the best, if not the best, record on safety and compliance for road transport in Europe.
It could never have been stopped because in the face of it, it’s not a bad idea. A campaign to stop truck drivers being taught how to control their death machines was never going to get popular support so was always doomed to fail.
