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Moruya’s Alan May Holden general manager Steve Smith put a proposal to Moruya High School this week where he would donate a $15,000 car for students to be taught how to drive during school hours, which the school is now considering.

“What I put forward is...an in-school driver education plan that’s going to involve the police and ambos,” he said.

Having two sons who are 10 months apart and are now both on their Ps, Steve said he knew how hard it was for parents to make up 120 hours, or in his case, 240 hours of teaching children to drive.

He said having an outsider would be beneficial and would discourage “fudging” of logbooks.

“If they’re doing it at school, they’ll have a different person with different experiences teaching them, and they’ll be clocking hours up legitimately.”

Moruya High School deputy principal Michael Lambert said they took the proposal on board with very keen interest.

“Driver education is an issue and it is an issue that is going to be considered by the school,” he said. “I think driver education for teenagers is extremely important, but how to fit it into the curriculum is another matter. I agree with the idea, and I don’t think anybody would disagree.”

He said he could see it working by sending students out to learn to drive during school hours, or having members of the community come into the school to teach students individually.

“I think (they would learn) skills that can only really come from experience and direct instruction. The more instruction and more experience we can give kids in a controlled environment, the better.”

Gary Smith is the coordinator for TeenSafe, a safe-driving course run in the school holidays for learner and provisional licence holders at Moruya speedway and he believed that incorporating learning to drive into schools would take the pressure off parents to clock-up 120 hours.

“Most parents can’t afford professional driving schools,” he said. “For me, I had four boys and for families trying to teach 120 hours with each child, if they’ve got four kids, that’s 480 hours they would have to find.

“I’d like to push to see it an option at high school, just like algebra or science, I’d like to see safe driving at schools,” he said.