Changes Coming to Boat Licensing System

[Golfisher]

Changes coming to the boat licensing system, apparently to make it a little bit less of a joke than it is now.

 

 

 

Boat licensing falls below board

Transport Canada moves to restore credibility to a program designed to make recreational boating safer

MARK HUME

 

From Saturday's Globe and Mail

 

August 4, 2007 at 12:00 AM EDT

 

VANCOUVER — A program designed to make recreational boating safer has come under such widespread criticism that Transport Canada is moving to restore credibility by tightening up testing standards and weeding out private-sector providers who aren't playing by the rules.

 

Critics say the pleasure-craft operator card is being hawked by providers who charge $40 to $60 to take a multiple-choice exam of dubious worth, under a system with so few controls that stories of cheating are as common as ducks on a dock.

 

There have been reports that service providers have posted tests on bulletin boards for boaters to study before they write the exam and that many people have had friends or family write it for them.

 

“We want to help bring credibility back to the program. We have been having some problems,” said Krista Kendall, a policy and standards development officer with Transport Canada's marine safety division.

 

Changes to the pleasure-craft operator card program – which requires boat operators to prove their nautical competency by passing a test – will include more auditing, a new protocol for exams over the Internet, a national registry of card holders and possibly a much tougher exam.

 

Ms. Kendall said she's heard of people supervising themselves while taking tests on the Internet, and is aware that some private-sector providers have been showing up at trade shows where they offer to coach boaters through the exam, or give guarantees that everyone who writes the test will pass.

 

“We are very concerned about that,” she said, adding that course providers can be suspended if they abuse the system.

 

“The objective of the program is to improve boating safety … the bottom line is to reduce accidents,” she said, arguing that despite its problems the initiative is well worth saving.

 

When recreational boaters flood the waterfront this weekend, an estimated two million of them will already be carrying the government card that is supposed to certify them as safe, knowledgeable mariners.

 

That card, which Canada's estimated seven million boaters will be required to have by the fall of 2009, has been credited with raising the general level of knowledge among boaters and helping to propel a downward trend in drowning incidents and boating accidents.

 

Each year about 200 people die in recreational-boating accidents in Canada, but the number of deaths in 1996-2000 was 17 per cent lower than in the previous five years. Because the latest national data available are from 2000, it's unclear whether the trend has continued, but experts expect that it has.

 

Although there are no Canadian studies on the link between safety training and boating fatalities, a U.S. Coast Guard investigation found that 47 per cent of all boating deaths occurred on vessels where the operator had not completed a safety-education course.

 

In Canada, 85 per cent of those who died boating during 1996-2000 were not wearing personal-flotation devices, and alcohol was involved in 38 per cent of fatalities. Because many boating accidents are related to recklessness or poor judgment, the government has been pushing boating education in the hope of saving lives.

 

But the testing program, which was launched in 1999 with a 10-year phase-in schedule, has been plagued by problems, many of which suggest the educational impact may be limited.

 

“We heard of one guy who went on the Internet, wrote the test repeatedly, and got cards for all his family as Christmas presents,” said John Guillick, deputy director of the Canadian Power and Sail Squadrons, a national boating association.

 

Those writing the exam on the Internet must provide a volunteer proctor who, via e-mail, assures the service provider that the test has been properly supervised. But the anonymity of the Internet allows for lots of ways to cheat.

 

“You hear people say, ‘My supervisor was my pet fish,' ” said Mr. Guillick, who is pushing the government to tighten up a program he thinks has gone off course.

 

“To have a good program of education and testing is not rocket science. I mean we do know the key learning points that we believe people need to know: right of way, the buoy system, the safety equipment that you have to have on the boat, the things to pay attention to … that kind of makes some sense. But to have a system that doesn't require a training manual and that only requires 36 questions on 149 key learning points doesn't make a lot of sense,” said Mr. Guillick, who wants an exam with at least 50 questions.

 

Michael Walsh, a former naval veteran and volunteer training officer for the Vancouver Power and Sail Squadron, agrees.

 

“My opinion, only my opinion, is that the thing is being abused dramatically as a cash cow by a lot of [private] operators,” he says.

 

“I was an officer in the navy for a number of years. I know what is entailed in the safe operation and handling of a vessel at sea and it scares me that the government is allowing this program to be watered down so dramatically,” said Mr. Walsh who thinks the multiple-choice questions are too easy.

 

“Anybody except an idiot can pass it.”

 

Many of the 80 service providers offering the test suggest taking a classroom course of three or four hours.

 

But even that course is considered too long by many boaters, who have been flocking to take their tests over the Internet – by some estimates 75 per cent have gone that route – leaving the classroom instructors with few students.

 

“One of our biggest problems in life is to get enough people to fill a class. We advertise on the radio. We advertise on highway billboards. We advertise all over the place about classes and sometimes we have to cancel classes because of how few people we've had sign up,” said Richard Scott, whose Winnipeg-based company, S.C.O.T.T.S. Boat Safe, offers a $60, four-hour course to prepare for and take the card test.

 

He said as he crosses the Prairies promoting boater safety he keeps hearing horror stories.

 

“We are only hoping that there are not as many people cheating to get their cards through Internet testing as we hear. We hope that there's more [being honest]. … But I know of many, many ways that cheating happens and it is a very, very, sad, sad scenario to have it happen that way. It really does drag down the integrity of the entire program,” he said.

 

Mr. Scott said many boaters just don't want to put in the effort to study for or write a test, and he gets approached all the time by people who say: “Rick, I'll give you $100 if you'll just give me the darn card.”

 

Kevin Dwyer, president of Best Boating, a service that offers tests over the Internet, said some of the criticisms are unfair.

 

He argues the vast majority of those taking the test online are playing by the rules.

 

“Yes, people can cheat … [but] honourable people do it honourably,” he said.

 

“There's a percentage of the population that always will cheat. There are criminals. But most people are honest. They will follow an honest agenda. So we offer an honest agenda. If a person chooses to cheat, then we try to catch that.”

 

Mr. Dwyer said his site attempts to verify the authenticity of test proctors, follows up with calls to those who took the test, and strives to see that boaters are getting educated.

 

“Our job, as I see it, is to attempt to raise the level of the general boating population as best we can.”

 

He said people need two key things to be safe on the water – a life jacket and boating knowledge.

 

But as things stand now, there are questions about just how many of the two million boaters with cards have those other things.

 

Suzanne Gorman, acting executive director of the Lifesaving Society, said despite its problems, the pleasure-craft operator card program has had a positive impact by educating boaters.

 

“I think … Transport Canada has noticed the weakness in the system and is trying to address that,” she said.

 

If all of Canada's seven million boaters comply with taking the test by 2009, they will have shelled out $350-million.

[nel]

The current system is a joke...whenever I speak about it, I call it a tax grab.

I wonder if they're going to screw all those who already got the card...invalidate all the old cards, and make everyone pay and do the test again. I think I deserve a discount if I gotta take another test.

Why do I have to suffer because the government couldn't get it right in the first place? (that test caused me a lot of stress...so many choices...arg!)

Unfortunately, I think they'll treat it like the drivers licenses...where only new drivers have to take g1 and g2 tests...So all the people who cheated on their boaters exam will get away with it (until they die or kill someone in a boat accident).

[English]

For a moment I thought I was on the plumber and heating engineers web site in the UK we get that sort of thing all the time, we pay our taxes and the government know this then they come up with a new ruse to screw some more money out of us and then do just that, we have been fed up with it for years. The certificate which I took 3 years ago which was then issued for life has just recently been changed and now we have to re take every 5 years at £ 300 ish plus a day off work. It happens all the time here, so if this is something new over there get used to it with global harmonisation on it's way other countries will be looking at whta the brits have done and thinking well if we do that........

 

Hope it doesn't go that way but

 

Regards Clive

[POLLIWOGG]

Its not a tax grab, and its not a license.

 

Its a piece of paper that states an approved organization has tested and found the holder competent. No money goes to the gov.

 

To think that your going to find a high level of honesty on the internet was sort of comical, he should have posted his E-mail address.

[LeXXington]

Yeap, Tax grab. If it was all for the safty the money would go into enforcement.

 

But for the people who do actually read the manuel etc, it does help.

 

I was sailing since the time I was 5 so I had lots of experiance on the water and in bad weather.

 

Still I went to a class took the course. Wrote the test in a class enviorment etc.

 

I feel wiser for doing it. People who cheat are only cheating themselves and putting them and there family in possible danger.

[POLLIWOGG]

I agree 100% with lexx why pay big bucks to write the test on line and get nothing out of it when you can sit in on a coarse and get something out of it for half the money.

 

The best way is to go in a group of friends and family and get it done and have some fun doing it.

 

Better still is to take a basic boating coarse through the winter, most are under $200 and go way beyond what you need for that card and include the card.

[Dano]

Thanks for the heads up. I wouldnt mind if they made everyone take the Canadian Power and Sail Squadron boating course, because there sure are a lot of folks out there who do not have a clue what they are doing.

[fishindevil]

Well i wouldnt mind one bit if they made everyone take the test over again,or do random stops and quizes or something cause,there are still just as many idiots out there as ever.....and man if they cant drive a car very good what in the heck makes them think they can drive a boat...lol..lol