{"id":44566,"date":"2026-03-04T15:45:35","date_gmt":"2026-03-04T13:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/accidents\/raising-standards-without-erasing-access-in-learner-transport\/"},"modified":"2026-03-04T15:45:35","modified_gmt":"2026-03-04T13:45:35","slug":"raising-standards-without-erasing-access-in-learner-transport","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/accidents\/raising-standards-without-erasing-access-in-learner-transport\/","title":{"rendered":"Raising standards without erasing access in learner transport"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By Peggie Mars, Founder of Wheel Well<\/p>\n<p>South Africans are right to demand safer scholar transport. Too many headlines have told stories of overloaded vehicles, unroadworthy minibuses and preventable tragedies. Parents should not have to wonder whether the vehicle collecting their child will return them home safely.<\/p>\n<p>The Gauteng Department of Roads and Transport&rsquo;s recent compliance crackdown signals that government has heard our frustrations and cries. The department has introduced a set of stringent compliance requirements aimed at professionalising the scholar transport sector. These include mandatory business registration documents, up-to-date financial statements, tax clearance certificates and private indemnity insurance in addition to Road Accident Fund cover. <\/p>\n<p>Vehicles must meet stricter safety standards. Drivers must have valid professional permits. The message is uncompromising: unsafe operators will be removed. Few would argue with that principle.<\/p>\n<p>But good policy&#8230;<\/p>\n<hr>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.arrivealive.co.za\/news.aspx?s=1&#038;i=76640&#038;page=raising-standards-without-erasing-access-in-learner-transport\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read more on Arrive Alive <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Peggie Mars, Founder of Wheel Well South Africans are right to demand safer scholar transport. Too many headlines have told stories of overloaded vehicles, unroadworthy minibuses and preventable tragedies. Parents should not have to wonder whether the vehicle collecting their child will return them home safely. The Gauteng Department of Roads and Transport&rsquo;s recent [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44567,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.arrivealive.co.za\/\/ckfinder\/userfiles\/images\/seatbelt-01.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2149],"tags":[164],"class_list":["post-44566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-accidents","tag-gauteng"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.arrivealive.co.za\/\/ckfinder\/userfiles\/images\/seatbelt-01.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44566"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44566\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44566"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44566"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}