Margetic: Any Idiot Can Get A Driving Licence

The price of the driving test should be 10,000 kunas, bad drivers and uneducated, instructors are to blame for accidents, thinks Margetic.

"The driving test should cost 10,000 kunas," said the president of the instructors' union Zlatko Margetic to Plavi Radio. Regardless of the fact that the exam costs around 4,500 kunas in the neighbouring Slovenia, Margetic thinks that the price of 7,500 kunas in Croatia should be even higher because "anyone can get a driver's licence these days."

Instructors and drivers to blame for accidents

At the same time, Margetic blames both instructors and drivers for the huge number of accidents. Instructors are undertrained for the job even if they do have all the necessary documents that the Croatian Automobile Club (HAK) demands.

Croatian drivers are most frequently badly taught because, apart from the instructors' lack of interest, they are forced to practice parking, for instance, at the learner's range and they consequently cannot cope on the road. The regulations are absurd and HAK thinks that this is how it has to be even though citizens do not agree. The most frequent cause of traffic accidents is speed, followed by alcohol. The biggest number of accidents occur on roundabouts and various intersections, he says.

Young drivers have to harp on theory too much  

- Young drivers today are met with the theory of driving, not with practice. This is why they can't cope on the road and why they don't pass the driving test. One doesn't need to nag them to know the streets by heart, but to find their way around – says Margetic.

He is also asking for an inquiry into the expertise of the instructors who train the drivers these days. Margetic points out that the most important thing in all this is to change the regulations and, by changing the regulations, HAK would be admitting to its substandard operation and, primarily, to a mistake, which they naturally do not want to do.