Motorcycle Council of NSW Interview | Ride Rage Radio speak to CJ Burns
RRR: We’ve got CJ Burns from the NSW Motorcycle Council in here to update us on all of the good things and there are a lot of good things to report lately, CJ, you’ve had some massive wins that not only affect motorcyclists in New South Wales, but all over the country and especially in that state where I’ll be heading in four weeks’ time, =Victoria.
CJ: “Yeah, thanks to have me on, guys. Yes, when I was working with the MCC I was on the Vehicle Standards Working Group and we’ve just had an announcement from Jamie Briggs, one of the federal ministers said they’re going to drop the ADRs for rear guards on motorcycles and we’ve got to give a lot of credit to Dan Levy from Centre for Road Safety for that. We raced at the Vehicle Standards Working Group with him 18 months ago and he championed it. And when I went through to the NTC meetings, which is the National Transport Commission, I think, earlier on this year, he got all the states together and put it forward to the Feds and the Feds have come good with it, they’ve dropped it, so it’s going to be a good thing.”
RRR: And there are actually a whole lot of areas that are affected. One that means that motorcyclists that are just for a nice Sunday ride can’t get pulled over and hassled for having a Fender Eliminator or simply holding their number plate in their indicators. Another thing it means is that motorcycle importers, being the main companies that bring motorcycles into the country, don’t have to go and make stupid one-off guards for this part of the world to have fitted to brand new motorcycles that weren’t actually complying with the ridiculous ADRs.
CJ: “Yeah, that is correct. That’s going to be for new bikes, older bikes are still going to have to comply with VSB 14, which does show you’ve got to have coverage from the rear axle 45° upwards over the rear wheel, but that means a Fender Eliminator can go on there and you can cut the rear end down and have your plate the way it should be, so VSB 14 rules at the moment and VSI06, which is the state regulation, which we had a very big hand in drafting points directly at VSB 14.”
RRR: So essentially how long have you guys been working on this? I imagine it’s not one of those things that happen in five minutes.
CJ: “No, no it doesn’t. A lot of this work was started four years ago. Generally change within the Government and the road rules in particular is a two-year implementation. Lane filtering was three years, three and a half years. I’ve been working on recreational registration in New South Wales for over three years, that’s getting closer and closer, which will be good news for dirtbike riders. But we’ve had some wins and the main part of this win was as insignificant as it seemed last year, was a change in the blinker regulations, it made Centre for Road Safety and Transport realise that there were conflicts within what they call Schedule 2 Road Registration Rules. They’re now aware of that and this is impacting on so many other areas, it’s going to impact on rear mud guards, bull bars, a whole lot of things for all those four wheel drivers and ute owners out there with bull bars. So we’re working very hard on that and we expect to see some change in the not too distant future.”
RRR: A lot of this seems to also be the fact that the relationships that you personally have built up with a lot of these committee members and also the Minister for Transport in New South Wales, Duncan Gay.
CJ: “Yeah, look, all credit to Duncan Gay and his team. Duncan, he comes from the bush, not too far from where I was born, he hangs out round Bylong way, but we’ve forgiven him for being a westie. But yeah, he’s a realist, he’s doing a good job and the team in the Centre for Road Safety, through a lot of hard work, through a lot of people, Guy Stanford, Brian Wood, myself, we’ve built relationships that’s seen the sense in what we’ve done, and now we put forward an opinion, it’s not just a stamp your foot opinion, it’s a reasoned opinion and they now have confidence in our judgement and what we have to put forward. And that’s going to be a big winner for all motorcycle riders.”
RRR: And it would appear from what you’ve been saying too that that relationships and those reasoned responses are now being sought out by other parties, especially the four wheel drive people.
CJ: “Yeah, yeah, I got pulled in by the New South Wales Four Wheel Drive Association to assist them with some work on some bull bars, the New South Wales Police have been out defecting people for having a four post or a five post bull bar, because of one picture they’ve seen in the Australian Standards, and we’re negotiating for change with that. This work with the bull bars, the work with the ADRs on rear guards and some other work we’ve been doing has also made Transport realise that they may have to make some changes to schedule 2, which is going to be better for us. And if they listen to our arguments, they’ll go across to the Vehicle Service Regulations, the federal ones, and just take them on completely without any state regulations underneath, and that will make life so much easier for everybody.”
RRR: And one other thing is though too that when you think about it, you cast your mind back over the last couple of years, you have had some massive victories and obviously the third party thing springs to mind immediately.
CJ: “Oh, yeah, that was a lot of hard work and both Dave, Cook and I and a lot of other people, a lot of work went in behind the scenes on that. Boris, Irina, everyone on the Facebook site, that was a really good win for us and that was a win for social justice really. Nobody wants to get hurt, but I was chatting to a mate of mine this afternoon who has been back in hospital over an injury that happened to him 10 years ago, and if that new CTP legislation had of gone through, he would have been out in the grass, not covered for his medical costs and could well have lost his leg as a cheap option for the medical system.”
RRR: So what are the things that you’re working on now that you’ve had this fantastic victory with the rear mud guards? You mentioned recreational registration, any other things that you’re working on at the moment?
CJ: Rec registration. “Well, as a member of Vehicle Standards Working Group, we’re still working on general standards. We’ve kept them at bay with needing an engineer certificate for exhaust systems, that was a really big win. And transport re-wrote VSA. Vehicle Standards Information Sheet 06, which is up on the Transport website and there’s not much for a motorbike that really needs an engineer certificate, so we got out of it quite well for a good negotiation.”
RRR: Now, you mentioned exhaust and that’s something that I wanted to bring up, you were mentioning about some of the stupid laws around the country in relation to exhaust that apparently in Queensland motorcyclists are being fined for not having an exhaust that reaches all the way to the back of the vehicle. Off the top of my head, I can think now of so many motorcycles that come out with a standard exhaust, provided by the manufacturer, that’s imported under ADRs and sold to people off the showroom floor that has an exhaust that barely reaches the length of the swingarm on the back wheel.
CJ: “Agreed, and that’s a policing issue, there seems to be a lack of common sense on the part of some people. They can look at the guidelines for Australian Design Rules, which revolve around a small bus or a car, any vehicle three and a half tons or less GVM, and because motorcycles aren’t recognized as a separate class of vehicle, they get lumped in with cars and the car ADR says your exhaust must stick out the end of the vehicle. So police look at the motorbikes and go, ‘Oh, that’s a brand new GSX-R750, we’ll stiff you for your blinkers. Oh, that’s a brand new,’ oh, God, I don’t even know what bikes have got shorter exhausts on them. It seriously gives credence to what everybody thinks about police out there not having anything better to do. I know they work hard, I know they’re concerned about public safety. I’ve spent enough time talking to John Hartley and Phil Brooks and Stewart Smith, who here in charge of the Highway Patrol. I know what they’re concerned about, they’re genuinely worried that we don’t go out and wrap ourselves around a pole, because they’re sick of hosing people off the bitumen. But the message needs to get down to their guys on the ground, stop being dicks. Do responsible policing, instead of just picking the low hanging fruit.”
RRR: It’s funny you should mention that too, because I was speaking to Rob and I think we mentioned it on the show last week about how we were out for a Father’s Day ride the other weekend and we were stopped on the side of the road, waiting for the rest of the party to turn up. In pulls a Highway Patrol copper, we sat there and had just a nice chat to a genuinely nice guy who was out doing his job who just said, ‘Take it easy, guys.’ Didn’t hassle us, didn’t want to just generally be a pain in the bum, we just had a nice, casual chat about being motorcyclists and when he left I said, ‘That’s what all police should be like.’ And it just goes to show that there are good coppers still out there.
CJ: “Yeah, we’ve had a lot of interaction with the Rapid Response Group at Motorcycle Awareness Week over the past couple of years, they’ve always turned up on their bikes. And when you get them one on one and start talking bikes, they’re mostly pretty good. But I think it’s a campaign, as if for instance just get people off the Old Pacific Highway, because their KPIs are ‘reduce the death rate’. So if they smash everything that moves, that moves the traffic into someone else’s LAC, and hey, problem solved, they’ve met the KPIs, fatality rate’s dropped. What we’ve got to do as riders is stop riding like dicks, go out, go and do some training, go and do track days, stop taking your mates out in head-ons on the Old Pacific Highway, and stop making it difficult for everybody else, just get some sense about what you’re doing.”
RRR: And to ride well within your limits, it’s probably the best bit of advice you can give any motorcyclist, whether they’re young and inexperienced or old and a bit cocky.
CJ: “Yeah, that’s right. Just because you put on a Power Ranger suit doesn’t mean you can ride like Valentino Rossi.”
RRR: You can look like him, but.. (laughs)
CJ: “But getting off the politics and everything, there’s one or two other things I want to say. Oh, yeah, ADRs. Get in contact with the Motorcycle Council about a link to Australian Design Rules submissions, which is happening on a federal level at the moment. Anything you’ve got a problem with an Australian Design Rule for instance mud guards, if you don’t say something, nothing will happen. And this your opportunity to get things changed. Now submissions can be as simple as a two paragraph e-mail, it doesn’t have to be hard, but get onto the Motorcycle Council, I’ll point you in the right direction for the link or get on to me on Facebook or send me an e-mail or whatever, I’ll spread the information around as much as I can. The other thing I wanted to say is a really good bloke passed away at 2 o’clock this morning, Animal from Kings Cross Bikers. He had a heart as big as a Kombi, that guy.”
RRR: He’s been in the studio here just not long after we started.
CJ: “What people don’t know, he used to do the [Christmas Ride out to St. Vincent’s?]. And what people don’t know in the background is he used to cadge stuff all year long. It might be a pair of thongs, it might be bright pink lipstick and it would be Christmas paper, sticky tape, he’d scrounge whatever he could and then he’d go down to St. Vincent’s with a whole lot of volunteers and he just handed out simple presents to ordinary people down at St. Vincent’s. And they loved him for it. Because it was only a little thing to them, but it was nice to be remembered on that day while you’re stuck in a hospital, having a miserable time. Kings Cross Bikers have gotten appeal, so hunt around on Facebook, anywhere you can. They need some money to give the poor bloke a decent send off. Because he was absolutely penniless, he gave everything he had away to people. That’s just the kind of bloke he was, all he ever wanted out of life was a cold can of Coke and a ride on a sunny day and it would be worthwhile to give him a good send off, because he really was a genuinely nice bloke and I’m pleased to say that I spent a bit of time with him and had a chat with him and yeah, there’s not many people that you like in this world. You meet a lot of people that are assholes, but he wasn’t that.”
RRR: Heart as big as a Kombi I like that, that’s how true it is.
RRR: He’s one of those guys that you used to see on the television on the time when there was a good news story about motorcycles, he would always be in there.
RRR: Yeah, too true, very sad, I didn’t realise that CJ. So we’ve got to thank you again for coming in, and for the results that you got mate. You hope you can continue in whichever form you can in CC or wherever it can be to put your hand on things that make a difference, because you’ve done heaps and thanks for joining us.
CJ: “My pleasure, my pleasure. And as I’ve said often enough before, it’s a team effort, many hands make light work and many voices make a thunderous noise, and that’s what the politicians listen to.”
