TORONTO — Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria used a King City availability Monday to announce a single standardized entry-level curriculum for Class A commercial drivers, saying every training school will have to teach it once the program is fully in place in early 2027. He pitched the rewrite as the Ford government’s answer to Auditor General Shelley Spence’s spring report on commercial-driver schools.Sarkaria said organizations that offer Class A training will be required to follow the new curriculum, which will demand more than 103 hours before a driver can sit the road test. Subjects under review include fatigue management, northern, rural and remote driving, human trafficking awareness and new mandatory air-brake instruction. Asked what brought this on and what it costs taxpayers, he said schools now run their own plans approved through the colleges ministry, that one standard will let MTO enforce the same course everywhere — he did not give a dollar figure.Ontario already required at least 103.5 hours of entry-level training on paper — 36.5 in class, 17 in-yard and 50 behind the wheel — but Spence found private career colleges cutting those hours, skipping manoeuvres and telling students to sign false completion forms, with weak oversight from both MTO and the colleges ministry. Sarkaria said the new curriculum aligns with the auditor’s recommendations..The government has already named an integrity manager for truck-driver testing, added supervisor spot checks and weekly reviews of training schools. Sarkaria added 131 new MTO enforcement officers with an emphasis in the North, nearly 130,000 commercial-vehicle inspections in the past year, tougher penalties for distracted driving in commercial vehicles and for driving without a working speed limiter, and a mandatory wait before Class D or higher holders can attempt a Class A road test beginning next year.The Ontario Trucking Association has separately asked for graduated endorsements by trailer configuration; Monday’s announcement did not adopt that model.
