You've passed your Practical Driving Assessment, handed in your Ls, and you're finally out on your own. Congratulations — that's a huge milestone, and we see plenty of nervous learners walk through that stage at Golden Road Driving Academy every month.
But getting your P plates isn't the finish line. There are rules attached to that provisional licence — some of them changed fairly recently — and getting caught out on them can mean fines, demerit points, or in the worst cases, losing your licence again before you've even had it a year. Here's exactly what applies, straight from the WA Department of Transport and Road Safety Commission.
How Long You're on P Plates in WA
In Western Australia, your provisional period runs for 2 years, or until you turn 19, whichever is longer. That period is split into two stages:
Red P plates — the first 6 months
Green P plates — the remaining 18 months (or longer, if you got your Ps before 18½)
The rules are noticeably stricter on red plates, which makes sense — that first six months behind the wheel without a supervisor is when new drivers are most at risk.
Red P Plates: The First 6 Months
This is the stage most learners ask us about, because the rules here are the ones most likely to catch a new driver out.
1. One passenger only — "Red Plate, One Mate"
Since 1 December 2024, red P-plate drivers in WA can only carry one passenger in the vehicle at any time — a rule known as “Red Plate, One Mate” (also called Tom's Law), introduced after WA Police and the Road Safety Commission found drivers aged 17–19 have the highest rate of serious injury and fatal crashes of any age group on WA roads. It applies to cars and motorcycles.
There are three exemptions where you can carry more than one passenger:
A fully licensed driver is in the car — someone who has held a full (not provisional) C-class licence for 4 or more years
The extra passengers are immediate family — your spouse, children, grandchildren, siblings, parents or grandparents
You need the extra passengers for paid or unpaid work, and you're carrying a letter from your employer confirming it
Break this rule and it's a $200 fine and 2 demerit points — the same penalty as breaching the night-driving curfew below.
2. No driving between midnight and 5am
Red P-plate drivers can't drive between 12am and 5am, unless you're travelling to or from paid/unpaid work, or to or from school. There's no general "just visiting a friend" exemption — if you're not working or studying, you need to be off the road in that window.
Green P Plates: The Next 18 Months
Once you've done your six months on red plates without losing your licence, you move to green plates. The one-passenger rule and the midnight curfew both drop away. The remaining conditions — zero alcohol and the lower demerit point threshold — stay in place until you get your full licence.
Rules That Apply the Whole Time You're on Ps
Zero blood alcohol — no exceptions
Both red and green P-plate drivers must have a blood alcohol content of 0.00% whenever they're driving. There's no "under 0.05 is fine" buffer like there is for fully licensed drivers — for P-platers (and L-platers), it's zero, full stop.
Mobile phones — same rule as everyone else
A common myth is that WA bans P-plate drivers from using a phone at all, the way some other states do. That's not the case here — WA applies the same phone rules to every driver, regardless of licence type:
Creating, sending or reading a text, email, social media post, photo or video while driving: 4 demerit points and a fine of 20 penalty units
Touching or holding your phone to make, receive or end a call when it isn't in a cradle: 3 demerit points and a fine of 10 penalty units
Accepting or ending a call is only allowed hands-free — phone mounted in a cradle, or fully voice-activated. As a new driver, though, the demerit points hit you much harder than they hit an experienced licence holder (see the next section), so it pays to just leave the phone alone.
Demerit Points: The Real Trap for New Drivers
This is the rule that catches out the most P-platers, because the threshold is so much lower than it is for a full licence.
Licence stage
Demerit point limit
Period
Red P plates (Type 1 novice — first year on Ps)
4 points
First 12 months
Green P plates (Type 2 novice — second year on Ps)
8 points
Second 12 months
Full C-class licence
12 points
Rolling 3-year period
In plain terms: a full licence holder can rack up 12 points over three years before facing a licence suspension notice. As a P-plater in your first year, one moderate speeding fine and one phone offence can be enough to hit 4 points and trigger a suspension notice. There's no separate reduced speed limit for P-plate drivers in WA — the general speed limits and speeding penalties apply to everyone — but because your points ceiling is so much lower, the same mistake costs a new driver their licence far sooner than it would an experienced one.
What Happens When Your Provisional Licence Expires
Good news: you don't need to sit another test. Towards the end of your provisional period, Transport WA sends you a renewal notice. Pay the renewal fee and you're issued your full licence, effective once your provisional period ends.
There's also an incentive worth knowing about — the Safe Driver Reward: if you get through your entire provisional period with no traffic offences, your first full-licence renewal is free for one year.
Quick Recap for New P-Platers
Red plates for your first 6 months, green for the next 18 (2 years total, or until you're 19)
Red plates: one passenger only (limited exemptions), no driving 12am–5am except work/school
Both stages: 0.00% BAC, same phone rules as every other driver
Demerit limit is 4 points in year one and 8 in year two — far lower than the 12-over-3-years limit on a full licence
No test needed at the end — pay the renewal and your full licence kicks in, with a free year's renewal if your record is clean
The safest way through your provisional period is the same advice we give every learner at Golden Road Driving Academy: build genuinely good habits before you ever get your Ps, so none of this feels like a list of rules to remember — it's just how you already drive.
Book a driving lesson with Golden Road Driving Academy today.
Drive safe. Stay focused.
— Paul, Golden Road Driving Academy
Admin@goldenroaddriving.com.au | +61 403 089 100
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