Do You have to be a student in order to get a G1 license?

According to the Ontario Ministry of Transportation representative you do not have to be in school to get your G1. There are bills regarding this issue that have tried to pass in the past so you will need to keep checking to see if the laws in Ontario do change in the future.

There was a bill regarding this issue that was originally introduced in 2005 where the Ontario legislature wanted to compel every high school student to prove they were in school before they were granted a license to drive a car. Students applying for their licenses would have to show a document to the Ministry of Transportation that proves they are an active student.

The government backed off the 2005 bill after conceding that law would be difficult to enforce. We had heard about new provincial legislation in Ontario that would take away teens driving privileges if they dropped out of school before the age of 18 however it appears that this legislature did not pass.

As we mentioned, we contacted the Ontario, Canada Ministry of Transportation (MTO), the licensing agency for Ontario, about if you could apply for a driver's license (G1) without presently being in school. They responded that if you are 16 years of age and older, you are eligible to apply for an Ontario driver’s license even though you are not in school.

Their site in fact states that the Ministry of the Attorney General reviewed all Ontario laws that set a minimum age requirement. This was done to ensure they obeyed provisions prohibiting age discrimination under the Ontario Human Rights Code and the Canadian Charter of Rights. After this review, the government decided to maintain 16 years as the minimum legal age for many "adult" activities in Ontario, such as leaving home or school, working full-time, getting married and driving.

We have heard that other legislation changed regarding how long you must stay in school had changed so that you are now required to attend school (or an equivalent learning program approved by the Ministry of Education) until you are 18 years old. So basically the drop out age had been changed however the MTO said that is not under their jurisdiction and so the representative did not confirm if this was the case now or not.