From today (10 September 2009), 18-year-olds will be permitted to drive lorries. Until now, the minimum LGV driving age was 21, but this has been lowered across the European Union to try and encourage more young people into the haulage industry.
BBC Radio 1’s newsbeat reports the story of Adam, an 18-year-old who works for his father’s waste company. Until now he’s been helping out, knowing that it would probably be a while before he got to drive the lorries himself. But today, he took his first lesson in an LGV.
Adam said: “I was over the moon that I could do it. It’s just better money, it’s just better everything. It means more responsibility.”
He says the lessons are hard: “They make you reverse into really tight gaps, it’s quite nerve-wracking. You’ve got to drive around narrow streets, you feel a bit worried about what you’re doing. But it’s all good.”
Almost a quarter of a million young motorists are driving illegally because they do not have any insurance cover, according to a report released today by BBC’s Newsbeat.
They found that more than 20% of 17 to 20 year olds are not covered by a valid car insurance policy, which amounts to a staggering 243,000 illegal young drivers on our roads.
Many illegal drivers cite the huge cost of an insurance policy as being the reason for not having cover. Yet the risks of not having a policy are huge, not just for themselves, but also for anybody they may be unfortunate enough to crash into.
The BBC reports the story of 21 year old Gary Street, who was hit by an uninsured driver at 30mph in Manchester two years ago.
A £2.3m advertising campaign launched last week to warn of the risks of driving whilst under the influence of drugs has received a mixed reception from the British public and road safety experts.
The television advert warns motorists that police can spot the involuntary signs of someone being under the influence of drugs if they are stopped. These signs include severely dilated or constricted pupils. The advert shows a car carrying several young people with their eyes enlarged, adding: “Your eyes will give you away.”
Young men aged between 17 and 29 are thought to be most likely to drive while on illegal drugs. Indeed, a recent survey in Scotland suggested that 81% of clubbers have driven whilst under the influence of illegal drugs.
The Department for Transport (DfT) estimates that as many as one in five drivers or motorcyclists killed in road accidents may have an impairing drug (legal or illegal) in their system. Transport Secretary Lord Adonis said in a recent interview, “Whatever one’s views on drug taking, we’ve got to make it absolutely socially unacceptable to drive while under the influence of drugs, because it can kill.”
A shocking new video has been made for school pupils in an attempt to reduce crashes caused by drivers texting whilst driving.
The short 30-minute film called ‘COW’ shows Cassie Cowan, a teenage girl, killing four people as a result of her using her mobile phone to send a text. A clip from the film is shown below…
It includes footage of all the emergency services attending the crash scene, including the air ambulance, police and firefighters.
Natalie Brennan, an Oldham CID Detective Constable was convicted of drink driving in March after being caught driving three times over the legal drink drive limit last October.As well as receiving a fine of £120 and a driving ban of 9 months, she was forced to resign from the Police force following a disciplinary hearing.
However, a week later she was reinstated after Greater Manchester Chief Constable Peter Fahy reviewed the case. ‘Exceptional personal circumstances’ has been given as the reason for her reinstatement.
The decision has caused outrage amongst road safety campaigners. A spokesperson from Roadpeace accused the Chief Constable of “sending out the wrong message”, whist a spokeswoman from Brake commented: “The police have got some explaining to do if one day a driving offence is deemed dangerous enough for a person to resign and the next day it is not.”
The Department for Transport has published statistics on road casualties in accidents reported to the police in Great Britain in 2008, according to the arrangements approved by the UK Statistics Authority
The number of people killed in road accidents reported to the police, fell by 14 per cent from 2,946 in 2007 to 2,538 in 2008. 28,567 people were killed or seriously injured in 2008, 7 per cent fewer than in 2007. There were just under 231,000 road casualties in Great Britain in 2008, 7 per cent less than in 2007.
The number of deaths among car users in 2008 was 1,257, 12 per cent less than in the previous year. The reported number of seriously injured fell by 7 per cent to 10,707. Total reported casualties among car users were 149,169, 8 per cent lower than 2007. Traffic estimates indicate a 1 per cent fall in car and taxi traffic over the period.
Child casualties fell by 8 per cent. The number of children killed or seriously injured in 2008 was 2,807 (down 9 per cent on 2007). Of those, 1,784 were pedestrians, 6 per cent down on 2007. 124 children died on the roads, 2 per cent higher than in the previous year, when the lowest ever child fatality figure of 121 was recorded.
There were 572 pedestrian deaths, 11 per cent less than in 2007. Reported killed or serious injured casualties fell by 4 per cent to 6,642. The all pedestrian casualty figure fell to 28,481 in 2008, 6 per cent lower than 2007.
The number of pedal cyclists killed fell by 15 per cent from 136 in 2007 to 115 in 2008. The number of seriously injured rose by 1 per cent to 2,450. The total casualties among pedal cyclists rose by 1 per cent to 16,297.
There were 493 motorcycle user fatalities in accidents reported to the police in 2008, 16 per cent lower than during 2007. The reported number of killed or seriously injured fell compared to 2007 (down 10 percent from 6,737 in 2007 to 6,048 in 2008). The all motorcycle user casualties figure for 2008 of 21,549 is 8 per cent lower than in 2007.
There were 170,500 road accidents involving personal injury reported to the police in 2008, 6 per cent fewer than in 2007. Of these, 25,457 accidents involved death or serious injury, 6 percent fewer than in 2007 (27,036).
More than half of all new drivers banned in the first two years of passing their test don’t bother retaking it. The law says after a ban you must re-sit a test before driving again, but many people don’t realise.
Road safety groups reckon many young people are getting behind the wheel illegally.
They’re asking courts not to send driving licenses back to banned drivers before they’ve passed a re-test.
Ollie from Essex was aged 17 and had only been driving a few weeks when he got pulled over.
“I got caught speeding,” he says, “doing a hundred miles an hour, so it was an instant ban.”
He’s one of thousands of young drivers who get disqualified every month for picking up six points or more in their first two years after passing their test.
TRIBUTES have been paid to a popular teenage schoolboy killed in a car crash.
Christopher Dale, 15, was hit by a car as he walked across a main road in Oldham. Police confirmed that he suffered serious, multiple injuries and was pronounced dead later at the Royal Oldham Hospital.
In a statement Christopher’s family said: “We are devastated at the loss of Chris.
“He was a wonderful son and brother who will be very much missed by all who knew him.”
The industry is changing, and it’s about time! Out with the old-fashioned and largely ineffective teaching methods, and in with the successful new coaching style. Some may argue that their current instructional style is proving very effective, but they largely base this claim on their pass rates.
But pass rates mean nothing when young drivers pass their tests and go on to have crashes. The facts:
An 18-year-old driver is more than three times as likely to be involved in a crash as a 48 year-old.
One in five new drivers has a crash within six months of passing their test.
So at long last, it appears that the DSA are supporting the approaches that many driver trainers like myself have been pushing for for years – progressing from short-term instructional methods which tend to help learners pass the driving test, towards more active-learning methods which prepare learners for solo driving and to foster ongoing learning after passing their driving test.
What would happen if all traffic lights were suddenly switched off? Would there be chaos and traffic gridlock or would the queues of frustrated drivers miraculously disappear?
Well, in a brave attempt to find out if removing traffic lights will ease congestion, Ealing Council are putting the theory to the test! For 6 months, traffic light signals at up to seven junctions in Ealing will be concealed by orange bags and drivers will be left to negotiate their way across by establishing eye contact with pedestrians and other motorists.
Council officials believe that instead of improving the flow of traffic, traffic lights lead to unnecessary delays and may even increase danger, with drivers racing towards green lights to make it through the junction before they turn back to red.
From today (10 September 2009), 18-year-olds will be permitted to drive lorries. Until now, the minimum LGV driving age was 21, but this has been lowered across the European Union to try and encourage more young people into the haulage industry.
They found that more than 20% of 17 to 20 year olds are not covered by a valid car insurance policy, which amounts to a staggering 243,000 illegal young drivers on our roads.
Natalie Brennan, an Oldham CID Detective Constable was convicted of drink driving in March after being caught driving three times over the legal drink drive limit last October.
The Department for Transport has published statistics on road casualties in accidents reported to the police in Great Britain in 2008, according to the arrangements approved by the UK Statistics Authority
More than half of all new drivers banned in the first two years of passing their test don’t bother retaking it. The law says after a ban you must re-sit a test before driving again, but many people don’t realise.
Source: Manchester Evening News
The industry is changing, and it’s about time! Out with the old-fashioned and largely ineffective teaching methods, and in with the successful new coaching style. Some may argue that their current instructional style is proving very effective, but they largely base this claim on their pass rates.
What would happen if all traffic lights were suddenly switched off? Would there be chaos and traffic gridlock or would the queues of frustrated drivers miraculously disappear?
