Drink driving

We have the same thing here, Andrewman, if you’re convicted you can have a device put in your car that won’t start unless the driver provides a sample.If you elect to have it fitted, it negates the year ban, not a bad idea, methinks.
I see what Moggy and Ren Frew are driving at (no pun intended) but I guess my opinion is biased quite heavily by the nature of my job.
Again, a good thread……

We are investigating putting breathilisers into our fleet as it is very accurate and can detect if it is your breathing into it or not. Its not that we had had drunk drivers working for us but more so that it drastically decreases insurance premiums. So much so im considering putting into my Navara just to save £300 a year! (it costs £500).

It only lets you start the car if your sober and also prevents people stealing the car as if a registered driver does not breath in, it wont enable the ignition!

And there I think we have it ? We all have different reaction times, we all have different alcohol tolerances, we all have different body masses etc etc…

Whichever way you look at it, a generic legal limit is going to make for winners and losers. And may I say, this is not an attempt to condone drink driving, but I do think that people who drive drunk and people who drive with a limited and legal amount of alcohol in their system are not the same thing.

Drunk drivers… hang ’em, drink drivers…. open to debate.

… any amount is dangerous as it reduces your reaction time

So having a reduced reaction time is dangerous?

But surely we don’t all have the same reaction times, so those who have slower reaction times than others are therefore dangerous and should be legislated off the road?

What if somebody with very fast reaction times normally, has a half of shandy? It might reduce their reaction times so they are only in the top quartile, but they’ll still be faster reacting than 75% of all drivers – so is it they that are dangerous or the other 75%

There seems to be a lot of lack of joined-up thinking on this topic.

Don’t get me wrong, drink driving ia a Bad Thing and is to be discouraged. But the starting point is to enforce the laws we have, laws that are being ignored by some people.

Moggy

Well I can confess that I have driwen car in drunk…It was last midsummer eve festives, at some early morning hour, I had passed out during the nigth after womiting most of my stomage content, slept few hours and then it was time to leave the place we were having fun.
We drowe back to our home with some 500 meters, in two rounds. For The first round we tryed to find a sober driwer, but only one sober enough was this 15 year old girl (with no license, naturally;) )from that house, were we were celebrating. We drowe with her, and albeit she was a good driwer for her age,

My conscience couldn’t bare the resposibility, so I decided to drowe the next punch back to my house. Despite the distance was so short, and road so familar than a road can be, I still felt the effects of the alcohol. My speed-sense was completely gone, and I remember doing rather hasty and unpredictable moves. Luckily nothing happened and we all got safe to home…But even at that point, (without any drunken self-pity) I knew that that was last time I would ever try that again. I just hope my promise to myself stands.

Yes, you can have a zero level of alcohol in your blood, any amount is dangerous as it reduces your reaction time , and a significant amount of the arrests made for drink-driving, are on the morning after.
Novice drivers over here have to have a zero BAC (blood alcohol count) If they are caught with ANY in their system, even if it is under the ‘legal’ limit they will be prosecuted.
An interesting stat…..apparently 1 in 15 drivers in the UK on any given day will be driving with alcohol (any amount) in their systems but, 1 in 5 will be driving with an amount of an illegal drug in their system…………:eek:

I also don’t think it is possible to have a zero level of alcohol in the blood (though stand to be corrected). Moggy is right that this level of tolerance would also penalise those people with residual alcohol from the night before that hasn’t worked its way through the system yet isn’t dangerous. It would also tie up the police with enforcing something that, because of the limited risk of low amounts of alcohol causing impairment, is probably a waste of time that could be spent doing something more productive.

It’s hard to believe in this day and age with the road toll the way it is..

The death rate on UK roads is low and was falling steadily up to the point where they pulled a lot of the traffic cars off the roads and started to rely on cameras for law enforcement / tax collection.

It is misleading posting stuff that makes it sound like it is carnage out there and getting worse. It simply isn’t.

I’m also unclear as to how having a lower limit will help. The main problems we have are people who ignore the current ‘sensible’ limits.

If they are doing that, they will ignore the ‘zero’ limit just the same and what you will end up doing is penalising otherwise law abiding motorists with residual alcohol in their blood from the previous evening.

Moggy

I’m a Toronto cop and we activelylook for impaired’s or drunk drivers.
The first time you have to go to a home at Xmas especially and tell a person they’ve lost a loved one to a drunk driver, you will never forget it and, you will resolve to nail every one you find. I’ve had that onerous duty several times in my career and still remember all of them.
There is no excuse, and I’ve heard them all….just don’t do it.

Well that will only work on those who have a driving licence, and who aren’t already banned…

…plus the prisons are full (and those who can’t afford a fine can’t be fined and those who can…well, they can afford it can’t they).

I think the mistake made here is to assume a ‘drink-driver’ is otherwise a completely law abiding driver and to base the deterrent punishment on this assumption (as much of government legislation is).

Yes I can see your point and agree that some of the drink drivers will be the unlicened and uninsured who dont give a thought for there actions and those you will never stop,but what about the ones that do it because they think they wont get caught,like the rep who will have a dinner with a customer and drink a bottle of wine,or the nother who goes out for lunch and then picks up the kids full of Gin and tonic.These people can ussally pay the fines so fine them and ban then,the ones that cant pay make the do community work ,cleaning river or waste land ,helping the old and ill.
There must be a better way do dealing with drink drivers,than we do now.
May be my way would not work ,but its better than what we have now

Paul

that’s a loaded question…

Perhaps I’m generalizing, but I feel safe in saying we’ve all (or a majority or us have) driven ‘impaired’ at some point in our lives. it is a horrendous thing to do, and by no means am I condoning it.

I’m currently supplementing my income by working at the local bar (I’m the night cook) and this bar is THE (as in ONLY) bar in town (barely a village by Euro standards, and the next bar is 15Km away). Our liquor laws and traffic laws are very clear (blood alcohol level of .08) and yet, due to our area’s particular geography and demography, there will be probably close to 3 out of every 5 drivers on the road with some degree of alcohol in their system (or ‘legally’ impaired).

I can state as a fact that regardless of any amount of assistance offered, there will always be drunk drivers on our roads…. we offered 4 rides home on Thursday night… only 1 accepted… I still don’t understand the mentality of drunk driving – and I have been guilty of it myself (never caught/charged – but some close calls). I spoke briefly with a neighbouring business manager on Thursday evening who’d only just received his license back (following a 1 year suspension for DUI – 1st offence) he now has to have his vehicle equipped with a breath-actuated ignition system (for 1 year) which will disable his vehicle if there is any alcohol in his system.

But, getting back to ‘arguments’… I don’t live in a ‘built-up’ area… public transport does not exist (no buses, no trains)… there are only 2 taxis (2 actual taxi cabs) within a 15 Km radius… These figures not only apply to where I live but also the 2 villages east and west of me (10 to 15 Km either direction)… and yet the local provincial police detachment is just as strict (if not predatory) in their enforcement as they would be in the larger population centres 30 to 40 Kms away.

JJ

It’s hard to believe in this day and age with the road toll the way it is..that people are still asinine and irresponsible enough to get behind the wheel of a motor vehicle with alcohol in their system

If you do and get caught the first time 2 year ban,the second time 10 year ban and prision time and if your daft enought to be caught a thrid time a lifetime ban…

Well that will only work on those who have a driving licence, and who aren’t already banned…

…plus the prisons are full (and those who can’t afford a fine can’t be fined and those who can…well, they can afford it can’t they).

I think the mistake made here is to assume a ‘drink-driver’ is otherwise a completely law abiding driver and to base the deterrent punishment on this assumption (as much of government legislation is).

Only scum do it out of choice.

Simple answer, have close friends die as a result of it.

I think drink driving is appalling and is the worst thing I think you can do in a car,
I have been driving for many years and I can honestly say that I have never driven with any alcohol in me.
I have often thought about it and had many an argument over it and how t should be punished.
These are my thoughts.
The alchol level should be zero,not one drink should be able to be drunk ,If you do and get caught the first time 2 year ban,the second time 10 year ban and prision time and if your daft enought to be caught a thrid time a lifetime ban,I also think that if you are caught drink driving none of this going to court and being able to drive while some shister lawyer trys to get you off,the police should impound the car you are driving then and there and crush it and suspend your licence then and there,ths making the ban start the minute you fail the test.
Now some of you will say this is to stronge and there may be a reson there is alcohol in your system,well I say never,if you want to drive then NO alchol

Paul

On a similar note, I was driving from Aberdeen to Glasgow late last night in fairly dense patches of fog. Whilst I took it upon myself to slow down to a sensible speed given that the visibility was down to about 15 metres in places, I was amazed at how many other drivers just kept plowing on at 70mph or more…

When I got home I poured myself a stiff drink and wondered how many holes in the hedgerow there might be…:eek: