At long last our parliamentarians are doing something about the carnage on our roads – but as they so often do – they are making a hash of it.
It is a fact that young drivers are the major cause of the problem so the obvious knee-jerk reaction is to raise the age at which you can get a driver’s licence.
That approach is simplistic – disadvantages many – particularly those in rural areas – and anyway entirely misses the point.
The problem is generally not caused by 15 year olds, so increasing the age to 16 will achieve nothing.
The problem is caused by inexperienced drivers driving extremely powerful cars. If we raise the driving age to 16 it will simply mean that the drivers in the real problem area 17 – 25 will have had one years less experience.
The whole process of getting a drivers licence is wrong. We send our kids off to a driving school where they putter around in little cars at 30-40k’s then say they are good enough to hold a drivers licence. We then put them in a car that is capable of doing 200k’s and tell them to go to it on the open road. These kids have no experience at high speed driving and little or no experience at car control.
To me the answer is obvious. Include a high speed driving/car control component in the process required to gain a drivers licence. It would be easy to set up at tracks such as Taupo or Manfield.
Everyone who wants to gain a licence should be given expert tuition on high speed car control and then observed whilst they do a few laps of the circuit in a prescribed time.
We will never stop young people speeding – but we can keep them and other road users alive by improving everybody’s driving skill level.
Think about it. It is an absolute nonsense the way we currently test for drivers licences. It is a process that is set in the days when cars were slow and heavy. Today’s cars are light and extremely powerful and we need to give prospective drivers a set of skills that can cope with such powerful recycled beer cans.
Raising the age from 15 to 16 will achieve nothing. You and I all know 15 year olds who are far more mature than some of the politicians who are making a hash of this new legislation.
December 17th, 2007 at 6:38 pm
I am severely disappointed that Napier City Council would back the Port Of Napier and take the protestors off the land, I have witnessed the walkers and riders being severely disadvantaged because of this. The protestors were not in their way. Napier City Council barriers and plastic tape has hampered them. Port Of Napier is employing a company based in Tauranga, already they have brought in workers from out of the region. You take the jobs off Napier people and money does NOT come back in. YOU put these people at risk of losing their mortgages, their livelihoods. I WILL NOT BE VOTING FOR YOU IN THE NEXT ROUND AND NOR WILL MY COMRADES. WE are the workers, WE are the people that keep this town alive. NOT the random injections of money that you get from visitors. WE PAY OUR RATES, WE PAY OUR BILLS WE ARE PROUD OF NAPIER. WE have received so much support from the community. MAYOR ARNOTT why don’t you show your face at the picket line?? Can you answer me that?? Why did Napier City Council put up barriers, you own most of the Port Of Napier, support us or be warned. WE WILL NOT SUPPORT YOU AND YOUR COUNCIL.
May 15th, 2008 at 10:46 am
None of these polls are very fair as they do not share the opinins of the youth just adults. I believe that the driving age should not be raised they should simply make it harder to get a liscence and raise the drinking age. They should also make courses such as defensive driving courses compulsary and punishment become harsher.
May 24th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
I believe the system is fine and fair and the whole country should not adjust to a couple of thousand who are misusing roads
September 28th, 2008 at 11:04 am
I agree with you. It seems that a lot of adults were in most accidents than teens. Also I noticed that teens are way more mature than adults. For instance, my dad was driving on a empty road from one state to another. He was caught and ended up with a speeding ticket. However he switched with my sister who was 16 going on 17. She took us back home without a speeding ticket.
October 25th, 2008 at 1:32 am
Good post.
October 27th, 2008 at 4:47 pm
The main problem is that younger drivers don’t have experience in driving fast,so they generally get over-confident thinking they can handle it when they might not be able to… I don’t think raising the age will do any good it will only make things inconvenient.