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18 To Learn To Drive


DanGersFord
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http://news.sky.com/story/1152957/driving-test-age-could-rise-to-18

Personally I think it's a bad idea. Personally I think they should change it so that you have to do the equivalent of a minimum of 1 hour long lesson a week for a year and a half. This would give young drivers a range of experience driving in different conditions day/night wet, dry, cold and icy conditions and give them a good base experience to build from. The fact that you can pass your test after just 10 lessons is quite frankly a joke.

Also I think for the first 2 years ANY new driver should have to have a black box installed and be limited to driving cars that are 1.3l or below. By that I mean new drivers of any age.

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Also its about time you should have to do a certain amount of driving on motorways/country roads as part of your lessons/test

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Its a good start, but its not enough. I agree with your thoughts, max engine size, black box tracking (should at least help insurance for most young drivers), limited driving hours of the day (or fee's for driving at night 'cos I can'), Pass Plus should be built into the driving instructor curriculum as standard, and not optional as this gives you some experience.

I personally like the Ford Driving Course thing that they do for free, where you can get the experience, I would suggest that something of that nature should certainly be offered, even as a chargeable service by many others but deemed mandatory and reasonably priced. If you fail, you cant get your license. Simples.

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I'm not a fan of the restricted driving times I mean there's alot of young people work night shift for example

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I have been driving for many years and I can honestly say that although I passed my test I am still learning in the sense that I still make the occasional error of judgement and I learn from that. I suppose that the old saying 'don't drive faster than your guardian angel can fly' is still the best advice!!! As for the new proposals - they are clearly a move in the right direction.

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I think they're penalising young drivers though. Any new driver are lacking experience at the moment and are more likely cause an accident. A minimum amount of lessons would help rectify this problem. It took me a year and a half of lessons before I went for my test and even though I physically knew how to drive after the first 9-10 lessons the experience only came after the extended time physically driving. I think one thing the government realy need to look at is older drivers. There's quite simply some people who are too old (ie have too many health problems/slower reaction times, sometimes starting to become confused) I think there should be an age limit on a licence of say 65-70 either that or regular competence tests say every five years to make sure everyone is competent enough to be driving

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I think jeebo already mentioned it, passplus should be a part of the driving lessons/test package. Raising the age won't make a difference and I cannot see the curfew being made into law. You cannot discriminate against men by giving women cheaper insurance (EU law), therefore it will be challenged you cannot discriminate against younger people by restricting what times they can and cannot go on the road. I'm not a fan of the black boxes either tbh a little too big brother snooping for my liking.

Compared to when I passed my test 13 years ago, it has definitely gotten harder to pass, but theres needs to definitely be a requirement to have instructed driving on A roads, dual carriageways and motorways, and possibly a discount on advanced driving course to tempt new drivers.

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Part of the problem is instructors teach learners to pass a test not to necessarily drive well

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agree with that sentiment Dan, I think its for young drivers own safety though. Passing your test and darting out the same night on country roads in the dark, your asking for trouble, which is why I would suggest that if you work lates, then your insurance 'excuses' the late driving, but if your driving after (say 9pm) then you get a fine (I am not talking £60 and three points - I'm talking a 'your only young, you need to gain the confidence, but were trying to desuade you from drink driving and killing yourself' fine so like an up to £10 charge.

If they are on black box insurance, driving sensibly and have low premiums, then its not going to affect them, but the boy racers who knock 4000G's going round country roads....

I just think that sort of system combined with a 'tiered' driving license system (as they do on Bike's) - For example (I am no expert, so dont shoot me if I get it wrong!)

At 17, you can get a license, you can ride a moped, or a restricted motorbike. This restriction sits on you for (perhaps) a couple of years? after that, you can apply for and complete a full bike license, which then opens up your 200cc bike or whatever to be a 3 liter Ninja bike if you want it!

What I am saying is that perhaps car licenses should be the same.

- Learners / Provisional License - Current restrictions apply, no driving alone, all insurance, fully insured and certified driver blah blah

- New Drivers License - You just passed your test - congratulations - you can drive, but limited hours to be safe, and limited engine (no 2.0 Turbo Diesel vauxhall for your first motor!)

- Intermediate License - You have completed Pass Plus and X other certifications, you should be more than competent, so you are now restricted to a bigger engine, and less of a curfew / no curfew blah blah

- Full Drivers License - You have driven for a minimum of (say) 2 years, you should be more than confident, you have driven a minimum number of miles, and you are no longer a danger to every man, woman, child, dog or goldfish on the road. You dont need a black box in the car and you can now buy a DB7, or a Vanquish.

Whilst most of that could be "managed" by the insurer monitoring the black box, the only real 'problem' for the police, is tying in the license type to the car being driven. And if they see a DB7 being driven by a spotty teenager, then they can pull them, maybe fine and/or points if it was deemed appropriate, but otherwise the 'fine' imposed by the insurer would be enough to dissuade most of their customers on the 'upcoming' licenses to stick to the rules.

Only my thoughts.

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I think there has been some good thoughts here. I don't think we should specifically penalise young drivers but I do think some sort of control is needed on new/inexperienced drivers.

I agree with the black box for the first two years and some sort of restriction in terms of engine size/power. I would imagine the best way would be bhp/tonne? Also with the black box thing there would need to be some pretty decent incentives to keep it after the 2 years of people would just think 'I can't wait to get to that day so I can rip out my black box and drive around like so sort of nut case!' :lol:

Also agree that motorway and night time experience etc needs to be mandatory in lessons/test and to be honest I can't believe that still hasn't been implemented! :angry:

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Motorway driving is not included in the standard test as not everyone has easy access.

Someone in Lands End would have to drive all the way to Exeter to reach one and take about 3 hours to do so.

I think there should be an insurance incentive system whereby new drivers for the first three years can qualify for a cashback style payment of say 25% if during each insurance year they have no 'at fault' accidents or instances of pulls/cautions/prosecutions by the Police.

A bit of cash in their pockets at the end of the year or the ability to subsidise their next years insurance would be a nice tempting goal.

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Motorway driving is not included in the standard test as not everyone has easy access.

Someone in Lands End would have to drive all the way to Exeter to reach one and take about 3 hours to do so.

I think there should be an insurance incentive system whereby new drivers for the first three years can qualify for a cashback style payment of say 25% if during each insurance year they have no 'at fault' accidents or instances of pulls/cautions/prosecutions by the Police.

A bit of cash in their pockets at the end of the year or the ability to subsidise their next years insurance would be a nice tempting goal.

Sounds like a great plan but I can't see money grabbing insurance companies going for it though :(

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unfortunately thats the problem, it would be due to us (the little people) to try and change the giants opinions, and the only people big enough to do that sit in Guy Fawkes' target, and to be fair, some of their policies and behaviors up there are for not much more than to sit on and keep Guy's stash warm.

I truely think that if they could implement something of our discussion here, it would make life a lot safer for these new people themselves, as well as those on the road in their path. The problem is though, one insurer wont make a change, because they know they will push people into someone elses arms...

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Also I think for the first 2 years ANY new driver should have to have a black box installed and be limited to driving cars that are 1.3l or below. By that I mean new drivers of any age.

If there's a limit, it needs to be on bhp, or even bhp/tonne.

A 1.6 TDCi focus can produce just 90bhp, in a 1300kg or so body.

A brand new Fiesta 1.0 Ecoboost can produce 125bhp in a much lighter body.

I know which one I'd rather have!!

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Nearest motorway to me is 270 miles and an hour/hour and a half boat journey away ;)

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very true, its one of those that is difficult to enforce though - how would the average Joe know these stats buying a motor from a corner shop seller?

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Motorway driving is not included in the standard test as not everyone has easy access.

Someone in Lands End would have to drive all the way to Exeter to reach one and take about 3 hours to do so.

I think there should be an insurance incentive system whereby new drivers for the first three years can qualify for a cashback style payment of say 25% if during each insurance year they have no 'at fault' accidents or instances of pulls/cautions/prosecutions by the Police.

A bit of cash in their pockets at the end of the year or the ability to subsidise their next years insurance would be a nice tempting goal.

The problem is greedy insurance companies will never go for it, they love younger drivers because the can pretty much charge what they want for them. I remember my first car, a 1.2 corsa (hangs head in shame) only cost me £450 and it cost me £1300 to insure it and that was only 3rd party, fire and theft. So even I'd had an accident my car wouldn't have been covered. The biggest thing that put me off driving like an idiot at that age was the fear of getting 6points within my first 2 years and losing my licence. To be honest I think new drivers should have to have a blackbox fitted with a reward system in place for careful driving ie an email every month with green, amber or red indicating how well you've driven that month, if you get 3-4 red warnings withing the two years you should have to resit your test, amber warnings that add to your premium the more of them you get and discounts for every month you get a green alert or money of fuel vouchers or something. As others have said a restriction on bhp/torque on cars and also a minimum of a year and a halfs worth of driving lessons, IMO would reduce premiums/the number of accidents involving young drivers dramatically. Aswel as keeping the 6points in 2 years and you lose your licence system in place
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I think that everyone should be able to drive when and where they like.

But I do think that all drivers should get some experience of ice, wet and fast driving.

I passed back in the 90s before the written test. Still I prob won't pass the written test now :-(

A restriction to engine size for under 21 say is good, just like a motorbike.

But that's my opinion.

Jono

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I think some of these are alright ideas - but they are all nearly impossible to introduce!

I drove my mums 1.2 punto for about a year when I passed

Then I got a job which required a fair bit of driving - so at 18 yrs old I got a 1.8 focus and have now covered nearly 20k, including driving home from work sometimes later than 11PM (plus some social driving even later) + driving work vans

so far (fingers crossed/touch wood and all that!) iv had no tickets or incidents

When im looking at all these possible rules I think they're good to reduce the trouble that some new drivers get in - but I cant help thinking how much of a nightmare it would be if they were in place when I passed!!

Put your selves in a new drivers position and try tell me you wouldn't hate it!!

And iv also got a bike licence through this new 2 part style and thought that id let you know that its totally killing motorcycle riding - new bike sales are down 70% since 2010, and I don't know a figure, but theres a tiny amount of new riders about now!!

Tom

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unfortunately i disagree with the new black boxes,

i was involved in the staffordshire pilot scheme for black boxes (fist council run scheme before insurance companies) it was free, totally voluntary and was for any driver of any age, i had box in my car for well over a year (my first year of driving) it didn't affect my insurance as they hadn't heard of such a thing at that time, i would drive at any time of day, speed, maneuvers whatever and this box would show me when i was doing something bad (or not advisable) by feedback of 3 Leds, the data was recorded and my parent, myself and the company running it could see what i was doing, (not where and when like todays black boxes which i think is wrong) we would have a monthly meeting where the drivers could speak to the local police, the owner of the company, victims or support groups and discuss the events they had done/seen etc

as a young driver i was shocked and embarrassed to be labelled a "bad" driver (not uncommon for a 18yr old) however this then changed me and i started to change my driving style,

the problems today is money, the new black box schemes are driven by money, so there is no reflection on the driver, the driver will be concerned about not incurring a fine, which doesn't teach them how to drive,

that black box was the best thing that i had taken part in, at the time i thought i was a good driver and wanted to go and just have a second opinion on how i drove, in terms of incentive, because i was the most improved driver (of my group) they gave me 20% off my next year insurance

the black boxes today are not for the drivers they are for the insurance companies to make money which is wrong

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driving lessons should cover all the basic driving conditions, i wonder how many young drivers take lessons and pass their test without ever driving in the dark? i agree somthing should be done to stop the 'i am invinsable attitude' of the young drivers once they have passed their test, i do not agree with black boxes as insurance companies can use it as an excuse not to pay out ( you were 3mph over the limit sir) restricting engine size is not the answer also as you can be as dangerous in a 1ltr as you can in a 3ltr, as my old instructer said once you pass your test you learn to drive, extending the basic driving test would be a good idear as they could get a better idear of a pupil's attitude to driving, anybody who has an hgv licence like myself will remember the 4 hour test. whatever they decide will not please everybody but something has to done.

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Part of the problem is instructors teach learners to pass a test not to necessarily drive well

couldnt agree more :)

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Also I think for the first 2 years ANY new driver should have to have a black box installed and be limited to driving cars that are 1.3l or below. By that I mean new drivers of any age.

Do you realise how many Vauxhall corsa's that would create :lol:

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Do you realise how many Vauxhall corsa's that would create :lol:

You've just hit the problem on the head right there! The government should just forget all their plans and just ban corsas from the country, this single stroke would get rid of every idiot young driver on the road lol
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You've just hit the problem on the head right there! The government should just forget all their plans and just ban corsas from the country, this single stroke would get rid of every idiot young driver on the road lol

Ireland done that,

Only Vauxhall over here is an import, they sell as Opel over here,

Although I was in an astra coupé last week a 2006 and I must say I was slightly impressed.

First convert able I was ever in too but for a 1.6 petrol giving the weight of convertibles it fairly moved,

I also must confess I've just gotten my full licence last June at the age of 28

Had my provisional for six years and no lessons

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