Government to consider doubling penalty points for drivers caught on phone

sim1515 wrote:

OldRidgeback wrote:

The research carried out by the TRL shows that the driver talking with other occupants in a car is not the same as when the driver is talking on the phone. There is similar research also saying the same. I've not heard anything saying otherwise and I do get a lot of this information at work.

Basically, when a driver is talking with someone sitting in the car, the driver will stop talking when something occurs in the driving scenario that requires additional brain processing power. This is not the case when the driver is talking on the phone and for various psychological reasons, which include visual clues and facial expressions that cannot be transmitted through a phone.

There is a lot of research saying hands free kits are no use. The TRL released a report saying so not so long ago and you can find that on the TRL website.

The problem with regard to phone use while driving is linked to the human brain's limitations in regard to how much it can process at any one time, rather like an old computer being tasked with a number of complex functions simultaneously and resulting in that rather annoying hourglass appearing and turning round and round and round and round for an undefined period.

Yes, there is a risk of inattention for drivers, say when children are fighting in the backseat, but that's another issue altogether and I somehow doubt the carrying of children in vehicles would be considered either logical or desirable.

I believe that there is contrasting research which suggests no difference between hands free and passengers, the University of Michigan I think. I think I've had this discussion before so I'm not going to get into it again, you can just read it here: http://road.cc/content/news/70508-police-campaign-wales-sees-1000-driver...

My real point is that using hands free is illegal at the moment yet lots of people still do it, it's good that the government has recognised they need to do more to deter people but as others have said, enforcing it seems to be an issue. If enforcing that is an issue, how successful do you think it would be trying to enforce a ban on hands free? With the cuts that everyone is talking about, I think they should concentrate on what they can hope to achieve rather than introducing things which seem much harder to enforce.

I think harsher penalties could help if they are widely know and hopefully enforced but I think that changing the public perception to view it as on a par with drink driving would definitely help too.

Well that does go against the TRL's research but I agree it's not worth falling out over.
In my own experience, when I'm driving and in a conversation, I'll stop talking when I encounter a situation that requires me to think about it. That is pretty much what the TRL research says also.
Back in the 30s when car radios were first introduced, there was some debate as to whether these posed a threat to safety due to the risks from distraction.

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

Disagree... no one in the land will want to see someones livelihood potentially taken away, businesses crippled for the sake of using a mobile phone. Look at the current death by dangerous driving laws... it is rarely used as juries are too reluctant to convict... why? Because they can all see that it could be them someday.

Honestly, £30 fine is more than enough if people get caught enough. I am sure those clever cameras that are everywhere around us could be developed to identify when people are talking on phones... use something like that to catch the blighters and you'll have the problem sorted pronto.

As it stands, if you were the one person caught out in a 100, and you ended up with a ban and a several thousand pound fine, lost job etc... would you feel that justice had been done, or that you were hard done by?

So someone's livelihood is worth more than someone else's life?

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

Disagree... no one in the land will want to see someones livelihood potentially taken away, businesses crippled for the sake of using a mobile phone. Look at the current death by dangerous driving laws... it is rarely used as juries are too reluctant to convict... why? Because they can all see that it could be them someday.

Honestly, £30 fine is more than enough if people get caught enough. I am sure those clever cameras that are everywhere around us could be developed to identify when people are talking on phones... use something like that to catch the blighters and you'll have the problem sorted pronto.

As it stands, if you were the one person caught out in a 100, and you ended up with a ban and a several thousand pound fine, lost job etc... would you feel that justice had been done, or that you were hard done by?

I've got to counter-diagree with you. If somebody drives for work and has to be contactable all the time (a self-employed builder is the perfect example) then it's not out of the realms of reasonable expectation that they would heve a hands-free car kit installed. I would consider this as essential as a set of safety boots to someone in this line of work but van drivers seem to be one of the biggest culprits of handheld mobile use in my experience.

I do agree with you point about enforecement. Catching a very small percentage of offenders but dishing out massive punishments certainly is not just.

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

Disagree... no one in the land will want to see someones livelihood potentially taken away, businesses crippled for the sake of using a mobile phone. Look at the current death by dangerous driving laws... it is rarely used as juries are too reluctant to convict... why? Because they can all see that it could be them someday.

Honestly, £30 fine is more than enough if people get caught enough. I am sure those clever cameras that are everywhere around us could be developed to identify when people are talking on phones... use something like that to catch the blighters and you'll have the problem sorted pronto.

As it stands, if you were the one person caught out in a 100, and you ended up with a ban and a several thousand pound fine, lost job etc... would you feel that justice had been done, or that you were hard done by?

Personally I'd be perfectly happy to say people's livelihoods taken away if they break the law. If your car, van, HGV, main battle tank is that important to your job, don't break the law. It's not exactly hard.

OldRidgeback wrote:

So someone's livelihood is worth more than someone else's life?

To be honest, if you look at the number of cases where the "exceptional circumstances" card has been played, I'm afraid the answer to that is a resounding YES.

Simmo72 wrote:

What is the definitions of using a mobile phone?

For instance could you be prosecuted under this proposed change for using a media app to change tracks played through your car stereo? Why is this different to changing tracks or stations on the stereo itself?

Or if you used the sat nav app, why would this be different from using a dedicated gps device. All of these require you to take your eyes off the main focus - staying on the road and not killing anyone.

In both cases using the mobile could actually be safer than using the device as you can position where you want, not in the middle of the car below windscreen level.

The law should be about careless driving, regardless of the cause

I think that the law specifically says that you cannot use a handheld mobile phone whilst driving. If your phone is in a cradle you would be able to do the things you desribe legally. As you point out it's no different to using an integrated sound system or sat-nav. As long as you are not holding the phone it's OK.

Worryingly I think that this also means that sending email/tweets/facebook updates is acceptable as long as your phone is cradled (and you don't crash the car etc.)

OldRidgeback wrote:

Well that does go against the TRL's research but I agree it's not worth falling out over.
In my own experience, when I'm driving and in a conversation, I'll stop talking when I encounter a situation that requires me to think about it. That is pretty much what the TRL research says also.
Back in the 30s when car radios were first introduced, there was some debate as to whether these posed a threat to safety due to the risks from distraction.

In my experience, I too stop talking when I encounter a situation, but I would do the same if the person I was talking to is in the car or not. I know there is some evidence to show that passengers can stop the conversation too recognising the danger but it's very subjective, a non driver (e.g. a child) may not know when to stop, or if they are in the back. I guess it's this subjectiveness which has led people to question it, coupled with the fact that there are so many distractions in a car which are legal (such as 1930s radios!) so lines are very hard to draw. One has been drawn with mobiles, they are dangerous and now illegal, hopefully they'll get people to stop using them!

Matt eaton wrote:

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

Disagree... no one in the land will want to see someones livelihood potentially taken away, businesses crippled for the sake of using a mobile phone. Look at the current death by dangerous driving laws... it is rarely used as juries are too reluctant to convict... why? Because they can all see that it could be them someday.

Honestly, £30 fine is more than enough if people get caught enough. I am sure those clever cameras that are everywhere around us could be developed to identify when people are talking on phones... use something like that to catch the blighters and you'll have the problem sorted pronto.

As it stands, if you were the one person caught out in a 100, and you ended up with a ban and a several thousand pound fine, lost job etc... would you feel that justice had been done, or that you were hard done by?

I've got to counter-diagree with you. If somebody drives for work and has to be contactable all the time (a self-employed builder is the perfect example) then it's not out of the realms of reasonable expectation that they would heve a hands-free car kit installed. I would consider this as essential as a set of safety boots to someone in this line of work but van drivers seem to be one of the biggest culprits of handheld mobile use in my experience.

I do agree with you point about enforecement. Catching a very small percentage of offenders but dishing out massive punishments certainly is not just.

How on earth did people manage in the days before mobile phones then? Employers shouldn't put staff in a position where they may have an accident due to mobile phone use. As far as I know my employer forbids the use of a mobile phone when driving.

Joeinpoole wrote:

I think you'll find that the necessity for the cuts was due to the idiotic muppets prior to 2010 who wrecked the economy (just as they did the last time they had power in the 70's).

Not only did they wreck the UK economy, they seem to have managed to do it in virtually every other country in the world at the same time even though those other countries had their own muppets in charge. I wonder if our muppets knew they had such global power...

Simmo72 wrote:

What is the definitions of using a mobile phone?

If you used the sat nav app, why would this be different from using a dedicated gps device. All of these require you to take your eyes off the main focus - staying on the road and not killing anyone.

In both cases using the mobile could actually be safer than using the device as you can position where you want, not in the middle of the car below windscreen level.

The law should be about careless driving, regardless of the cause

I agree with you the law should etc, but disagree with you Re sat navs as far as I am concerned sat nav screens should go blank as soon as the vehicle moves and voice commands/prompts used, if you wish to change destination pull over and park (there was a very tragic (and avoidable) fatality on the Twyford by-pass due to someone fiddling with the sat-nav instead of looking where they were going)

but as others have said enforcement will be needed otherwise it's meaningless.

Matt eaton wrote:

I don't think it's a case of 'managing' without the phone but it's become an expectation that people are contactable. It's particuarally relevant in my example of the self-employed builder where missing a call could resulting in them losing out on business/work.

In other lines of work it's often an unwritten expectation for staff to be contactable on the phone whilst travelling. I fear that many people also attend to emails etc. whilst driving and that this is becoming more widely accecpted/expected. In high-presure jobs where time is valuable it's easy to see why people use technolgy to be productive whilst driving. It's no justification but I can understand the motivation.

As with cars themselves, no sooner is something invented than it rapidly becomes compulsory. Furthermore, any rule-bending that can be gotten away with will also become compulsory because if you don't do it those you compete with will.

Invention is the mother of necessity.

Simmo72 wrote:

What is the definitions of using a mobile phone?

For instance could you be prosecuted under this proposed change for using a media app to change tracks played through your car stereo? Why is this different to changing tracks or stations on the stereo itself?

Or if you used the sat nav app, why would this be different from using a dedicated gps device. All of these require you to take your eyes off the main focus - staying on the road and not killing anyone.

In both cases using the mobile could actually be safer than using the device as you can position where you want, not in the middle of the car below windscreen level.

The law should be about careless driving, regardless of the cause

Exactly. Well put.

Matt eaton wrote:

I don't think it's a case of 'managing' without the phone but it's become an expectation that people are contactable. It's particuarally relevant in my example of the self-employed builder where missing a call could resulting in them losing out on business/work.

Having been trying to corral various self-employed tradespeople I can assure you most of 'em hereabouts ain't hangin' on the telephone waiting for your call.

Quote:

In other lines of work it's often an unwritten expectation for staff to be contactable on the phone whilst travelling. I fear that many people also attend to emails etc. whilst driving and that this is becoming more widely accecpted/expected. In high-presure jobs where time is valuable it's easy to see why people use technolgy to be productive whilst driving. It's no justification but I can understand the motivation.

Can't they just turn their phone off when driving and tell their boss they are doing so? Boss has a duty of care, and expecting folk to deal with calls and email whilst driving is failing in it.

Joeinpoole wrote:

I think you'll find that the necessity for the cuts was due to the idiotic muppets prior to 2010 who wrecked the economy (just as they did the last time they had power in the 70's). I blame the foolish wankers who voted for *them*.

Ha ha! Nothing to do with the international banking crisis that affected the USA and most of Western Europe? Not that I think Blair & co. were lily white either.

The press lapped up the 'austerity' bollocks (as did much of the public, they're good like that) but if the Tories wanted to genuinely save us some money they didn't have to target the less well off first while letting the super-rich and huge corporations smuggle vast amounts of money out of the country.

Back on topic, the reports I have read indicate that hands-free is almost as bad as hand-held. I'm sure I read that different parts of the brain were in use when compared to conversing with a passenger.

I think some people may be arguing in defence of their own behaviour rather than having a sound case to put forward; "I've done it and I am a capable and alert driver*, so..."

(* because everyone thinks they are)

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

I guess this comes down to the fact that some people will be at the raggity edge of their competencies just getting a car from A to B every day, whilst for others driving is something they could almost do in their sleep.

For the second group, having a conversation on a phone and being able to prioritise focus on the road is simple... for the former it is clearly a step too far.

I suspect that it's also that former group which is more likely to be on the phone, iPad, eating a bowl of cereal...

"Having been trying to corral various self-employed tradespeople I can assure you most of 'em hereabouts ain't hangin' on the telephone waiting for your call."

In that case I'm being way too sympathetic to the multiple van drivers I see talking on handheld phones every day.

"Can't they just turn their phone off when driving and tell their boss they are doing so? Boss has a duty of care, and expecting folk to deal with calls and email whilst driving is failing in it."

Of course people CAN turn their phones off and tell their boss/colleages etc. that they are unavailable but people's behaviours are driven by the culture in which they work/live. As I said before any expectation is an unspoken one and many people will be tempted to break the rules if it means that they will get ahead in the workplace. This is no justification but it does explain behaviours that we all witness every day. Unless enforcement is stepped up it's not going to change.

Jimmy Ray Will wrote:

Disagree... no one in the land will want to see someones livelihood potentially taken away, businesses crippled for the sake of using a mobile phone. Look at the current death by dangerous driving laws... it is rarely used as juries are too reluctant to convict... why? Because they can all see that it could be them someday.

Honestly, £30 fine is more than enough if people get caught enough. I am sure those clever cameras that are everywhere around us could be developed to identify when people are talking on phones... use something like that to catch the blighters and you'll have the problem sorted pronto.

As it stands, if you were the one person caught out in a 100, and you ended up with a ban and a several thousand pound fine, lost job etc... would you feel that justice had been done, or that you were hard done by?

Yes - juries & the judiciary can all see that it could be them someday. This is why it needs to be made as unacceptable as drink driving.

£30 is NOTHING these days.

If you were one person caught out in 100... You still broke the law knowingly, and you still put others lives in danger. Tough! The only thing I'd add to this is to ensure that more than 1% are caught!!!

Word of mouth is incredibly powerful. So imagine a friend of yours gets caught using a mobile phone whilst driving, gets banned etc. It might make you think twice about doing it.

workhard wrote:

Can't they just turn their phone off when driving and tell their boss they are doing so? Boss has a duty of care, and expecting folk to deal with calls and email whilst driving is failing in it.

I don't think the expectation is to break the current laws, and most employers who require people to drive stick people on company training of some form (usually just a computer based thing).
The reality is people think they can multitask in the time in the car, and otherwise see it was 'wasted time', saving time when they get back to the office or other location.
The expectation of an employer might be to do your work as the business needs, and on time etc. It's the induvidual employee who makes the choice to break the law.

It wasn't my opinion or view, I was just stating the scenario. I'm in total agreement with you, sat navs are distracting, as are all the built in media touch screen toys in modern cars, far too much there to take your eye of the road whilst you attempt to stop your air conditioning and automated voice calls that have somehow switched to spanish.

It wasn't my opinion or view, I was just stating the scenario. I'm in total agreement with you, sat navs are distracting, as are all the built in media touch screen toys in modern cars, far too much there to take your eye of the road whilst you attempt to stop your air conditioning and automated voice calls that have somehow switched to spanish.

Simmo72 wrote:

It wasn't my opinion or view, I was just stating the scenario. I'm in total agreement with you, sat navs are distracting, as are all the built in media touch screen toys in modern cars, far too much there to take your eye of the road whilst you attempt to stop your air conditioning and automated voice calls that have somehow switched to spanish.

All the technology is a bit of a double-edged sword. It can be distacting but following Sat-Nav has got to be better than fumbling with a map on the passenger seat and turning the air-con up a notch has got to be better than trying to take off a coat or jumper whilst driving.

The thing that still gets me is smoking at the wheel. Holding onto a burning piece of plant material while piloting a car seems mad to me. The actual act of lighting up seems particuarally distracting.

drfabulous0 wrote:

I really don't think that fines and enforcement are the most practical way to deal with this, better to use technology. It's realistic with current technology for the car to be able to disable the use of the phone from the driver's seat, but better still driverless cars aren't too far away, then everyone can safely tweet away as they sit in traffic in their can.

I'm not so sure that we have the technology available to block the use of mobile devices in such a small and specific area as the driver's seat of a car. Even if this were possible it wouldn't stop people from dealing with email etc. whilst driving as any email that they draft would simply be sent as soon as they got out of the car or even when they put the phone on the passenger seat.

True driverless technology also has a long way to go. I can imagine cars with this technology apearing on our roads before long however I think it will be more like an auto-pilot function added to ordinary cars. This is certainly no bad thing but from an enforcement point-of-view how would it be possible to tell if the car was driving itself? Until we have cars that literally have no conventional driver controls the law won't be able to change and the person sitting behind the steering wheel will always be considered the driver.

I agree that a technological solution would be the ideal but I don't think that signal blockers or driverless cars are going to provide this.

i totally agree with you. Good sense. I would gladly accept it if i did it, i'm sure many would.