know your (drink-drive) limits
Ministers have been urged to cut the drink-drive limit by nearly half in a
government-commissioned report.
Sir Peter North's review for the Department for Transport has
recommended reducing the legal limit from 80mg of alcohol per 100ml
of blood to 50mg. At present, motorists often find it difficult to
know whether or not they are actually over the limit. What exactly
does 80mg in 100ml of blood mean? It is believed that a male of
average build could drink two pints of regular strength lager
before being over the legal drink-drive limit.
However there has been a tendency towards larger measures of
alcohol being available and alcohol being stronger, which has meant
that it has never been more difficult to identify whether one is or
is not near or in excess of the legal drink-drive limit. One of the
supposed advantages of reducing the drink-drive limit to 50mg is
that it will apparently clarify the position for the motorist. If
the recommendation were to be implemented, it is claimed the
average male could well be over the limit after drinking just a
single pint of regular strength lager.
We believe that further debate is still needed and if the
Government proposes to introduce legislation, Parliament will have
the opportunity to do just that. If a person may or may not be over
the current drink drive limit by drinking two pints, would they be
over or under the proposed drink-drive limit if they drank one
pint? It depends on a range of criteria, including:
- the strength of the drink
- how tall they are
- how much they weigh
- their sex
- how much they had to eat and when
- how long after drinking they are driving.
Does reducing the limit really add to the certainty? It will
certainly not assist the motorist who is caught drink driving the
morning after the night before.
Encouraging people to drink less (if at all) before driving,
must be right. However replacing one limit with another will not
necessarily assist the confused motorist. Parliament has already
introduced and supported legislation that enables convicted drink
drivers to see a reduction in their driving disqualification if
they attend a driver education course. The rationale for this is
that drink drivers need to be educated so they know their limits.
Whilst some drink drivers are way over the drink-drive limit when
caught by the police, others are only marginally over. Therefore,
if the Government believes that motorists need education in
understanding current drink-driving levels and the effects that
alcohol can have on them, will that be made any easier simply by
changing the limit? Surely 'before the event' driver education
should be considered rather than just 'after the event'
The report also recommends that the current mandatory 12-month
driving ban should be maintained for the new 50mg limit. The UK has
one of the strictest drink driving regimes in Europe and this would
certainly remain the case if the 12-month ban were to remain in
force.
There are a total of 51 recommendations in the report. Those
recommendations include making it easier for police to identify and
prosecute drug-drivers by allowing nurses, as well as doctors, to
authorise blood tests of suspects. The report also recommends that
police officers should be able to carry out random breath tests at
the side of the road. At present, whilst police officers have the
power to stop a vehicle at random, the officer can only require a
motorist to take a breath test if there has been an accident, if
the officer reasonably suspects a moving traffic offence to have
been committed or if the officer reasonably suspects the motorist
to have actually consumed alcohol.
The report's recommendations have been welcomed by road safety
groups and motoring organisations alike although there remains a
question mark about whether or not the report will be implemented
in whole or even in part. This is because the report was
commissioned by the previous Government and the Conservative Party,
when in opposition, opposed reducing the legal limit to 50mg. So we
will have to wait and see.
View further information on drink
driving offences.
