Driving- Privilege or Entitlement?

Not disagreeing with your premise - that the ability to pilot 2 tons of potentially lethal machinery is not a god given right - but I don't think the answer is legislation, or more rules. Stop for a second and consider how you feel about the idea that you might have to license a bike, you'll see what I mean.

It isn't a perfect world, roads are never going to be safe but we can make them safer by education. My dad and father in law both drove into their eighties; my dad should have given up 10 years earlier and only gave up after a stroke, my father in law gave up within weeks of him realising he probably needed to.

If more people could be encouraged to develop advanced driving skills, the roads would be safer. It is ironic that the people most in need are those who are (probably) least likely to take it on board. And you know what? the same applies to bikes, too. (just the consequences of running amok with a bike are slightly less dramatic)

Im not suggesting that young people or company car drivers (I have been both) are at all better drivers. What I am saying is that the older people get the slower reactions become, should this be taken into account? A younger person (by this I mean, for example, below....say 60, so not 'young')should have quick enough reactions to avoid an incident wheras an 85+ year old person may not.

I saw a tv program the other day, cops with cameras or somthing similar. An old gent got to the top of a sliproad on a motorway and turned right into the traffic instead of following the roundabout to the left. Luckily the drivers going the other way were aware enough to see this and the police on the scene put things right. He was cheerily waved on his way when told to go the other way. If an 18 year old guy had done that then he would have got points.

Asking for blanket changes to driving laws on the basis of one crash is a bit like asking for a cycling ban because a few idiots jump the lights. Bad driving is bad driving, it's not confined to the old. I see people every day not in control of their vehicles. Most of them aren't old. Most old people drive so slowly that they're unlikely to damage anything they crash into anyway, annoying when you're behind them but hardly worthy of a ban

Totally agree wild man. Not to mention that if you are going to start withdrawing licences on the grounds of unfitness to old age, what about some sort of maturity qualification at the other end of the age scale… trickier I know because mental maturity isn't the same as physical maturity.

Your driving licence does expire at 70 and I'm guessing you have to provide some sort of medical evidence that you are still fit to drive to get a new one.

Either way, in my experience while doddery older drivers are a problem they are nothing compared to testosterone filled youths and should know better 'middle youths' they are the people who routinely nearly kill me.

After the age of 70 drivers should have to sit the test again...simply to show that their hazard perception, eyesight and reaction times are strong enough to cope with a world that drives faster than when they passed originally. My grandmother drives and it terrifies me, she cant see properly but she sees it as her right as she has a license....no no no.