Mix 94.5

---

As a carer in the community that looks after many acquired brain injury persons, I would have to say after talking to many, many able and disabled, that a great aversion to any speeding/risky behaviour would be to live a day in the shoes of a young bloke/girl that now has to endure the embarassment of somebody else wiping your bum or washing parts of you that you thought were "private". There are worse things than dying and legislation (pain in the a***e that they are) are just trying to help avoid a very sad conclusion. And before you write me off as a wowser I am a paramedic and ride an 1100 motor cycle, or I would but someone stole it last week!!

Posted by Sharon Brown Monday 20 October, 2008 01:11 PM

---

Well said Ian, like you I have owned and ridden motorbikes for 28 years and also driven motor vehicles of various horse power. It was a lot different when I got my bike license, it was in the country and all I did was ride around the block, the sergeant literally gave it to me but he had seen me riding around town and thought I could ride. As for my motor vehicles I have mostly owned low powered cars... an old XM falcon without seatbelts or airbags was one of my first cars, not very powerful but it was how we drove them that got us into trouble, driving down greenmount in angel gear half cut.... no random breath testing then and we thought we were bullet proof. But I do agree, power to weight legislation has been in the UK for many years and statistically it has reduced the death toll of young drivers and as you say that 250cc motorcycles of today are faster than any 750cc bike of the past when the laws came into effect. My current bike is a 1956 650cc Triumph T110 which is battling to reach 100kph top speed and I have a friend who whizzes past me on his 250cc like I am standing still. To effectively reduce the road toll of young riders/drivers requires a combination of reducing power to weight in the vehicles and gradually increasing it as they gain experience, education and a willingness by the rider/driver to use their own commonsense and realise they are not bullet proof. It is the culture of young people now that we have all these high powered vehicles to try and be like thier heros and go faster and try to drag eachother off at the lights... take a look at the Ford vs Holden culture, how stupid to try to pit themselves against each other on the public roads, they have no respect for themselves or the public. It will be difficult to change the culture of young people while there is this mentality that speed is good, some of the culture can be attributed to movies such as "Tokyo Drift" and computer games. also it is easier and more affordable to get high performance parts for vehicles. Well thats my 2 bobs worth, thanks for letting us all have the opportunity to have our say.

Posted by Norm Monday 20 October, 2008 01:09 PM

---

I don't drive and I prefer not to, but I whole heartly agree with the fact that P platers should only drive smaller cars, but you know what, it won't stop them from killing themselves, as they will still show off if front of their mates, it doesn't matter how big of an engine in the car, you have they will still speed and they will still loose control and wrap themselves around a tree along with all their friends or even take kill and innocent bystander. The only way is good driver education, and the best way to start, is to make all new Learner drivers take driving lessons from the driving school, by this I mean that the 25 hours that they need to have (or is it going up) before they sit for their licence at least 20 hours should be with a driving school and then the other 5 could be with the parents. Yes, I can just here is now that sounds good in theory, but what about all the costs, if you want to drive (properly) then money should not come into it. I have 2 children with licenses, and they both went thru driving schools, and it was the best thing for them as the school told each of them when they were ready or not, and that's the way it should be, I don't think there will ever be a solution to this problem, but we can try, and let's hope that we don't loose too many more young lives on our roads before an answer is found.

Posted by Rosemarie Wednesday 3 September, 2008 05:15 AM

---

Great Ian, I agree about power to weight ratio, and as a Mum of an 18 yr old about to start learning to drive. I was bought up on a farm so have been driving all manner of vehicles since I was 9 years of age. But the diff in how we were taught is My father made us back a trailer out of under a verandah ,before we could drive any where ,next was the skid control,oh and in the wet just to make sure we could do it. I firmly believe that as a parent we have to make sure that the instuctors themselves have alot more skills to teach these young drivers aswel as the gov being able to enforce the law with some common sense laws to examine some of the instructors as I have been on the road & as a first aider have been in the midst of the carnage too many times, seeing the stupidity of instructors on their Phones or sleeping ...how can the kids learn anything about safety on the road. I am taking my son tothe only empty carpark for his first probably ten sessions as I know how much time really needs to be put into teaching them the basic abilty's of the car & how to judge it in all types of circumstances.I guess I got alittle on my high horse as there are too many items to address in thisshort space of time including the attitudes of the young drivers themselves as I work withyoung footballers/Rugby players & hear them bragging about driving & going too sleep cause they haven't slept for days. Just one of many comments needing to be addressed.
Cheers Viv

Posted by Vivienne Rintoul Thursday 28 August, 2008 07:56 AM

---

I can definitely see your point, Ian, and agree wholeheartedly.

I knew a kid, worked with my dad 25 years ago as an apprentice... learned to drive in his mum's front wheel drive Mazda 323, and got his licence at age 18 in the same car. Later on of the day he got his licence (2 days after his 18th birthday) he goes and buys a car - a large, V8 rear wheel drive Monaro. Takes it out on the dirt roads near work, where he'd learned to "play" in Mum's car, and it all goes horribly wrong - himself and 3 others in the car died as he lost control and slid off the side of the road and into a tree. The irony?... Just 2 weeks later, the kind of legislation you're talking about, Ian, was passed, and this would have been prevented.

Posted by David Wednesday 27 August, 2008 07:59 PM

---

Never a truer word spoken, 90% of the pollies in this world have probably never ridden a motorcycle, nor driven a high performance car. They talk as though they are experts on the matter, or they get advice from other so called experts, yet neither have any idea about the facts.

Whilst I agree with you about Power - Weight ratio is the way to go, in both cars and bikes, they should also seriously consider driver/rider training before letting the new license holder hit the road too, so at least they know what to do in case of an emergency.

What ever happened to the driver training schools, like the old skid pan in Mt Lawley. A lot of very usefull skills were lost when these places closed down.

Posted by Wizard Wednesday 27 August, 2008 01:21 PM

---

Well written ian. I totally aagree, the govt need to understand more some of the implications of what laws they enforce.

Posted by Johnno Wednesday 27 August, 2008 12:54 PM