DRIVING LICENCES

Press, Volume XC, Issue 27309, 27 March 1954, Page 3

DRIVING LICENCES

Sir—Having driven a car for 40 years, I have decided to give it best while my licence and I are both intact. At my age, I have to submit myself like a bull at a show if I want a licence. My first car could do 15 miles an hour as easy as my last could do 80. This is not the only job I have to forgo now. One time I could play “Pop Goes the Weasel” on a tin whistle. Not today. Also I cannot sew and carry 900 bags or 78 tons of wheat from a threshing machine in one day. A-friend asked me could I carry 900 bags today. I said: “Certainly I could, if they were empty.” He omitted the word wheat.—Yours, etc., P. S. DRAPER. Leithfield Beach, March 26, 1954.

Sir,—lt appears as though the transport authorities regard motorists of 70 or over as a menace to the general public. I think it should be recognised that these elderly motorists very seldom figure among those drivers responsible for motor accidents or among those apprehended for being intoxicated while in charge of motor vehicles. Generally speaking, motorists in this age-group are careful drivers, showing more consideration and courtesy than many younger persons in the motoring section of the community. It is time a concerted effort was made to have these irksome restrictions removed. Compare the generous treatment now accorded other motorists when relicensing with that meted out to those applicants in the 70’s. The penalising of the latter is unfair and illogical, in so far as it constitutes no important factor in the road-safety campaign.—Yours, etc., „ , TAHU. March 26, 1954.