Road Safety And Common Sense

Southland Times, Issue 23855, 28 June 1939, Page 4

Road Safety And Common Sense

F would be a pity if the Minister of .Transport, whose work in the interests of road safety has been widely recognized and approved, allowed excess of zeal to betray him into the acceptance of foolish and irksome regulations. His recent proposal to set a higher age limit for taxi drivers can scarcely be justified by his contention that the young man of 24 is more balanced in temperament than the mere youth of 21. Actually there is very little difference, in outlook and behaviour, between these two ages: maturity still lies some distance ahead. This may not be a matter of great importance. But more serious criticism can be put forward against the proposal to make it an offence for drivers of motorvehicles to take intoxicants while driving or within half an hour immediately before driving. The opportunities for evasion are probably limitless, and it will be a bad day for transport control in the Dominion when motorists begin to lose their respect for the law. It must be admitted that although there are severe penalties against the drunken motorist, offences of this kind are disturbingly frequent. But an attempt to banish drink from the roads altogether could succeed only in a country where no liquor is obtainable. Most persons accept regulations for road safety, possibly more cheerfully than in other cases, because they know that only through a strict control can it be possible to reduce the number of fatal accidents which now confront the country with a major social problem. If the Transport Department began to exceed the bounds of common sense, however, the entire campaign .might be endangered by a growing tendency to treat the law with contempt. These facts were emphasized at the quarterly meeting of delegates to the South Island Motor Union on Monday. No doubt there will be a sufficient number of protests from other quarters to make it plain to Mr Semple that, although motorists are willing to co-operate in all reasonable attacks on the drunken driver, they are unable to support a measure which smacks more of interference than of legitimate regulation.