Motoring organisation estimates introduction of graduated driving licences would save at least 58 lives a year
The Department for Transport announced in July 2019 it was considering GDL in England, but the assessment was halted in autumn 2020. Photograph: Martin Godwin/The Guardian
New drivers under 21 in the UK should be banned from carrying passengers of a similar age for six months after passing their test, a motoring organisation has urged.
The AA estimated that introducing a graduated driving licence (GDL) would save at least 58 lives and prevent 934 people being seriously injured in road crashes each year.
The AA would like to see motorists with a “G” graduated driver plate handed six penalty points for not wearing a seatbelt, which would mean they lose their licence.
Graduated driving licensing is already used in several countries, including the US, Canada, Australia and Sweden.
Department for Transport (DfT) figures show 290 people were killed and 4,669 seriously injured in crashes on Britain’s roads last year in incidents involving at least one driver between 17 and 24 years old.
The AA’s chief executive, Jakob Pfaudler, said: “Not only is this a tragic waste of life, but it contributes to the burden of high insurance premiums for young drivers. These premiums should fall when there is evidence of a reduction of young drivers and passengers killed and seriously injured.
“Graduated driver licensing has been proven in other countries to significantly reduce road deaths and serious injuries. We are calling on the transport secretary to make simple, pragmatic changes to the licensing process so young people are better protected in their first few months of independent driving.”
Under the Conservative government, the DfT announced in July 2019 it was considering introducing GDL in England, but the assessment was halted in autumn 2020, partly because of the potential impact on young people’s employment.
The most popular element of the AA’s proposal, according to an online survey of 10,566 of its members, was passenger restrictions, with 33% of respondents saying they would support them.
Last week, the senior coroner for north-west Wales, Kate Robertson, raised concerns about young, newly qualified drivers carrying passengers after an inquest into the deaths of four teenagers who drowned when their car rolled into a ditch on a trip to Snowdonia in November last year.
Crystal Owen, whose son Harvey was one of them, told the Sunday Times that a ban could have saved their lives.
She said she had subsequently learned that graduated licences existed in other countries. “I thought: ‘What the hell is going on? Why is this or some version of it not law?’”
She added: “Their brains are not fully formed, which is why we have other restrictions on things like buying cigarettes.”
Owen has co-founded a campaign group, Forget-me-not Families Uniting, calling for the introduction of a GDL, and has launched a petition on Change.org, which says: “With one in every five newly qualified drivers crashing within their first year and young drivers being at higher risk of being involved in a fatal crash when carrying peer age passengers, there is an urgent need to act now to save lives.”
A DfT spokesperson said: “Whilst we are not considering graduated driving licences, we absolutely recognise that young people are disproportionately victims of tragic incidents on our roads, and we are considering other measures to tackle this problem and protect young drivers. That’s why we are committed to delivering a new road safety strategy – the first in over a decade – and will set out next steps on this in due course.”
