More “opinion masquerading as “research”, this time from Be Wiser Insurance. They’ve discovered that many parents don’t feel their little darlings are properly equipped to drive when they pass their tests, with over 60% saying they were especially worried about them going on motorways.
Look. It would be great if we could take them on motorways during lessons, but that is not where they have their accidents.
The favoured location for this is on a country lane, on a bend, at night. More importantly, the correct procedure when at the location is to have a car full of mates screaming and shouting, a full stock of freshly-bought McDonalds food, and to be in the middle of a “bad testosterone” day, thus forcing you to show off how far away from maturity you really are. Oh, and all this must happen in a pratmobile – most likely part-financed by mummy and daddy – decked out to scream “I go faaaaast” from every angle.
To be fair, lesser worries are also given in the same story, such as driving at night, driving in town centres, and being distracted. But no further detail is given. The main focus is that motorways comment.
Be Wiser is either wholly irresponsible – or just very bad at interpreting and reporting important data correctly – for following the comment up with:
And the statistics appear to back up the worries of parents as drivers aged between 18-25 years are the group mostly likely to be involved in an accident according to Government figures.
YES! ON COUNTRY LANES, AT NIGHT, ON A BEND… NOT ON MOTORWAYS! Be Wiser has missed a trick by not expanding on the actual problems that it must – as an insurer – know about and which are the real causes of accidents. Apart from country lanes, other important factors include texting, showing off, driving and accelerating far too quickly then braking far too harshly, not knowing where you are going and changing direction at the last minute, not knowing the rules of the Highway Code (or not caring), and so on. All related to attitude, by the way. Motorways don’t even make the top ten.