South Meath Driving School

The Christmas rush was on last year when a young man phoned me for a few driving lessons. Appointment made, I met him and he advises that his driving test was one week hence, it being his first. Fine, “So you must be well prepared, have you already had some lessons?”, I enquire. “No, I just picked up driving tips from my father and friends for the past two years. I know I wont pass the test this time and I suppose I’m as well admit that the reason I’m doing it at all is to renew my Permit,” he said.

I sat into this youth’s car and after the usual preliminaries, he took off, like a kangaroo, without signalling, let alone checking the ‘blindspot’. “Enough!” I called out. We returned and continued the lesson in my dual controlled car. I enquired if he had driven on his own. “Sometimes”, he replied, “a few times a week, don’t they all do it.”

Some have a natural talent but this young man would not acquire the skills easily. No harm in that, he’s not alone, the harm lies in the Road Safety Authority regulations. Those regulations were drawn up in 2006 after much research and decades of neglect. It was incorporated into the Road Safety Plan to 2012 to substantially cut road deaths – to 252.

Significantly that has already been achieved and must be worked on to further reduce road deaths, like the erection of more speed cameras and a Leaving Certificate programme involving the training of our youth in Road Safety appreciation and driving skills.

But there are other factors which contribute in no small way to that early achievement of the 2012 plan, like the emigration of c.100,000 people in recent times, or the unemployment rate of 13.5% and the reduction of some 12% in tourist numbers visiting Ireland. All that reduces traffic volume on our roads, coupled with motorway/dual carriageway development.

I’ve pointed out before that in a EU country like Portugal where wages are only a ¼ of those in Ireland, (though that may be levelling out!) the holder of the Learner Permit (or equivalent) cannot drive on a public road unless with a driving instructor and must take 32 compulsory driving lessons before sitting a driving test.

The RSA will state that the holder of an (Irish) Learner Permit must legally be accompanied by a qualified driver. That’s balderdash- the great flaw is that the beginner may take a car onto any road while not having acquired the necessary skills to cope with the multiple tasks involved in safe driving. I demand to know what power has a person in the passenger seat to correct/assist a learner driver when even a small problem arises, let alone an emergency. Just imagine that young lad or lass, their heart pumping, and they have to simply overtake a cyclist: wet road, car close behind, approaching bend, continuous white line. A nightmare. What then of an emergency? Does Daddy have one hand on the steering wheel, the other on the handbrake while shouting “ I told you brake, not accelerate, you little bag of soot!”

It may be of help for the learner to be accompanied by a qualified driver, but there are many who chance going it alone. The seasoned driver may be trusted, but what of the rookie? He’s tantamount to a child with a loaded shotgun.

I’m informed that compulsory lessons are imminent, that it will be 12 or 15 that’ll be required. The sooner the better for all. Last year there was talk, too, of the Graduated Driving Licence being introduced in 2010, but there’s no sign of it yet which is a pity as the research has been done and it will only cost a little more for administration purposes.

And so my Christmas student of ’09 underwent two driving lessons with me. A further 8 or 10 would be required but he played the system and won! Well, did he? He succeeded in getting in and out of the gates of the test centre and returning in jig time because the tester survives on a 6^th sense. He received a blue certificate of incompetency as expected but drove home, alone. Now, he could get a licence for another year. That is not beating the system, rather it’s the system letting us down. What’s another year with a wink and a nod, for good auld Ireland didn’t go away!