What upward trending road toll? The road toll in NZ is trending downwards over the last 5 years.

Apart from that ill informed comment, I do agree that those you have mentioned have shown they are too stupid to be allowed to drive and should have their right to do so removed.

I maintain that vehicles should have a sensor that checks the drivers breath for alcohol which activates a kill switch so they cannot drive. As for car surfers and tsunami victims.. this may sound a little harsh but ever heard of survival of the fittest?

Politicians should all be made to stand in the stocks once a week so we can throw rotten vegetables at them to stop them doing and saying stupid things.

@ Thalia #2. Unfortunately, advances in medical science have somewhat negated the whole survival of the fittest aspect of life.

Aside from that, I quite agree.

@Geoff #3 this is true, that and christians trying to save the world one child sponsorship at a time, but when you see things like car surfing you can't help but think Darwinism is still at work.

@gak how do you remove a persons right to drive? you can already be indefinately disqualified but that doesn't stop you going out and getting in a car and doing it in spite of that.. and it doesn't stop people with no licenses (hence no rights to start with) driving a vehicle either, in fact some dealers advertise the fact they will sell to unlicensed drivers. The reason the road toll is downtrending is because less people die not because there are less accidents.

Yep take them out of the gene pool is what I say.

I certainly have seen or heard nothing of the death rates going down on our roads. It seems everyday in the news someone dies. They want to stop going on about speed and revenue gathering and start teaching people to drive properly instead of giving them a scratch and win card for a theory test and a practical a trained hamster could pass. Then you might find things start to get better!!!

Uh, Dave, this comment I think is a little off 'Oh by the way, they qualify for ACC even though it wasn't an accident. Cancer sufferers don't.' What has that got to do with anything? Of course a cancer sufferer wouldnt get ACC, its accident insurance. Thats why one would have health insurance? Sounds like you are clutching at straws & trying to get people riled up, because you know they'll jump on your bandwagon. Boring.

Car surfers and tsunami watchers will becoem part of hte process of natural selection - I see no reason to do anything to them at all!

I'm bemused by short terms for drunken drivers tho. I had the joy of being caught for EBA twice in my mis-spent youth - 30 years ago now - 1st time I was disqualified for 1 year (with a $450 fine), the 2nd time for 2 years (with 3 months periodic detention) - and that time included careless use causing injury and fortunate it wasn't worse!! :(

For all the ranting and raving about drunk driving that's happened in the 30 years since the punishments don't seem to be any worse now!

GH #6: His point was that falling off a car while car surfing is plain stupidity and should not be considered an accident or be covered by ACC.

Perhaps that's a good call. Why should careful people pay for stupid people? But then, people that are stupid and fall out of trees or get wiped out skiing in off-limits places or lose an eye when they use power tools without goggles get ACC. Perhaps they shouldn't either. Where would you draw the line between stupidity and acceptable risk taking?

Perhaps there is a problem with the "no fault" rule that applies to ACC. Regular insurance companies won't give you cover if you're breaking the law or being really, really stupid [try getting cover for damage to a car while drink driving].

Access to ACC should not be available to those who have been convicted of drink driving and injured themselves. Same goes for their passengers, they get into a car of their own free will after all. In fact anybody who is found guilty of an offence, whether in a car or other crime should not be covered by ACC either.

Taz #5

Of course every day you here of someone dying on the road, around 400 people a year die on the roads!

Also, as a driving researcher, I know a lot about the driver licensing system. Of the 14 adults I have recently tested on a subset of the road code rules, none of them would have received a passing grade for a learner licence. Would you? Also, when was the last time you performed a full licence practical test? It's actually not that easy to pass.