+1 and well said Caseye.Originally Posted by caseye
Brilliant work T.G.W, major respect for what you have done and your tenacity in continuing with this lobbying, an example to all of us mate
Registered User
+1 and well said Caseye.
Brilliant work T.G.W, major respect for what you have done and your tenacity in continuing with this lobbying, an example to all of us mate
Den tha thriamvéf̱sei páno̱
Cheers FM!!It's been a long haul..
Just a reminder to those interested, Submissions are being requested for select commitee - you can do this online here: http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/SC...-and-Other.htm
The bill http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/...resel&p=1&sr=1
Or .pdf
http://www.legislation.govt.nz/bill/...ed805ff502.pdf
Submissions are due 21st October!!!
FAQ's here: http://www.transport.govt.nz/saferjo...kage-FAQs.aspx
ter·ra in·cog·ni·taAchievement is not always success while reputed failure often is. It is honest endeavor, persistent effort to do the best possible under any and all circumstances.
Orison Swett Marden
Hardcore Biker
I once had youth failed after having 1 x 4% beer, ok so I thought strange but ok I'm an adult.
I was more surprised that I was not asked for identification, this happened when I was 23, I'm now 28 and still get ID'd everytime I purchase alcohol.
I wonder how old that cop thought I was as I would have expected to have been asked for identification to prove I wasn't a youth and not over the limit.
Also I think the limit is too high, I have walked passed a checkpoint and asked to be tested to see if I was able to drive in the current state. I passed even though I'd never drive that intoxicated.
Den tha thriamvéf̱sei páno̱
For now, all we can hope is that people will plan ahead, or make judgmement calls such as yours.
Apologise for the long post...
I went searching for data and came back with sketchy figures and estimations, reports based on unsure information from worldwide BAC reports.
We simply cannot base a blanket policy around unknown information - we just don't have the data, we can't even correctly estimate how many lives or costs would be saved.
If the data were to show significant crash rates within .5 and .8, it's something that without a doubt should be changed.
This data should've been collected years ago - unfortunately it hasn't.
What does stand out was that we allow drivers to cultivate multiple convictions, we have a severe problem with youth, and we have a significant amount of incomplete license owners or disqualified drink drivers causing crashes.
There is actually a helluva lot more to preventing drink driving and the category of wider issues of which there's quite a list, and so many issues not being tackled - unfortunately, no singular magic bullet.
Having read literally hundreds of reports on worldwide BAC limits and critques, they always come back to saying the same thing - we are unable to expect legislation of lowering limits alone to change a minority of public behaviours.
There's shown to be positive gains overseas when lowering limits in changing behaviours, alongside certain types of public programs, campaigns, education, enforcement, asessing and monitoring of alcoholics, in the US - impaired courts - not all but some of which would require serious rethinking in NZ (and alot of money).
We have seen over the last year - scare mongering tactics - media coverage of absorption rates and no detail at all paid to metabolism rates, aka; the healthy liver processes one standard drink an hour - drink beyond and you'll be too drunk to drive.
Same as with residual alcohol - if you don't let your liver rid itself of alcohol in the morning by the time you drive (again at one standard drink an hour) you'll be intoxicated or over the limit.
Alcohol related crashes frequently happen during the day.
Metabolism rates are just as important to understand and to educate, if there had been mention - the media stories would've been quite different and more honest.
ter·ra in·cog·ni·taAchievement is not always success while reputed failure often is. It is honest endeavor, persistent effort to do the best possible under any and all circumstances.
Orison Swett Marden
Hardcore Biker
I think the data is sufficient. Luckily got some under the OIA before the subject was sensitive.For now, all we can hope is that people will plan ahead, or make judgmement calls such as yours.
Apologise for the long post...
I went searching for data and came back with sketchy figures and estimations, reports based on unsure information from worldwide BAC reports.
We simply cannot base a blanket policy around unknown information - we just don't have the data, we can't even correctly estimate how many lives or costs would be saved.
Local figures for bacs are here -
I note one driver over 35 dies at 0.05-8 every two years ie half an adult dies at 0.05-8 every year, MASSIVE PROBLEM HERALD DICKS
And there are numerous studies showing that
A) people are incredibly unlikely to crash due to being at 0.05-8 & crashes DUE TO being at that level account for under 1/2 a percent of the toll - resulting in MoTs advice to Govt in the Safer Journeys regulatory impact statement that if fewer peopledie at 0.05-8 due to the numners of such drivers reducing this will be offset by more sober drivers dying ie the same guys will still die alcohol free as it wasn't the deciding factor, any more than being blonde.
b) 0.05 limits increase drink driving deaths (Denmark, Victoria, NT etc etc) due to complex unintende policy impacts.
What has me most convinced (the intelligent and independent studies findings aside) is that all the places with the lowest drunk deaths per km / mile travelled, remain at 0.08, with grossly more severe and modern penalty regimes. While the UK is less comparable, we should look at some of the more result driven States.
TGW has talked about NMs way of addressing it's still serious problem. And drink drive safe havens Utah and NY have about half our drunk toll death risk per km travelled. Intelligent preventive penalties and real deterrence - full stop to flat out offending. Big full stop. The answers are known already, our Justice system is just too liberal or the revenue gatherers too keen for repeat business. Enter 0.05...
As was explained by Senators to the appalled Mum of a teen who got killed, who'd campaigned all the way into the Whitehouse (she told me) "we just can't get completely rid of drink driving - too many industries depend on it, from panelbeaters... you have to be pragmatic"
Hardcore Biker
Lower averaged blood alcohol concentrations in the driving population do not lower shared crash incidence. Ireland noticed this.
The myth of such an easy lever just by focussing on BACs alone has lately been subject to much doubt in the policy area. It's an outmoded approach due to many confounding factors.
Prime ones being that
1 recent cannabis use doubles ones supposed BAC related risk (which is very significant as to whether you crash or not). A lot of mixing throws a spanner in the works and is why NZ sees manifold more fatal crashes at BACs under 0.05 than between 0.05-0.09
2. Fatigue makes alcohol more dangerous at very low levels than is taken into account in current policy think tanks. Fatigue is endemic in todays world unlike when the original alcohol crash risk studies were done.
3. The kind of alcohol affects crash risk, more drink crashes are experienced in countries increasing beer consumption, but not in ones increasing wine consumption by volume per capita.
A theory that may explain this (apart from beer drinkers being more macho and reckless by nature than wine snobs) is the inclusion of (? sp) lupulin in beer which is hops - a sedative related to cannabis. So beer likely depresses ones responses more than wine though brewers are keen to spread a myth the hops aren't psychoactive. They are. Go to your chemist or health shop and buy a hops loaded insomnia remedy. Whoa... and then we have people steeping thc teabags in their beer or even their energy caffeine enhanced alcohol brews.
And service stations are selling no doz type stuff to impaired drivers as well.
Forum whore
http://www.etsc.eu/documents/copy_of...ory%20note.pdf
Check Norway out. Same population, much smaller roading infrastructure. 0.01 limit.
If a man is alone in the woods and there isn't a woke Hollywood around to call him racist, is he still white?
Hardcore Biker
In Norway I've heard theres a law like no more than 2 drink sales to any customer.. it's seagoing and full of sailors and had to get tough.
Forum whore
It's more to do with the huge suicide problems in Norway, largely due to the seasonal light patterns so depressants like alcohol are frowned upon socially and legally. Their suicide rate doesn't approach ours though. Something else to think about.
If a man is alone in the woods and there isn't a woke Hollywood around to call him racist, is he still white?
Hardcore Biker
Thanks for that.
I've just finished reading a fascinating book by Tom Vanderbilt called
TRAFFIC
Why we drive the way we do
(and what it says about us)
ISBN 978-0-307-27719-0
Recommended reading
"I don't like it, and I'm sorry I ever had anything to do with it." -- Erwin Schrodinger talking about quantum mechanics.
Forum whore
Most people seriously don't give a shit and really aren't that interested in understanding metabolic function. It's why there's so many fat people now.
The message is quite simple. Don't drink and drive. If we're not going to introduce the death penalty for the second offence at least allow cops to legally beat the shit out of anyone pulled over with excess breath alcohol more than once. That would work, provided we allow the cops to inflict crippling injuries that leave people in hospital recovering for months.
I don't have any patience with the waffling around the issue. Politicians and lobbyists split hairs about allowing people to operate a motor vehicle while under the influence of a depressant that alters mood, increases reaction times, and causes damage to internal organs including the brain like none of that matters. Because of my liver damage from my accident I'm almost somnolent after one beer. I'm sure there are many people out there in the same boat, perfectly legal to drive but functionally incapable after small amounts of alcohol. So I don't drink and drive but I have NO faith that my fellow Kiwi cares enough about other road users to exercise the same restraint.
Again, I don't suppose anyone gives a shit but do you have ANY idea what is like to drive about expecting the worst all the time (because it happens)? Every second I'm operating a vehicle, while still recovering from a bunch of injuries that have turned out to be much worse than expected? Should I be driving at all? Am I being irresponsible? I KNOW I'm thinking too hard because my fellow road user doesn't think like that and will happily get in a vehicle in whatever altered state they so choose to drive in. In the meantime I'm going to make room for cyclists and motorcyclists and take the abuse from other road users.
The biggest part of this whole mess is always left alone. Most people view driving as a casual right that requires no development as physical capabilities and vehicles change. My accident in January was my fault. I bought a hyper-sports machine that was many levels over what I'd been riding and I probably got bitten because I overreacted to a fairly common situation. I should've done some rider training and a bunch of ride days to get used to the new bike. I still don't know what happened really because I can't remember. All I know was that there was stock on the road immediately before the accident and the Cops found evidence of a collision with a sheep. So who is the fuckwit there then? Me. No one else seems to ride or drive with that attitude though, so therefore drink driving, killing cyclists and pediestrians, running reds and killing kids will remain a national pass time.
Harden up and give a fuck people. Stop arguing about the semantics of what quantity of which drug has the least effect on your driving or riding ability (honestly, you may have excellent machine control but you're still a shit rider/driver - accept that and the road toll will go down when you start doing something about it) and start riding or driving like everyone else out there is your dependant.
If a man is alone in the woods and there isn't a woke Hollywood around to call him racist, is he still white?
Den tha thriamvéf̱sei páno̱
My point regarding metabolism is that it reflects loudly on people who drive drunk in the morning after a hard night, and further regarding any limit at all, it is a huge factor that's not been addressed.
Off the top of my head - even the latest case 11am, the case prior 8am, our case midday, van kampen in the morning, another case mothers day.
Lowering limits essentially means you won't be drinking much the night before, or you will... and hope you don't crash, kill or get caught..
The first year after our crash I was in a severe fog I don't even know what happened then, I shouldn'tve been driving but who else was going to.
Jim, I do know what it's like to be in fear when driving, I can't travel too far as the sole driver because I am fearful for my kids safety or mine as their only remaining parent, with minimal support.
Can't go up north or down the southern isles for long holidays anymore because I feel quite exposed and I know how hideous a smash is.
I can't and won't ride my bike on the road, or pillion with anyone anymore - that joy has been stolen and it has screwed my love for attending rides and rallies, I watch people discuss these and feel complete envy.
Maybe these things will change one day, but I can't see it, just another in a long list of consequences and sacrifices.
Lowering limits legislation is not even on the table - it has been dismissed back in July.
However the debate has been pushed by those looking for an easy vote on an election campaign, a new editor at a paper, and a group pushing a 5+ prohibition plan - they're not bothered that we need more in place to support something like this.
It is not an easy subject, for more solutions you find more problems, and a HUGE problem is that half of what we do now isn't enforced with any meaning, it has been an extreme push to get this far.
But I agree with you - why are we told and know that we don't drink and drive if there is ANY limit at all. It negates the whole point.
The otherside of that is any limit won't prevent those that don't abide laws anyway, so this goes again back to enforcement and community involvement; catching or restricting those on the roads before harm's done. And enforcing the law when it is.
ter·ra in·cog·ni·taAchievement is not always success while reputed failure often is. It is honest endeavor, persistent effort to do the best possible under any and all circumstances.
Orison Swett Marden
Forum whore
You're an intelligent, caring, driven woman carrying a much bigger load than is feasibly possibly to most people. All I ask is that you try to understand that most people won't consider the arguments you put forth because they're simply beyond their capability for understanding and acceptance. Most people don't think about their interaction with other road users beyond having enough gas to get to work and bitching about people who cut them up.
All we can do is loudly make drinking and riding/driving socially unacceptable and lobby for it to be much harder and most importantly, VERY expensive to get a licence and even MORE expensive to get it back if you lose it. Shift the economic benefits from panelbeaters to rider and driving trainers. The only way to make people value anything these days seems to be through their pocket. Yes that doesn't address the utterly moronic or criminally insane, but too much focus is on those people. We need to focus on what we can change and that is primarily driver attitude. Where that can be changed is at the training level. Make it compulsory to be trained by training schools who primarily teach attitude and secondarily teach driving to pass your scratchy. Make it expensive.
Doing these things will have a much bigger impact on road tolls and attitudes than focusing on drink driving and speeding as the cause of all things bad on the road.
If a man is alone in the woods and there isn't a woke Hollywood around to call him racist, is he still white?
Den tha thriamvéf̱sei páno̱
Thanks, I appreciate what you say Jim, love how you get straight to the point!!!
When you look at the picture as a whole, it is too much to drive at once, each factor needs a sole focus and be driven by those impassioned and financial enough to do so.
I have been asked to support this and that over the years, each issue takes immense focus, as I'd prefer not to support something on someone elses say so, but to look further into it with an objective and knowledgable view.
In additition to creating awareness, being apart of education programs and researching solutions - last year I submitted a request for road safety classes in schools, I asked for regular relicensing and training, I further asked for maori road safety education because there's a clear culture difference and this should be acknowledged and worked on, I submitted what I did on limited knowledge and information but in a belief of what I felt important.
I know what I know on a particular subject within the whole spectrum, that has affected my family and others and I believe will prevent the same, if we didn't focus on this subject who would've? Nobody else had.
Those measures will be announced hopefully sometime after the 16th of December..
The focus given by myself and others similarly affected has driven these changes and that was the point of my choice of journey, these are the most significant changes to alcohol and driving in ten years.
Knowing what I do on processes - nobody can put all their efforts across the whole spectrum.
ter·ra in·cog·ni·taAchievement is not always success while reputed failure often is. It is honest endeavor, persistent effort to do the best possible under any and all circumstances.
Orison Swett Marden
Hardcore Biker
Yep these are the most significant change to drink drive laws in 10 years
Now we need to look at these baby killers as most safer journeys submitters said; http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crim...er-driver-on-P
The vast majority do try to drive safe, 99% aren't driving drunk or recklessly. I really relate to the paranoia others discuss and definitely limit my highway trips to avoid masacre by the nut jobs, and always take alternate routes to crash prone ones. I've installed a cage to block the dog into the back so it doesn't get killed by an impaired driver like my Mums which was killed too (2 grand of vet surgery later another funeral).
Agree with keep it simple but not so much a flat dont drink then drive message for all, as total zero limits have failed overseas, so don't drive drunk or impaired is the best message imo. As you say the biggest part is attitude, to get caring about other strangers as if they're dependent we need to relate the anti violence value to road safety from a young age.
Road safety education should not be look left then right or signal on your bicycle - it needs to be integrated into the early curriculum as a value of caring to both self and others. I know a lot of otherwise caring people who just cant seem to translate that into their road safety behaviour - they feel immune like a Mum I saw recently elect to drunk drive after much pleading not to from others because she "needed to be home for her kids".
Teen years are too late to make that penny of vulnerability and responsibility to wider society drop. Offenders are either mistake makers or else if incorrigible don't give a F. That starts early and is characterwise a global feature.
The debate and lobbying allows people with focussed awareness on a component of the problem to improve things, sometimes or more often than not here the partial solutions are in details or areas that tend to get ignored. If raising awareness on metabolism, excess power for experience & suchlike helps some people realise their risks with light bulb moments then its all good.
Whats the bet someone has read above posts and rethought something?
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