Drinking age / driving accident statistics

[Skyryder]

The lowering of the drinking age was not adopted as poicy by any party. It was a conscience vote. The same is true of raising the drinking age. MPs' can vote one way or the other.

The promoters of lowering the drinking age was the beer brewies led by Douglas Myers of Lion Nathan. They were concerned with falling market share (total industry beer sales) against the wine industry. The Buisness Roundtable went into top gear to ensure that as many MPs' as possible supported the lowering of the drinking age. Jenny Shiply was leader of the National Party and led drive for the drinking age to be lowered. The excuse was that education was the answer to drink problems.

If I had my way the age would be up'ed to 25, zero tolerance for driving and some jail time for drunk drivers.

And as for adults who supply minors.............wont tell what I'd do to those fuckers.


Skyryder

[gamgee]

it was also proven that as ice cream sales increased, the rate of homocides also increased
this was because increasing temperatures increased peoples desire for ice cream
the temperature also increased peoples stress levels, causing an increase in the rate of homicides
no link but the figures conveniently showed a trend

[Cookie]

WOW - who ever thought that lowering the drinking age would result in younger people getting drunk and driving.

It's like a bolt from the blue...

[snip]

It was a shock when I finally understood it too.

[festus]

15-25 age group for male drivers has always been a high risk high accident age group. Accident causes in this group have always been the same even before the lowering of the age limit for drinking, it's piss and/or speed. It has always been a factor in this age group and always will be.......

Only difference from years gone by are the faster cars and faster women....

[kro]

Statistics are like bikinis, what they reveal is suggestive, what they hide is vital.

People can come up with statistics to prove anything, 75% of all people know that !!!!

[scumdog]

it was also proven that as ice cream sales increased, the rate of homocides also increased
this was because increasing temperatures increased peoples desire for ice cream
the temperature also increased peoples stress levels, causing an increase in the rate of homicides
no link but the figures conveniently showed a trend

Get some grammar and punctuation - and stop eating ice-cream.

[scumdog]

In the USA the drinking age was dropped to 18, it caused so many problems that a lot of the states lifted it back to 21 (or 20 - o.k. I'm not sure) and some states dug their toes in and said "nup, leavin it at 18". (possibly influenced by booze barons?)
The US Government said "o.k. - but your getting no central government funding for the roads until you DO raise the age"

Guess what? They ALL raised the drinking age!

[oldrider]

The problem with laws that can not be policed is that sooner or later they become ineffective as a deterrent. Current situation, :spudwhat: No consequence. Who cares!
How many people are there who just don't care and have thousands of dollars of fines just wiped because they have no hope of ever paying them.
Drinking its self is a personal problem. There are enough laws dealing with behaviour, the drink is just a side issue.
How many recidivist drink drivers are out there now despite up to 10 convictions? making new laws is not the answer if they can not be policed.
Something needs to be done about the consequences for breaking current law.
I am of the opinion that the judicial system and the judges and lawyers are the biggest threat to law and order in this country today.
Cheers John.

[scumdog]

Judges are TOO soft, top fine first time up is $4,500 and 3 months prison, who can remember anybody going up for a first drink-driving offence that got more than a few hundred dollars fine and the mandatory 6 months disqualification (and then I bet there wouldn't be THAT much disqualification if it wasn't MANDATORY)
When was the last time a Judge ever got burgled or rammed by a drunk driver etc?????
Cops do their best and often think "why the eff do I bother?"

[Skyryder]

Just out of curiosity can any tell me if you are caught driving over the legal alcohol limit does section 3(a) of the Land Transport Act 1988 apply. Is this offence an instant loss of licence like speeding 51+?



Skyryder

[scumdog]

Just out of curiosity can any tell me if you are caught driving over the legal alcohol limit does section 3(a) of the Land Transport Act 1988 apply. Is this offence an instant loss of licence like speeding 51+?

Skyryder

I dunno 3 (a), but over 800 is instant 28 days loss of licence - and over 160 on blood count.

[Lou Girardin]

The other issue is the Anglo-Saxon compulsion to drink till you're legless, then go looking for trouble. It's very uncommon in Europe for example.
Fix this and you'll fix a lot of our booze problems.

[mops]

[double post]

[Hitcher]

New Zealanders can't handle our piss. There's no surprise in that, based on generations of statistics and good old anecdotal evidence. Pushing the legal drinking age back out to 20 solves nothing until we all learn to co-exist more peacefully with each other and with alcohol.

[mops]

having don advanced statistics at the uni, we had a whole lecture on 'manipulating' data in terms of statistics and graphs and from there on I never trust public media stats or graphs, as they can be presented in any light you want - yes, to a degree, but still....

problem in NZ is that people have to have to drive a car, as the public transport is F*** useless. Where I come from notmally you get a car if you have a family, otherwise excelent public transport can get you anywhere, anytime and quick for ridicolously small cost.... and you can be drunk, etc... try to do that in NZ, particulary Auckland.

incerasing drinking age wont fix the problem
education - surly a good thought, but who will do that, to whom, how to enforce that (with a test ?) and most importantly who will pay for it ?

you ppl do dum things... sometimes more, sometimes less, no cure for that.

ig you are concerned with drink driving, make penalties hards and reduce limit to 0... thats right... no F**** excuses... if you plan to drink you have to plan it so you dont need to use a car. I'm talking about jail time and loss of license and fines. no 'special conditions licenses' for ppl who drive vehicles for living. too harsh ? well you want to reduce drink driving or what ?

on the bottom of that nzherald articles it also states that more youn ppl have cars and they drive more, so it is possible that this age group drives, drove say 40% (pulled that value out of a finger) more kilometers than they did in 1999, while number of accidents incerased by 20%... now those staistics have completly opposite meaning....

go figure....

[edited to correct spelling mistakes]