Why not the maximum sentence - or is it?

[thirdcrank]

Obviously, I've no data about this and by its very nature, it's not the sort of thing that is easily counted. I'll offer the sums regularly bandied about by the ABI about the extra cost of insuring a motor vehicle caused by uninsured drivers ie, the amount paid out by the ABI to compensate people who suffer injury or damage when the guilty party is either uninsured or not identified (often having failed to stop to avoid identification.) There may be some who want to protect their NCB and others who are trying to avoid identification of somebody else's partner in the vehicle etc but I fancy a majority are disqualified drivers.

We've also had a link (from irc?) about the high number of automatic number plate (ANPR) recognition hits which are not followed up. Some will have been things like mucky plates or cherished plates with irregular characters, but I fancy plenty will be uninsured vehicles etc.

Also, re road safety, to have somebody driving round with a built-in motive for trying to evade the police is "an accident waiting to happen."

First hit on a search for "cost of uninsured drivers UK"

Motor insurance: uninsured drivers cost us £2bn a year

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/pers ... -year.html

[Bez]

Usual estimates are that around 3% of drivers are uninsured and/or untaxed; not sure of the figure for unlicensed/banned (I would expect it to be lower but not negligible).

I once set about working out whether, given an objective assessment of the risk of punishment for being caught uninsured, it made financial sense for an average driver to buy insurance.

https://beyondthekerb.org.uk/2013/12/17 ... omparison/

[thirdcrank]

To anybody still actively following this thread, I'd invite them to think about the following.

Imagine that the defendant in this case behaves well enough in prison to be released (probably conditionally in some form or other.) Bearing in mind resource constraints and pubic attitudes towards police surveillance, how would they suggest compliance with a driving ban should be ensured? Ditto, for the rest of his life?

(And before anybody mentions it, AFAIK they are still keeping an eye on Mr Assange.)

[Bez]

Well, there's already the suggestion of a sufficiently strong deterrent rather than surveillance. No solution is watertight, and obviously without changing legislation and/or vehicle technology (eg fingerprint readers) there's not all that much that can be done. So those things are arguably ripe for change.

But the argument that lifetime bans are pointless because people will inevitably violate them has to extrapolate to all bans being pointless for the same reason. Either a lifetime ban is no less reasonable in principle than any other ban, or we might as well stop banning people and do something else instead. I'm not implying one answer or the other, but it should be borne in mind that keeping the most dangerous drivers off the road is probably an aim we can all agree is worthwhile, and that doing so is far more a means of protecting others than it is of punishing the offender.

There is, of course, no easy answer, nor any perfect one. Pending any better option I still tend to favour the "drive badly and get a ban; violate a ban and the punishment verges on draconian" approach.

[thirdcrank]

... But the argument that lifetime bans are pointless because people will inevitably violate them has to extrapolate to all bans being pointless for the same reason. Either a lifetime ban is no less reasonable in principle than any other ban, or we might as well stop banning people and do something else instead.....

Just to spell out my own position clearly:

I think that the threat of a ban is effective against people I've already described as bourgeois. That's been the success story of the breathalyser. Beyond that, I think that the success of disqualification is in the eye of the beholder, ie those bourgeois who would comply with a ban and assume that compliance is general are glad something is being done and at little cost. I'm also pretty confident that in most cases, it's pretty much bad luck that leads to a conviction for driving while disqualified. As fewer police resources are directed towards "roads policing," so the odds against being caught lengthen.

On the issue of lifetime bans, I'll throw in that they were ruled a breach of civil liberties almost fifty years ago. Prior to that, we used to have repeat offenders with bans similar to American prison sentences, measured in hundreds of years. On a personal note, I discussed this at the time with a family member of one of the people appealing to whichever European Court. They told me that the person in question was only appealing because while the appeal was in progress, it extended their remand privileges. The person in question had never bothered about bans in the past and wasn't going to bother about them in the future, no matter what the decision from Europe.

Not strictly relevant to this thread, but at least in respect of totting up, the deterrent effect of the threat of disqualification is undermined by the "hardship" loophole and the growing feeling that it's easy to avoid a ban.

[Bez]

On the issue of lifetime bans, I'll throw in that they were ruled a breach of civil liberties almost fifty years ago.

Don't suppose you can dig up a link to an online reference?

They do occasionally crop up. Almost always for elderly people with medical conditions, but I can think of one (Dennis Putz in 2010) which wasn't.

[horizon]

Not strictly relevant to this thread, but at least in respect of totting up, the deterrent effect of the threat of disqualification is undermined by the "hardship" loophole and the growing feeling that it's easy to avoid a ban.

Personally I haven't argued for the deterrent effect. I see disqualification as a simple matter of keeping unsuitable people off the road (assuming it is or can be enforced). The earlier in the driving career of the unsuitable person this is enacted the better but even after a serious accident it still makes sense.

[thirdcrank]

As a general answer to bez and horizon:

It's always been possible to reach the minimum age to hold a licence and already have what I'll term pre-existing licence endorsements. These would normally be the result of things like joyriding, or riding about on a clapped-out moped. In spite of all the court diversion policies known to mankind, there are still some people who enter the court system aged 10 and are then never out of it. Less priority given to roads policing probably means that these cases are fewer now than formerly, simply through fewer detections.

I'm pretty sure that the European court case I mentioned made it into the Criminal Law Review; my memory here is based on knowing about the named defendant made me more interested in reading about it. I had no direct involvement - he lived locally and I had some sort of enquiry at his house. I'm annoyed that I cannot remember the name of the defendant here, it's one of those tip-of-my-tongue things. Unless I'm jumbling memories, the case which resulted in the appeal to Europe involved taking something big and slow like a road sweeping truck and driving it about in a slo-mo "pursuit" all over the place. The point is this, current sentencing guidelines don't include lifelong driving bans and AFAIK, the underlying thinking is that it's wrong to take away somebody's hopes by throwing away the key, even if it's only the ignition key.

PS I find that any internet search on something like this is thwarted by ads from learned friends offering to represent me.

[[XAP]Bob]

Given how ready the DVLA are to revoke people's licenses in the event that they have a reportable medical condition *despite* the support of their GP I struggle to see why a second 'dangerous driving' conviction shouldn't result in the same.

I'm not necessarily advocating a lifetime ban on first offence, but by the time you are *convicted* of *dangerous* driving *twice* then I think that it's pretty easy to suggest that they simply shouldn't be on the road at all...


Actually I'd rather have a graduated, short, licensing scheme, with the opportunity to 'graduate' to more powerful engines (possibly with bonus speed on motorways?) and the opportunity to be relegated back down the scheme for road offences. Licenses wouldn't be lifetime either - they should be reapplied for, and retested for, on a regular basis (5 years?).

At that point you aren't throwing away the key - you might ban them from every having a hit powered vehicle, or just relegate them for 18 months....

[Username]

Where is that proof? I hope you don't actually believe that a 34 year old man is not capable of change. I have known men with serious offences under their belt in their younger years who turned it around later on. We're talking similar offence in one case but he rehabilitated and completely got on with being a.productive member of society. I really didn't know he used to be a case like this guy.

Another guy was a heavily into hard drugs and prison. His thing was violence. Preference was for kicking the **** out of squaddies on a night out (plural he was a hard nutcase on drugs who didn't care what happened, still always walked away). Family man, regular employment for 20 years now and one of the hardest/most reliable workers in that company.

So I ask you again, what evidence is there that he is not capable of rehabilitation?

Point taken, but if he is capeable of being rehabilitated, then he needs to have shown it. Like in your example about 20 years of hard work. However such processes will inevitably be progressive. I would not hand him a license to operate machinery because he put in 2 months of good work. A person needs to show long term improvements. But even then I would be fearful of a relapse or something.

Bottom line, if someone is capable of change, they need to actually do it before being given privileges or trust. An indefinite ban is applicable here.