An expert panel is to advise the government on whether to create a new offence in relation to drug driving.
The panel is to look at whether taking any amount of drugs should constitute an offence or if it is possible to introduce maximum levels for different drugs, which would be similar to drink-driving limits. The action comes as the Prime Minister admitted that the government had not yet tackled the issue of drug driving which is a factor in hundreds of deaths and injuries on the country’s roads every year.
Last year Sir Peter North produced a government report which advocated taking much tougher action to try and tackle the issue which, as the law stands, is very difficult for the police to implement. At the present time, though driving while unfit through drugs is an offence, they have to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the driver was impaired because of the drug. However, they can’t get a screening test, which requires a blood sample, until the driver has been seen by a doctor and it is often not possible to quickly get a doctor to go down to the station.
The experts, who will start their work in the spring, will not look at a ban on driving when under the influence of medications such as painkillers or sleeping tablets, but they will look at applying the existing impairment law to some prescribed or otherwise legally obtained drugs. Jo Bullock from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents welcomed the action as a step forward in the fight against drug driving which will help the police catch and convict those responsible.
