When did drink driving become socially unacceptable?

[Globetrote]

Like the title says - when in the UK did it become unacceptable from a moral and social viewpoint? I see online that the first law with alcohol legal limits was introduced in 1967, but the first public campaign was earlier in 1964 and aimed at housewives to pressurise their husbands not to drink drive.

The reason I ask is this - I was born in another country with similar timeframes for drink driving laws/campaign, but my father regularly drove drunk. I remember it clearly in the 1980s when I was a child being petrified, car often swerving across lanes and he nearly passed out at the wheel, but he never got caught until about 20 years ago when he lost his license for 6 months (again, not in the UK/EU). He thought the it was hilarious to have to get the bus for 6 months, and had no shame.

I was talking to a friend and she said ‘oh everyone was drunk driving in the 80’s, you shouldn’t be bothered about it as it wasn’t just you.’

I knew what he was doing was wrong, I remember the public campaigns in my country, and I hear that they had similar here in England. Did people just not give a shit back then? When did attitudes start to change?

My father and I are NC now for many reasons, but it makes me angry how he played roulette with my life and that of others on the road and has no conscience about it - and then my friend just discounted my feelings about it like it was all nonsense and no big deal.

(parents were divorced and DM never knew until years later).

My generation found it unacceptable (generally) so that’s people learning to drive from mid 90s onward. My dad used to limit himself to 3 pints at the pub from around then(!). So that’s my experience.

I'm sure everyone drove over the limit in the 70s and early 80s. Not drunk like swervy and passing out drunk but I distinctly remember my Dad having more than a couple of pints in the pub and driving us home and our family friends were all the same.

My parents didn’t drive after even one drink by the 80s for sure. They took it in turns to do the driving after a night out. It is completely unacceptable in my circle of friends, I don’t know anyone who drinks and drives.

It was a big thing when I started driving (early 90's) but (still) a completely alien concept to my parents, especially my father who will still down a couple of pints before driving home. His response to me when (I was very early 20's) I said I was not drinking at a pub because I was driving 'bet you are not popular with the pub landlord'.

The 00s I'd say but some places it still hasn't hit yet

It’s something I always wonder about when watching American tv though. There are loads of programmes where people meet up in a bar by the roadside in the middle of nowhere, have a few drinks, then presumably drive home.

Mid to late 80s here

As others have said, when I passed my test in the mid 90s it was completely unacceptable among my peers, none of us would have dreamt of doing it. We either took it in turns to stay sober and drive, or we walked/got taxis/got the bus. Older people, particularly men, at the time still did it.

90s I'd say.

I remember hanging around at parties in the 80s where the adults (who included, teachers, doctors and the like) would drink then drive home. If they got caught the general consensus was : unlucky, God the police are a pain.

I think the mindset then around driving was different - more libertarian, more of a feeling like driving and parking as you wished was the default, rather than now where it's more something you have to ask permission for and that is highly regulated.

I'd say mid/late 80's. I was late teens then and when I learned to drive it just would never have crossed my mind to drink anything and drive so I'd say those younger than 50 now would have always found it socially unacceptable

Around mid 1990s I'd say. (Although I passed my driving test in the late 1990s and never thought about drinking and driving!)

My aunt used to come to our house once a fortnight (in the 1970s/1980s,) and would knock back 2 half tumblers of neat whiskey - would have been around 8-10 'shorts.'

I don't know how she was still standing after it, but nope, she was fine. She would leave the house after 1 and a half to 2 hours, get in her car, and drive 4 miles home. Madness that no-one said anything, or reported her. (I was only young and didn't get the enormity of it or how dangerous she must have been.) She NEVER had an accident though ... Pure luck IMO. (I don't think she caused one either, but I will never know!)

She died a decade ago aged 75... Not from cirrhosis of the liver oddly! She was dead one morning when my cousin checked in on her. Her death was reported as 'natural causes.'

It was unacceptable to me and my friends and family when we were learning to drive in the 1980s. Even my brothers who were general happy to float the law would never drink drive. My Dad carried on drink driving until probably the mid 1990s but he was cagey about it and I don't think he went crazy with it 🫤

I live in very small town in the countryside and it is still acceptable here. People think it’s funny. Nobody
lives more than a mile away from the two pubs here but pretty much everyone drives home after a few drinks. I actually thought they were all joking when I first moved here, but no, they really do drive home pissed.

I remember my dbro being banned for a year for drink driving in the early 90s and there was a real mixture of older people thinking he was either just unlucky to get caught or younger people thinking he was the devil incarnate. So I would think around early 90s attitudes started to shift.

When I started work in the late 80s, the older managers were still going to the pub for long lunches and a few pints then driving back in their company cars. I don't remember friends drinking/driving beyond one drink.

Agree with mid 90s. I remember someone about to drive home drunk after a teen party and we hid his keys.

Late 80s with most people below 40 not doing it.

Mid 90s got you to roughly the point where the only ones left doing it were older men (mostly) who also had to come up with assorted reasons why they should also be exempt from wearing seatbelts and the occasional younger bloke who thought he was smart because he did exactly what his Dad did.

According to DP, that timeline was stretched into the last decade in rural areas.

Driving whilst having a giant spliff though? That seems to be entirely normal for males under 35, going by the smell from every 4th-5th vehicle that goes by when I'm on my way to the bus stop (sometime between 6 and 7 in the morning).

I passed my test age 17 in 1988 and it was unacceptable then

During the 80s I’d say. Lots about car safety changed between the start of the 80s and the end of the decade. I learned to drive mid 90s and would never have even considered at any point drinking and driving.

I learned to drive early 2000s in the UK and it was definitely unacceptable by then. None of the older people at the pub I used to go to would do it and none of my friends would either. Drink driving was just something nobody did.

Then I moved to rural France… I’m still living there and it’s very common even now. I think it’s different in the cities and maybe with younger people - my DD and her friends all say they’d never drink and drive, hopefully they’ll stick to that.

I agree with it being around then. I was in my 20's.

Mind you, some time in the 70's my dad's friend ended up in prison for killing someone through drinking and driving, and the consequences were so awful for his wife and dc, and his victim of course, that I never drank and drove at all. Put me off for life.

I remember in the 80s doing it after a few pints. Now I live in Italy where despite the legal limit being lower than UK literally everyone does it and it's socially accepted. Suggest a taxi at they look at you like you're from a different planet! All my friends drive after several bottles of wine at lunch. Kids in the car too. I've given up trying to explain the dangers. The whole country is driving pissed.

I didn't know that it was!

Have I been asleep at the wheel ? (bad pun I know !)

I passed my test in 1989 and remember my mum making me promise to never drive after I'd had even 1 drink. I remember people in the early 80s driving after a few so it must have been sometime in between.
I'm in my 50s now and still won't drive after a glass of wine, I can hear my mother in my head!

I think when the Boomer generation gave way to Gen X. I'm Gen X and it's never been socially acceptable to drink and drive, but my DPs generation were really bad and still bloody do it.

It sounds like a mixed bag of responses as to when it became unacceptable.

No one has mentioned remembering being affected by being in a car with a drunk driver though so maybe most parents did this without their kids in the car too?