To think people over 80 should not drive

[TorridAntelope]

I don't care how bright and sparky they are, the stats show they are dangerous

I think this is very individual. I know several 80 year olds who are perfectly competent drivers. My Dad had to stop and niggled about it but it was the right thing. I have another family member who took the decision to stop himself. He felt that he wasn’t as sharp as he once was and it was time. I thought that was very sensible. Sadly I agree there are many elderly who absolutely should not be driving at all. Perhaps retesting at say 75 is the answer?

Can you please post your mobile number here in case some octogenarian needs a lift?

To add I would say the same about motobility vehicles. There is an elderly woman in my town who is an absolute menace and thinks the walkways are the M25. It’s a matter of time before she hurts others or indeed herself.

Serious question, if the worst did happen and your dad had an accident, do you think he could get away with minor injuries or recover from more serious ones?. It’s a matter of their own safety as well as others I think. At that age you’re frailer. You bleed much more and easier. Your body can’t take that force anymore.

How do you know they’re all over 60? The worst drivers I see on the roads are young men who seem to think they and everyone else is immortal.

It’s very ageist to propose a ban on all drivers over 80. I go to a yoga class where a member brought in cakes because it was her 80th birthday - everyone was shocked and the consensus was, we all thought she was mid to late sixties . Fitter and more switched on than many in their fifties and sixties . Why should she and others like her be banned on their 80th birthday?

No, that’s age discrimination, as you’ll discover when you’re a fit, alert 80 year old (like my mother) who has 60 years driving experience.

Don’t the stats show young men are dangerous drivers, which is why they have higher insurance premiums? Should all young men be banned from driving because some are dangerous?

A woman in her 40s rear-ended my poor partner when he was on the way to work last month. He'd saved up for years to buy the car and was so proud of it. We were also taking it to the airport the next day for a short break, so he'd registered it for airport parking. The amount of admin and phone calls he's had to do has been shocking.

When they both got out of their cars she started crying that she had been following so closely as she was feeling "so emotional" that day, and that she knew what she was doing but "just couldn't stop" herself.

Now that in my book is more dangerous than any older or teenage driver.

That is an odd way to look at it. If people can't drive they'll have to walk/get public transport - both have their own risks - particularly falling on ice etc.

I’ve never read a thread before where so many people are wanging on about “The Data” and “The Statistics” and “a large proportion of” without one person actually posting any reliable, verifiable data 😅

The stats also show that young men with a car full of their friends are dangerous. Let’s ban them as well.

@MyDeftDuck your example illustrates the problem perfectly. For every elderly person who is able to acknowledge they cannot drive safely anymore, there is another who stubbornly keeps going until they have an accident and are forced to stop

Insurance companies use data to determine premiums. The highest premiums are for young men, they start rising very gently for drivers over 70.

I think everyone who wants to drive a vehicle should be subject to yearly eye tests whether you are 17 or 97 as part of holding a valid driving licence.

Most accidents caused by 18-24 year olds. 🤷‍♀️

On that basis they probably shouldn’t be a passenger either.

There should be more checks and tests as we age.

My brother in law was killed outright when an 80 year old man with cataracts smashed into the back of the bin lorry.

My PIL have declined very quickly so even a fiver year retest wouldn't catch it.
MIL is now hunched with silicosis, can't twist or glance. She's also lost the eyesight in her right eye but is adamant the optician has said she's fine to drive like all the other one eyed drivers.
Their children. DH and siblings, know there's a problem because each phone call has some sort of pleading, emotional car dig like 'we took the scenic route, glorious' , 'the car is running so well' like it's a 1930s Lagonda not last off the production line Rover.
Whilst they can drive, there is no plan B - no taxi app, no electric scooter, no online grocery service, no compost heap when they can go to the tip.

Ageist bigotry again.

Everyone should have to prove driving competence every 5 years or so. And we should ban a lot more dangerous drivers for life.

Insurance premiums start rising more steeply after 80. My fathers premium has risen by 50% over 2 years (no claims made). He is 86. The insurance companies have the stats to know he is now as dangerous as a younger male driver.

He is more dangerous than a middle aged driver, because he is slower in his thinking and response time.

I think we naturally notice the young male idiots more easily because their stupidity is more noticeable. The 86 year old driver doing 70 on a busy motorway is less noticeable until he hits something or pulls into your path because he didn’t see you.

I've always thought that no matter what age you are, if you are convicted of causing a death by dangerous driving especially if drink or drug related, you should never be allowed to get behind the wheel of a vehicle again.

I watched a TV programme this week where an 81 year old man was killed on a crossing and was hit by some absolute shitbag who was not only driving like a maniac but was sniffing laughing gas. He was 20 years old.

The lengths this waste of space went to to hide being found out included using cloned plates and torching the vehicle.

Should have locked him up for life.

My 'prangs' and scrapes my PIL and my dad were involved in never show up in the statistics. Every single panel on the Rover has been repaired by Paul the loyal bodywork guy.

First my dad scraped the gate post, then he knocked it over which cured that but without that to guide him took out the ornamental tree in a big pot which luckily protected the patio doors.

Over those ten years, not one 'accident', at least ten, ended up recorded. And the rear end shunt with another vehicle that could have been so much worse was settled off record.

Actually the OP isn’t necessarily wrong on a per-mile basis.

There is a government report on older drivers (older defined as over 70). It has a graph of killed or seriously injured car drivers per billion miles driven. For men age 17-24 it’s about 150. For women aged 81 to 85 it looks like it’s just over 150. For women aged 86+ it’s 250.

So on a per mile basis a woman driver aged 86+ is about 66% more likely to be killed or seriously injured than a young male driver.

Of course an elderly woman is more likely to be seriously injured if in the same accident as a young man, so that is a factor.

it says the following (but I’m not sure what % of miles driven by this age group):

Overall older [thats 70+] car drivers accounted for around 10% of all casualties in collisions involving cars in 2024, though this proportion increases with casualty severity (as older drivers are more likely to be killed in collisions in which they are injured than drivers of other ages.

www.gov.uk/government/statistics/reported-road-casualties-great-britain-older-and-younger-driver-factsheets-2024/reported-road-casualties-in-great-britain-older-driver-factsheet-2024

Plenty of people don't or can't drive for whatever reason and they make their own arrangements in life.

If you are arguing that all over 80s shouldn't be allowed to drive as some of them are a higher risk then we should also raise the age to begin driving to 25. We should also ban everyone from driving for the first 2 years after they pass their test too.