Mobile phones

[Horse]

it is possible to recognise and minimise the hazards involved and thus maintain safety. .

However, see the link I posted last night referring to brain activity and field of view. I would suggest that most drivers who choose to make cals don't actually know the effects it as on them, so an 'accurate' assessment and minimisation is unlikely to be achieved.

[angus]

Perhaps we should be looking instead at companies that encourage dangerous driving by putting pressure on drivers to complete journeys within a certain time-frame. I suspect many couriers use their mobile phones whilst driving simply because they don't have the time to pull over to make/take a call. As so many people these days live in constant threat of redundancy, it's no surprise that they feel they have no choice but to eat into their safety margins just to get the job done in time. But why go after a hard target, when you can go after the soft one?

This is more to the point

So how about the suggestion that employers be prosecuted too? if a courier/sales rep/other "professional driver" is caught taking a work related call, fine the employer. 1% of turnover per offence should concentrate the corporate mind

[jont-]

so our legislative approach is not to ban everything, but to ban what is wrong...

Hah. If only. Our legislative approach is to take populist knee jerk reactions that play well in the tabloid press.

[Matt1962]

it is possible to recognise and minimise the hazards involved and thus maintain safety. .

However, see the link I posted last night referring to brain activity and field of view. I would suggest that most drivers who choose to make cals don't actually know the effects it as on them, so an 'accurate' assessment and minimisation is unlikely to be achieved.

If this (most people don't know) is true then it is a good argument to put more effort into making people aware of the possible effects of hands-free use. It is not such a good argument to make such use illegal.

Brain activity/field of view - I would have thought this is completely dependent on the circumstances of the call? You would be 'using' your hands free device if you noted a caller name from the satnav screen, cancelled the call from the steering wheel button and then parked in a layby ASAP to call back (as I often do). Not sure your brain activity or field of view from a driving perspective would be greatly altered during this process?
A few seconds answering a simple question (e.g. When are you likely to get here? - the only sort of call I would contemplate continuing whilst actually driving) might alter brain activity I suppose, but as at this point I am consciously trying to prioritise the driving activity, I am not sure by how much?

[akirk]

The only way of stopping that is making a car into a closed cell (rather like a faraday cage?) where all signal fails - but that is a step beyond living real life as mentioned above - how do you stop a call coming into your passenger's phone from distracting you as a driver? If the passenger is having a conversation and you feel engaged (e.g. maybe passenger is spouse and a child is on the other end of the call), then surely you could have the same distraction as if you took the call?

Alasdair

[waremark]

You are absolutely correct and I would probably support treating hands-free the same as hand-held too. The only problem is that it would get even less compliance than hand-held has now so it would be pointless.

Have you considered why hands-free is not included in the legislation? Could it, perhaps, be [in no small part] because it is impossible to police?

Have you considered the ironic potential effect of banning the use of hand-held but not hands-free mobile phone use? It massively increased the prevalence of hands-free equipment, from bluetooth systems which are standard in a large proportion of cars to earphones which come with most (?) mobile phones. Many people, if not the majority of those on this forum, think it is fine to use hands-free mobile phones.

Banning the use of hand-helds and so increasing the prevalence of hands-free equipment may have actually increased the amount of phone use by drivers and hence increased the number of accidents due to the distraction from mobile phone use.

Do you agree?

[waremark]

My point, and I think it is the one that really divides the two 'factions' here, is not that hands-free is absolutely neutral with regard to driving safety, but that it is possible to recognise and minimise the hazards involved and thus maintain safety. Furthermore, mobile phone use in general and hands free in particular just might be overrated in it's importance with regard to the overall picture of driving hazards - this is why I am taking issue with some of the studies quoted.

Yes. And policemen on a shout, and Lewis on the track, do not normally crash because of their use of mobile communication equipment.

I seem to be the only one here admitting to making significant use of hands-free phones while driving - as I have been doing for 30 years. I wonder if it is coincidental that among my driving friends I am known for being one of the more talkative while at the wheel, and that I enjoy commentary? I also listen to a lot of talk radio, which I find at least as distracting. In both cases, it is the eyes off the road bit, initiating a call or selecting a station, which I find requires a great deal of care.

I think I would probably use a hands-free phone if not equipped for hands-free if it was not for the law not allowing it. When driving in convoy on one trip we used walky-talkies, which are not caught by the phone legislation.

I hope I am not going to be lynched - or, more seriously, being involved in a crash as a result of my mobile phone use.

[akirk]

to be fair, we are probably not a good demographic for any study into this as I suspect that many of us have more capability than the average driver...

the reality is that there will always be the law-abiding citizen who will comply with any law - you could ban hands-free and they would comply...
equally there will always be those who ignore the law - they still use hand-held and don't care, legislation does little to stop them
then there is the middle group and the legislation on hands-free is generally complied with because there is an easy alternative as above, most cars now have bluetooth etc. and it works seamlessly, so it is easier to comply than not comply as a call coming in is automatically answered through the car kit...

but... if you were to ban hands-free, i.e. make it all illegal, then I suspect that some of that group would as likely pick up their phones as it would become no more / no less illegal than hands-free... so it could be counter-productive!

Alasdair

[martine]

Isn't it the case that increasingly the research is showing all mobile phone use has a detrimental effect - hence the law should catch up. I quite agree enforcing the ban on hands-free use would be very difficult but it still might be worth doing as it sends the message (and I don't mean 'text'!): drivers need to concentrate on driving.

[Strangely Brown]

Banning the use of hand-helds and so increasing the prevalence of hands-free equipment may have actually increased the amount of phone use by drivers and hence increased the number of accidents due to the distraction from mobile phone use.

Do you agree?

Yes, I think that allowing hands-free use to continue after banning hand-held certainly contributed to the massive growth of bluetooth connection options, and associated use and the consequences thereof, but I am not sure that it wouldn't have happened anyway. I suspect that manufacturers would have added it "for non-UK markets" so UK legality is largely irrelevant - Cars do over 70mph don't they?