What can be done about the use of mobile phones?

[V10leptoquark]

speedking31 said:

Surely the thing that will hurt is to immediately remove the offender's phone for say a week.

A lot of the 'determined offenders' will always carry two phones.
When asked by the police to provide their phone for evidence, they simply hand over a dormant phone that hardly gets any use, and would never get used in the car anyways.
Whilst they carry on offending with their primary phone in the car.

[Hoofy]

V10leptoquark said:

speedking31 said:

Surely the thing that will hurt is to immediately remove the offender's phone for say a week.

A lot of the 'determined offenders' will always carry two phones.
When asked by the police to provide their phone for evidence, they simply hand over a dormant phone that hardly gets any use, and would never get used in the car anyways.
Whilst they carry on offending with their primary phone in the car.

Search them then.

[speedking31]

V10leptoquark said:

A lot of the 'determined offenders' will always carry two phones.
When asked by the police to provide their phone for evidence, they simply hand over a dormant phone that hardly gets any use, and would never get used in the car anyways.
Whilst they carry on offending with their primary phone in the car.

That's still an extra cost and inconvenience to make sure you have that available at all times. And couldn't the PC look at the recent call list / messages / does the phone have the facebook app, and determine that that wasn't the phone that was in use.

And if they want to carry on then they will have to source another second phone or reclaim their original second phone, which is more inconvenience.

[anonymous-user]

If someone is caught on their phone the police should be given their authority to take control of their social media accounts and employ a "Head of Social Media Embarrassment" who can then make tweets/updates etc from the persons account for two weeks and then they can pay to have the access back. money going to a local charity.

Or just chop off the hand of a loved one.

[oyster]

V8RX7 said:

Remind me how much have accident stats increased since mobiles came out ?

The answer is - they haven't

I'm not saying they don't cause a few accidents but it is no where near the hysteria that surrounds them.

OP - on a daily basis how many accidents do you see on your commute being surrounded by all these phone users ?

What an odd post.
You start by suggesting accident stats haven't increased because of mobiles, then you admit they do cause a few accidents - which is it?

[av185]

speedking31 said:

Surely the thing that will hurt is to immediately remove the offender's phone for say a week.

I agree entirely but it will never happen.

Phones and essential instalife is now a basic human right.

As prisoners have confirmed some years back.

[Bobberoo99]

Anybody who thinks it's remotely acceptable to use your phone while driving just needs to look at this and think about how you'd feel if it was your family!!
https://news.sky.com/story/a34-crash-lorry-driver-...

[telecat]

Bobberoo99 said:

Anybody who thinks it's remotely acceptable to use your phone while driving just needs to look at this and think about how you'd feel if it was your family!!
https://news.sky.com/story/a34-crash-lorry-driver-...

He could Have been scrolling though his music on a lot of Infotainment systems so it does not really apply. The Thing is He has a bigger responsibility in a Vehicle that is bigger and more difficult to use than most on the road. He needs to be doing it better than the rest of us and he didn't. This though is not down to Phone use it's down to lower quality drivers in these vehicles.

[surveyor]

There is not an answer that will work at present. Ultimately though its a technological problem.

Carplay and Screen mirror are on the way to a soloution. But lets go further... let's put a charging dock in an armrest. Let it automatically connect without needing technical know how when it's in there. If it's taken out with the engine on, let's lock the screen until the engine is off.

none of the other stuff will work.

[HTP99]

Today following a Mercedes SLK which was doing 65 in the outside lane of the A3, I had, had enough so pulled into L2 and breezed by, looked over, her head was down and she was clearly typing on her phone.

[Countdown]

telecat said:

He could Have been scrolling though his music on a lot of Infotainment systems so it does not really apply. The Thing is He has a bigger responsibility in a Vehicle that is bigger and more difficult to use than most on the road. He needs to be doing it better than the rest of us and he didn't. This though is not down to Phone use it's down to lower quality drivers in these vehicles.

Anybody who uses a phone whilst driving is, by definition, a "lower quality" driver.

[deadslow]

Hoofy said:

V10leptoquark said:

speedking31 said:

Surely the thing that will hurt is to immediately remove the offender's phone for say a week.

A lot of the 'determined offenders' will always carry two phones.
When asked by the police to provide their phone for evidence, they simply hand over a dormant phone that hardly gets any use, and would never get used in the car anyways.
Whilst they carry on offending with their primary phone in the car.

Search them then.

yes, compulsory full cavity search ought to get the right message across.

[Bobberoo99]

Let's be honest here, the only real deterrent is an instant 3 month ban and a £2000- £5000 fine, hit people where it hurts and they'll soon get the message, it will never make it through parliament though as the self serving pillocks pretending to run the country will stop it.

[Sa Calobra]

I've been on the phone handsfree before discussing an issue. Beit personal or business it DOES distract you as it can give you anxiety or require you to negotiate, discuss or come up with solutions.

That is distracting. You might say most of your calls are light-hearted non business but not all.

Therefore for me all hands free should be banned.

Anyone saying otherwise, yes your eyes are looking where you are going but your mind has taken on new tasks.

When I cycle I look down and see multiple people texting as they pass me.

Only banning cars from the road will stop people doing this.

[The Surveyor]

Sa Calobra said:

I've been on the phone handsfree before discussing an issue. Beit personal or business it DOES distract you as it can give you anxiety or require you to negotiate, discuss or come up with solutions.

That is distracting. You might say most of your calls are light-hearted non business but not all.

Therefore for me all hands free should be banned.

Anyone saying otherwise, yes your eyes are looking where you are going but your mind has taken on new tasks.

When I cycle I look down and see multiple people texting as they pass me.

Only banning cars from the road will stop people doing this.

There are different levels of 'distraction' though.

I drive a lot, I use my phone a lot when I'm driving. My car has a Bluetooth hands-free kit and my phone stays in my bag in the back of the cars so all calls are made or answered using the same screen as the sat-nav, music player, or radio. For me, making a call is not significantly distracting and for the avoidance of any doubt, I don't use my phone for anything other than those calls whilst driving.

The problem here is the view that 'all' phone use should be banned when that simply isn't practical. I'd argue it isn't necessary either.

The main beef on here is people who text, email, blog, or sort their music out whilst driving and whilst holding their phone, constantly looking down at the screen to the point that their driving becomes a secondary activity. That to me is a much more significant distraction than simply talking on a phone, and that significant distraction is already banned.

We don't need more rules, we simply need more police enforcing the existing ones.

[anonymous-user]

What gets my goat is drink driving is treated like the plague, and have even half a pint and every mum and dad on the land will put you under the guillotine - but the same mums & dads are driving along typing bloody messages on their phones and wandering all over the lanes.

Only a couple of days ago I followed a mum in slow moving traffic texting away. Massive gaps in front - zooms up. texts again, this time whilst rolling along.

It really needs to be made socially as unanceptable as drink driving, and that happened through a TV campaign.....

[av185]

The Surveyor said:

We don't need more rules, we simply need more police enforcing the existing ones.

Will never happen though even with the possible 20k extra police.

The only way forward as others have said would be to make it totally socially unacceptable.

Non police submitting evidence via phone pics, dashcam footage etc could be the only viable solution.

[505diff]

Saturday M11, southbound between junction 9-8, long queue at in lane 2 running at 40 mph, up ahead fked DAF 7.5 tonne horse box in lane one and part of lane two, leaning to one side, on the back sign written in big font, ‘think horses’ as I finally pass, woman driving is on a mobile. How predictable, bet she has all the ‘POLITE’ gear to wear on the horse on the road as well.