The law says you can not legally pass a vehicle that is sitting on the speed limet. So why is this not obeyed or policed.
Gps is not revelent to turns of wheel distance due to roadside interferance.
Most drivers see 5-10 over what their speedo says is ok but this causes leap frogging, according to the law this is illegal.
Why are road rules are only partially adhered to.
I say if people adhered to the road rules we woud have nill deaths and nill broken cars.

I wasn't aware of this law Doog. There are a lot of bad drivers on the road, and often they are a risk to other drivers. It seems that our societies have lost the gentle social pressure on good behavior that creates stability, and it's everyone for themselves. If you can hurt someone, it puts you ahead in this narcissistic system (narcissism seems notoriously difficult to define or assign). Most of the time I'm happy to let these idiots hurt themselves by staying out of their way, I'm not the police. But sadly the police often seem to be in all the places that you don't want them to be.

Many drivers don't give way when changing lanes, don't leave two car lengths or two seconds between vehicles, impede the flow of traffic by not driving at the speed limit or driving in the overtaking lane. Sometimes you see idiots driving side by side along the freeway at ten kilometres below blocking vehicles.

Sometimes ethnic conflict finds it's way onto the roads, the sort of "you're not the boss of me" Anti-Uncle Tom adolescent attitude.

My attitude is usually to let these idiots hurt themselves, it's sad that our two tier legal system seems to let these people off the hook, but even with our irresponsible governing framework playing "slalom with icebergs", these drivers looking for a fight will find one, and their insurance company's will laugh at them

As with most things society, Road rules too are a mentality issue ! Only the other day I drove in a 110km/h & still people were overtaking.

The ability of driving is an art form. To drive to the prescribed road signs of permissible speed limits.
So why is it so hard to achieve.
Urgent driving is illegal. Our roads are a life or death situation.
Accidents are not a forgone conclusion, they are created.
So why do we have accidental accidents By law. Far to common.
A common site is a vehicle approaching from behind of a vehicle that is on the speed limit gets the urge to pass the car on the speed limit. Which is illegal. So why do it. To me that is allowing your rear vision mirror to control your driving. Our roads are not being used as prescribed and penalties are far from adequate and speeding drivers need that cause accidents need to be accountable for murder.

Why is the speed limit determined by some bureaucrat in head office considered right? Why is 60 in a 60 zone perfectly safe and 61 in a 60 zone inherently unsafe

60 km/h is easy to do as it is easy to do 61 km/h. the necessity to do over the speed limit is disrespectful.
The road rules are set so everybody has a fair go at getting into the flow of traffic.
Speeding cars, tailgaters, and those that continually drive in the fast lane are all disrupting the flow of traffic.
Speed limiting trucks has failed, we need black boxes installed in all new cars. The road toll is getting bigger year by year something has got to give.

60 km/h is easy to do as it is easy to do 61 km/h.
door,
other way round. I don't know about others but i find it ludicrous to have to focus more on my speed than on the road. It's easy to look into the rear vision mirror or at the traffic & find yourself a few K's over the limit plus, the GPS speed varies from the odometer indicated speed. Drive a tiny bit slower & someone overtakes & bam, there goes the concentration on the speed & right away your 5 K's over the limit or under. Speed signs are an indicator for supposedly safe driving but that goes out the window if some impatient galah cuts in front of you or doesn't let you change lane to head for your exit road. I've found traffic Police pretty good, it's the Cops who act so unforgiving.

I think of how much safer our vehicles are for the sake of motor racing. What irks me is people speeding on modified scooters. I remember one kid killed a few years back for the sake of a faulty brake.

So no explanation as to why 60 is safe and 61 unsafe?

In fact the safest speed is what the surrounding traffic is doing. Controlled studies have shown that doing somewhere between 95% and 110% of the posted speed limit is the safest speed. Most speed accidents occur outside that range, especially accidents causing death.

We should also note, in regards to doog's belief that doing the government mandated speed will reduce road deaths to zero, that not all accidents are speed related. Indeed the number is less than 50% being speed related and even that number is dodgy since it counts all accidents that had speed as a factor as being caused by speed.

And if we are getting into issues of a few kilometres/hr, ignore GPS which cannot calculate down to that precision. Then again, neither can your odometer.

If authorities were indeed concerned about reducing road fatalities & carnage/infrastructure damage etc. then why permit the production of vehicles capable of high speed ?
Make cars that simply can't go over the maximum speed limit. Also, do away with so many different limits that only confuse & irate drivers. 50-55km/h in town & 110 km/h on the open road. We can never totally avoid fatalities but the can be reduced in number. After all, there are such things as accidents & stupidity. Speed freaks can assemble at raceways !
Spend the available funding on nurturing a healthier mentality instead of Arts & all the other silly things tax Dollars are wasted on. i don't care what anyone thinks but to my thinking mentality is the key to just about everything to do with a decent society !
get rid of that evil that is DEI.

Peter Walsh, minister in the Hawke government and said to be the last true socialist to be in parliament, once opined that governments really don't want to slow traffic down as they claimed.

If they really did, he said, they'd stop repairing potholes.

When the black box comes into being maybe then we can get people to obey the designated speed limit. GPS is not a lawful gauge for speed turns of the wheel is the best gauge. It is your responsibility to get your speedo checked, instead of making excuses.
Who is in charge of setting the road speed? the road signs tell you what you are looking for.
Speeding drivers are driving fines and speed cameras. A subject that should be thousands more of. Every body all of a sudden knows where their speedo is when approaching a known camera, an act that lasts as long as it takes to be out of range only. Speeding is a deliberate act.
Trucks on the Calder are doing 2 trips / day from Geelong to Mildura carting grain. A job that was done by train one train 4000 tonn of grain. Trucks 60 tonn / trip. Not responsible.

There are a lot of persons that use car parks as speed ways marked at 20 km/h. Arrogance at it's best.
Serial offenders of road rules need to be taken off the road and re educated and if that fails off the road for life.
Fines are inadequate and need to be at a level that has real deterrence no smoking, no eating, no excessive noise, Every person driving needs to be 100% responsible at all times.

Caravaners driving like the caravan does not exist. When they come to grief the caravan ends in a pile of junk. Heading to Blackall a caravan left his second axle on a cattle grid. The driver said he was trying to catch up with his mate that left Melbourne the day before he did.

School holidays just another reason to have wholesale carnage on the roads from drivers that have very urgent driving skills or think they have more right on the roads than others.
The best part of going somewhere is the scenery, instead of creating large doses of anxiety, by wanting to be the first in a line of traffic setting a bad behaviour with kids on board.

doog,
I can't stop repeating that mentality is the cause of all this. This poor mentality could be drastically improved by the introduction of a National Service. 18months -24 months in that service will open eyes & mind & an appropriate appreciation for the privilege of being part of this society ! Driving would be one of the biggest winners.

I agree with Indyvidual that the undisciplined behavior on the roads is a symptom of a wider problem of discipline. This is an indication of a lack of leadership. John Kennedy was a democrat, perhaps not very well known for their discipline, (but he was perhaps redeemed as a Christian Catholic), however he was correct when he said "that we don't do it because it's easy, but because it's hard".

In the days of national service kids were leaving school at a far younger age like 16 years old, as i did and became apprentice.
School leavers are now expected to stay in school until 18 years old.
That was the age of national service.
Either apprentice or national service teaches respect for leaders and time keeping. Now there is neither, we have adult apprentice and no national service.

Turn signals. The recommended distance is 30 meters before you turn. So where did that go. Sometimes you get 2 flashes then turn. A good reason to stay back. You leave half a car spacing and someone will want to get into it.
How often do you see drivers after negotiating a roundabout drive up the bike lane, instead of getting the idea of what a steering wheel; is all about

I found the restricted PPL in the 70's here easier than a Driver's license back in Europe in the 60's.
Instead of concerning themselves with the age of drivers, authorities should focus on drivers' mentality ! I have yet to hear of 80 year olds driving as badly as 20 year olds.
If it can be established that a prospective driver has a history of drug abuse or criminal activity their age for obtaining a license should automatically go up to 25.
Only when laws get tougher on culprits than on innocent bystanders will mentality improve.

With the requirement for new drivers to have 120 hours behind the wheel in all conditions is useless if you are being instructed by corrupt drivers It's monkey see monkey do situation.
I say we need the total driver experience to be undertaken by professional driving instructors where accountability can be undertaken for their product.
Black boxes are the go to equipment to pull traffic movement into line with road rules.
More cameras and trip meters are being required because of corrupt drivers on our roads.

Roundabouts are always problematic why? because you only get right of way if someone else gives it to you.
Who knows what the recommended roundabout speed limit is? 15 kmph.
Women with infants in the car should take that as gospel because an infants brain does not fit the size of the skull. I say that has a lot to do with the uptick of autism in kids. That is just another reason to obey road rules.

Uncompliant drivers are the scourge of out roads, wildlife are a causality far to often blamed for carnage that could be avoided. You do not swerve to save the life of an animal and kill yourself or other innocent persons in the illegal maneuver.
Kangaroo signs are everywhere in AU so why do you not expect a kangaroo to cross a road at any time. Stick to the speed limit designated by the road signage.

Track risky road behaviour trends across Australia and each state and territory. Includes drink driving, drug driving, speeding, mobile phone and seatbelt non-compliance and unlicensed driving.

For the 12 months ending August 2025, the states that experienced the most road deaths were New South Wales with 375 (16.1% increase on previous 12 months), followed by Queensland with 311 (7.2% increase). Australian Capital Territory had the lowest number of deaths in the past 12 months, with 8 (14.3% increase).

So far in 2025, the greatest number of deaths have occurred in New South Wales with 251 (24.3% increase), followed by Queensland with 206 deaths (4.6% increase).

The fatality rate was 4.7 for the 12 months ending December 2024 and was 1.2% higher compared to the previous calendar year.

Serial offenders on our roads should not be there, confiscate their cars crush them. The word hoon applies to a lot more than young persons.
There are a majority of constant offenders that think they have the right to be above the law. What makes a person think that way.
Driving with urgentsy is best left to the ones that help out persons that come to grief and need scraping off the road like common road kill.

The biggest blights in town areas is not thinking where you are going the car stop lights come on before the indicator light comes on.
A very good reason not to tailgate. The legal distance to put your intentions on is 30 meters before you turn.
Licensed drivers are responsible for their actions while driving.
So it's about time the law follows those rules to the limit.
The speed limit is the limit without exceptions.
If you do not believe your speedo get it checked and do not drive by sat nav which is not legal. Sat nav was designed for space, interference by roadside trees interferes with sat nav intermittent signals.
That is not an excuse for speeding.

If you are being taught to drive and your instructor is a serial offender of road rules how does this happen to be ok.
There thousands of guilty drivers out there that at risk of deliberate murder.
When you have a collision it is essential that you stop and check for damage as well as clearing the road of obstructions for other drivers.
Today all of that is hit and run.
What makes someone to leave the location of an accident whether it be animal or human.
Absolute guilt of what has happened.

There is a lot of seriously guilty persons out there. The police force needs to stand up and do proper policing. Or else the situation will just get worse.
Leapfrogging, tailgating, passing over double lines, Urgent driving, red light runners, turning left on yellow, passing a vehicle sitting on the speed limit, indicators applied far to late late or after the fact, serial speeding, Alcohol, drugs, idiots, hit and run, Policing is a problem they catch one in 10 thousand. We need far more technology and surveillance on out roads.

Lets surmise why persons may act like maniacs on the roads, Maybe it's an indebtedness reaction, A making of their own trying to keep up with the top ten while slipping into further debt.
There has got to be more involved than just wanting to be first in a conga line of traffic.
Every driver has to absolutely focus on the driver coming in the opposite direction, you would not know what is their problem or status of mind is.
Drunk ,drugged, or just irresponsible.
Whatever the decisions made while driving have to change.
Grossly inadequate penalties are a sign that offenders do not care.

Does anyone worry about road deaths. I would say no. As long it is not them in the news. It is easy come easy go.
Society is not what it used to be. since females decided that they need to work to be part of socialistic society the balance of society has changed for worse.
Million $ houses are now the norm. Where does that leave persons with out partners.
One partner working to pay for house and another to live off. So where is the gain.
The losers are kids raised by govt institutions that are corrupt which adds nothing to society.
Men will not marry anymore, women have surrender to self entitlement rather than being a home builder and child raiser. A complete loss of focus of what it takes to be a society.
All of this reflects of what we see on our roads.

15 year old school kid killed crossing at a controlled intersection and a 40 km zone at 8.30am today. What went wrong, to early to say. A delivery truck hit the kid.
Impatience is the name of the game. Driving with urgency rather than driving within the designated speed limit.
Speedsters might as well be driving blindfolded.
50 kmh means a maximum of 50 kmh. Anything else is disrespectful to the persons that live in that street.
Carnage and downright entitlement has got to change.

Eating, drinking, telephones, animals, in the vehicle are distractions so why do it. Do you think you have entitled powers that others do not.

When you have a presumed clear road ahead does not give you any right to exceed the speed limit.

Do the right thing for others that have delayed passage into the traffic because you were speeding.

Speed limits are there to give equal share of the road to all drivers.
Entitlement is not a lawful code, it is ignorance, disrespect, and against the law.

Very sloppy driving skills are practised every day. The will to drive safely has been abandoned. Faults of society have increased due to entitlement of i am number one and no one else matters.

All of this behaviour will only enforce more penalties, cameras.

So be it. Jurisdictions rely on money generated by fines so deliberate speeding just ads to the income.

Speeding on town streets is very disrespectful to the persons that live there.

A pet hate of mine is drivers that 'ride' pedestrians. I remember one popular road where cars moved at 70 over the rise to turn left 100 metres on, there didn't seem to be a way for pedestrians to cross the 6 metres between the side and the island by walking at 4 kmph. Many drivers seem to be bloody mindedly targeting the peds. Walking isn't safe. Multiculturalism doesn't help. Pedestrian deaths are rising.

Canem you are absolutely right. Drivers relying on brakes are a bug bare. Come the day when your brakes can make you faster or out of control in some conditions.
If you know you have a left or right turn coming up put the indicators on now not when you are at the intersection. The law says 30 meters before you turn. half the cars on the road are in turn motion before they indicate. That is where dash cameras are best fitted as drivers will lie to save themselves. My vehicle on the back says see you on U Tube along with your rego in small print. Drivers know when they have done wrong.
You are supposed to see the leading drivers wheels where they touch the road. Self entitlement should be a crime in the making.
When is an accident not an accident. When you are over the speed limit.

This subject is foremost of Australia's number one priority. so why so little conversation on such an important discussion.

People are being murdered by lethal force on our roads every day and who cares. Certainly the ones that do not stop to see what they have done.

Others just drive to be first in line. Towing caravans or other trailers see no difference in driving a sole sedan car.

Road sharing is a lost art of driving, now is more likely you watching every single car coming toward you to see if they are going to allow you to have your side of the road.

One for all or all for one or every man for themself.