I think we should resume the Bathurst track, & use it as a licencing test track.

All applicants for a licence should be allowed one test every 5 years, [definitely no more often], to be judged competent or otherwise. Old V8 super cars, now rather useless things, could be made available for hire for this test, at preferably exorbitant rates.

Any who are unable to lap in 2min 15 seconds, [the 100 MPH lap time, first achieved in 1968], should be failed, & banned from anything faster, or bigger than a bicycle, or perhaps a horse, until they have successfully tested at their next chance.

Survivors of any crashes should be held fully responsible for the cost of any repairs necessary.

Anyone found driving unlicensed should be deported to Tasmania, after first removing all vehicles & boats from the island.

With such a system we could then increase the speed limit to 160Km/H, [which was a legal speed when I got my licence], as most drivers would be competent.

I expect your agreement to this suggestion Ludwig, as it should reduce the population somewhat. Firstly by eliminating many incompetents from the population, then making it much harder for the youth to get together with a place to copulate.

Talk about a win win!

It's a mentality issue that's getting worse the longer we are without a National Service to instill sense & responsibility.
I know many who drive 10 times safer after a six pack than many sober people.
If there were more Police instead of so many Coppers the road user community would be a much happier & safer one.

579, you wrote:

<< The police should move their tolerance to cut out at 60, so drivers would be more inclined to drive to the speed limit. >>

I’d have no problem with that, just as long as they launched a major publicity campaign first so that everyone knew about it before it came into effect.

Whatever the case, the police have SURELY got to tell us, the general public, just exactly what they are policing! If right on the official speed limit, then fine, if 3 or 5 or 10ks over, no worries, .just as long as we know what the bloody hell they’re up to!

The policeable limit in Queensland has for a long time been 10kmh over – you wouldn’t get booked unless you were doing at least 11kmh over the official limit. Now that seems to be different in some circumstances, but we’ve heard nothing in the way of publicity about it.

So the cops have led us to understand that the real limit is ten ks over what the signs say, and then out of the blue they start booking people for doing 5 or 8 ks over. Now THAT is DESPICABLE!!

It reeks of revenue-raising!

In this state 60 means 60. What else can it mean. Police with number plate recognition catch drivers with unpayd fines as much as 40,ooo $.
Serial offenders, speeding or drunk, should never be allowed on the roads again.
Drivers that consistently drive in the right hand lane for kilometers on end for no reason, and drivers that put their blinker on after they have made a move.
Lazy drivers that can not steer a car moving over solid lines and cutting corners on intersections.
The said revenue raising, does not exist, Do the right thing and you will not be fined.
You get 40% off license renewal for a clean record.
If a policeman tells you to stand on your head, that is what you do without question.

<< Do the right thing and you will not be fined. >>

But 579, we need to know what the right thing is!!

Read the opening post – if you do the right thing by the letter of the law out on the open highway, you can actually be more of a hazard than if you do the safest thing! Is the safest thing not the right thing, especially when the policing regime allows you to not fastidiously stick to the speed limit?

Given that the cruising speed is almost always right up there on or just over the speed limit and perilously close to the bookable speed, we absolutely need to know exactly where we stand with the law. That is: exactly what the police are policing. And we need to know that it is consistent across the board.

<< In this state 60 means 60 >>

No it doesn’t. Not in any state. No one gets booked for doing 1 or 2 ks over.

<< If a policeman tells you to stand on your head, that is what you do without question. >>

If the policing regime was consistent and well elucidated, then yes, maybe. But a sloppy variable policing regime with speed limits and all sorts other stuff, and the huge discretionary powers of the police which mean that different parameters are policed in different places or even by different officers in the same town, is just crap…and really does corrode respect for the police and the law.

Here’s another example of hypocrisy in law that I raised on OLO a while back, and which resulted in a very good discussion: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=1976&page=0

Haaa haha Hasbeen.

Crikey, you’re and old HOON!

( :>)