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Road safety is a continuously debated subject – we are always thinking of new ways to make our roads safer and reduce accidents, which is all great to hear. And there are more ideas on the horizon; including one outlined in sources from the BBC suggesting that restrictions on newly qualified drivers could reduce road accidents.

According to the source (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11376809), a new proposed scheme would see newly qualified drivers having to adhere to night time curfews and restrictions on carrying passengers of a similar age, according to research from Cardiff University. It is suggested that a “graduate driving license” for drivers aged 17 – 19 could potentially save more than 200 lives and result in 1,700 fewer serious injuries each year. This is quite a statement.

The research suggests that one in five new drivers’ crash within the first 6 months of passing their test. This statistic doesn’t surprise me – it’s a common fact that you only really learn to drive once you have passed your test and you are out there on the roads by yourself. I’m sure many of you will agree that it’s an entirely different ball game; and many young drivers are known to be a little overexcited on the roads, if you get what I mean! The research indicates that some kind of a “graduate driving license” would reduce many accidents.
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We place a huge amount of trust in our medical team, and most of the time the advice or treatment they give up is right. There are few tragic occasions, like this one, where they make mistakes. This can cause further injury, illness or even death.

Eleven doctors failed to trace signs of cancer, and now mum of three is told she’ll die. Angela Skeffington, 43, was given just weeks to live after doctors failed to trace tell-tale signs of cancer.

Angela first noticed something was wrong five months ago, although on numerous visits to the doctors she was told she was suffering from period pains. The 43-year-old gran of five has now been diagnosed with terminal stomach cancer. Medics say it has spread to her liver and lymph nodes and is far too advanced to operate.
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If you’ve been involved in an accident or are extremely ill and need urgent medical attention you’d expect the medic attending to you to get there as fast as possible. Not in this case.

An ambulance driver has been told he could lose his job and his licence after he was clocked by a speed camera travelling at 112mph when rushing to attend to a patient in need.

Paul Bex, who received the letter from police informing him that he faces prosecution, was speeding under blue lights to attend to a home patient after a surgeon told him he needed a liver plant within three hours.
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It’s 5pm and you’ve just tuned into the radio, for the ‘big drive home’. Within minutes it’s time for the travel news, which kindly informs you that there has been another pile up on the M1, which means you’ll be queuing in traffic for a good few hours.

This means that you’ll be using more petrol, which is costing you more money. But I’m guessing at that moment in time that’s the least of your worries. All you can think about is getting home and sitting in front the T.V with a nice cuppa tea, unless it’s close to pay day and your tanks showing red.

That’s what runs through my mind every day I finish work. I jump in the car, and rush off home. Happily singing along to the tunes on the radio generously picked out by my favourite DJ on my chosen radio station.
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Two teenagers were killed as a car carrying five pals went over a mountains edge.

Chloe Lane-Busby, 16 and Jai Burkes, 18 were both found dead at the scene when the car they were travelling home in after a night out plunged off a cliff.

One passenger aged 16 managed to escape from the wreckage to get help.

When rescuers arrived at the scene, they discovered that the car had landed on its roof in 4ft of water.
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Last week in the news (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11083236), it has been reported that written complaints against the NHS has seen the biggest annual rise ever seen since records began 12 years ago.

Over 100,000 complaints were made in 2009/2010 and this was a 13.4% increase on the complaints made in the previous year.

On average, the annual increase in complaints per year from 1997/1998 has been 1.1%; so the rise seen this year is drastic.
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It’s a wet day today at The Injury Lawyers camp – the rain has been coming down quite hard over the weekend and today, and the roads are wet and pose a possible hazard. We should all take extra care on wet roads; rather obviously, we must ensure to keep a greater distance between vehicles, keep speed to a sensible minimum, and keep an extra eye out with the rainwater clogging up our windscreens.  But even without the rain, accidents are still so easy to be involved in – and they are all too common.

In fact, just last Friday I managed to dodge a road accident on my way home from work. Whilst driving down a residential road, another vehicle clearly had not looked in to my road before emerging from a side road, and ended up pulling right out in front of me. It was certainly a nerve-racking experience; the car-lined residential street was in no way capable of allowing two vehicles to pass next to each other.

 A head on collision was marginally avoided as I managed to swerve to evade the offending vehicle, narrowly (and I mean, narrowly – there were millimetres in it!) missing a circular metal barrier for a pathway tree on the side of the road. In fact, the barrier itself had already been bent inwards and was pressing against the tree. Clearly someone has already hit it sometime before me – which turned out to work in my favour. Had the barrier been fully extended, I would certainly have hit it! A bit of a miracle it may seem (although I hope whichever poor sole hit it before me wasn’t too badly hurt).
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It is saddening that not a day can go by when it appears that there are reports of fatal accidents on Britain’s roads. In fact it is a news headline which dominates these days and seems to be on the increase.

I previously wrote an article on the changes that the government are looking to implement in relation to driving tests in order to try and provide learner drivers with more awareness and get them used to driving independently on our roads.
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In recent news, it has been reported that a taxi driver reached speeds of 100mph in freezing conditions whilst he had passengers in his vehicle.

Neil Colquhoun told his two passengers, Victoria and Louise Guthrie to “shut up” when they asked him to slow down, as he raced along at dangerous speeds. Mr Colquhoun reached speeds of up to 70mph in built up areas that have a speed limit of 30mph. He then went on to overtake another vehicle on a blind bend. The two sisters were left feeling very “shaken” and to make matters worse, they recently lost their brother in a motorbike crash.

The sisters must have been terrified by the speeds that Mr. Colquhoun reached as he sped past the scene of one of Scotland’s worst road accidents. As they left Perth, Mr. Colquhoun overtook the vehicle on the blind bend and then went on to reach speeds of 100mph on the Burnbrae Straight near Methven where five people died in 2007 in a road accident. The sisters told Perth Sheriff Court that they watched the speedometer as Mr. Colquhoun continued to drive at speeds of 70mph as he drove through the village of Methven.
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We are all aware that there is a lot of controversy around in today’s society about what ‘can’ and ‘can’t’ be done and I have to say that on occasions I read some shockers and today was no exception.

Whilst browsing the Daily Mail’s website this morning I came across an article regarding the theft of 3 ‘high powered’ motorbikes from a store in Altrincham, Manchester. The robbers raided the store and fled at high speeds on the stolen bikes.

Accordingly, the store owner had called for police assistance only to be astonished when the officers in attendance were ordered not to give chase as the criminals were not wearing any safety equipment! The store owner had to literally stand by and watch the bikes be driven off into the distance with nobody able to do anything about it.
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