Quote:
Originally Posted by sushi_chef
I have been reading this thread with great interest over the last few days and it's an excellent debate.
I agree with some previous comments about the statistics but putting these aside I'd like to look at it from a different angle.
First of all lets consider what might make someone a good / low risk driver a poor / high risk driver?
Age / maturity? Common Sense? Experience? Level of advanced driver training? General level of health / fitness? Knowledge of Highway Code?
If we take the above 6 variables we can grade them from 1 - 5 with 1 being the lowest risk and 5 being the highest.
Now lets take some example drivers
Driver A: 21 years old (4) Lots of common sense (1) Experience, not much (4) Done sone advanced courses (3) Health / Fitness, Excellent (1) and only a couple of years after passing test has a good knowledge of the highway code (2)
Overall Score 15
Driver B: 38 years old (2) No common Sense (5) Experience, plenty (2) No Advanced courses (5) Health / Fitness, average (3) Not read the highway code since before his test (3)
Overall Score 20
Obviously you could go on for ever with hypothetical examples.
The point that I am trying to make is that being a "good driver" takes in to account a lot of factors and all of those factors count. If someone said to me, "sushi, theres a 21 year old driver and a 38 year old driver, who's the biggest risk?" I would say the 21 year old driver, the example above shows that this may not be the case.
So, whilst it may be wrong to strerotype younger drivers, people may often stereotpe by basing their opinion on the limited information that they have, rightly or wrongly.
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You make some valid and interesting points but the problem is we have to start somewhere and generally that beginning is with statistics - whether they are accurate or not - we start there because we understand numbers. I guess the problem with the age thing is that because statistically speaking one age group is considered to be a higher risk than the other it doesn't take in to consideration the individual as it would be impossible to create a system that would be able to cope with this.
So we are left with a system that is based on the majority and penalises the minority - but how do you change it?
Personally I think we should all have to undergo refresher courses every ten years or so - not retake out test but some kind of course that measures our ability to ensure we are still driving within the law and are still competent to drive. Maybe through the course you could be graded and that grading could be reflected in insurance premiums - maybe this would be fairer to the person rather than to age group you sit in. In this way if you obtain a lower grade, even if you are in your 30's and have been driving for many years, then maybe your insurance premium would be higher and more reflect your competence rather than your perceived competence.