LEARNING TO DRIVE

The one thing that almost everyone agrees on is the other guy can’t drive. We all have said it as we watch someone driving recklessly down Hespeler Road or as we watch someone weaving in and out of traffic and not signalling their intentions to turn left as they cruise past you, but rarely will we admit that we can drive badly as well. I know I am not a perfect driver and i occasionally make a mistake behind the wheel, but just the other day i asked myself a simple Question..how many mistakes have I not caught? 1 a day, maybe just 2, after all I have been driving for almost 40 years and have never had an accident so I must be doing something right, aren’t I? And then I started to think what would happen if I had to take my driving test again? Would I pass? I would like to think so but you never know now do you? And that brings me to something that has been on my mind for a little while now and that is something that many people will scream about but I feel it is time that the rules of driving be changed, no not the road rules but the rules in regard to our licenses, it is time that our Government take a serious look at the licencing of our Provinces drivers and make some serious changes to it. We need to make it mandatory that ALL drivers be retested every so often, let’s say every 5 years till the age of 65 and then perhaps every two years after that. I am not saying that you would lose your license if you fail a re-test straight up as we would need a safety zone in the program so minor problems in a persons driving could be pointed out and corrected, while those with major driving issues would be giving a time period to work on those said issues. Cost could be a problem and that is where the Insurance company’s come in to play as they should be required to pay a percentage of the costs of a program like this, and perhaps (I know it’s a daydream) they could work some magic and add some savings on to our Insurance renewals.Will it work? Not likely but I would hope that our elected Leaders would have the foresight to consider such an issue because we need something like this to get rid of some of the bad drivers on the road today, I just hope I am not one of them.