I had this conversation with Vern recently and then brought it up again the following evening with my fellow bloggers over a few drinks in Gallagher's Fun House.
What if, when you turn 21, you can apply for a license to drink. A bar/restaurant cannot serve you alcohol unless you produce this license. If you get caught drunk driving then you loose your license to drink and not your license to drive.
My rationale behind this is that it is not the driving that is the problem it is the drinking. By taking away someones driving license you can cause a lot of hardship for the people that depend on that person and not just the person. If that person is a father that needs to ferry the kids around then you may end up with a household with just one driver (the mother) and everyone else dependent on her (including the husband) for rides.
Revoking someones license to drink can also be used in other situations where drinking has been or is currently causing a problem. The courts could revoke that license or the drinker could voluntarily allow the revocation of such license for a period of time.
Just some random thoughts on the matter.
4 comments:
firstly its lose not loose.
secondly this is not your greatest idea. whats to stop someone else going to the bottle store for you, buying bucketloads of alcohol and pouring it down your throat. also how do you get rounds in at the pub? do you h ave to collect each person's card prior to ordering? will tea totallers be able to sell their cards on ebay?
they had a similar system in the army here, we were allowed 2 beers a night, and as we were classified as govt property they had a right to enforce it. problem was that not everyone went to the pub every night, and it would be the norm to be able to get in at least 10 beers a night.
personally i prefer the shocking steering wheel anti hijack theme.
hope you well otherwise.
mike
There's nothing stopping you from driving a car either after your license has been revoked for DUI. So the same methods for enforcing that would apply to the drinking license revoked.
Thanks for correcting the spelling. How did you spot the mistake?
They have another method here for convicted DUI drivers after they are allowed to drive again. Their cars are fitted with breathalyzers. They have to blow into a tube before the ignition will work. After that the car will cut-out every 10 minutes for the next 60 minutes and they will be required to pull over to the side of the road and use the breathalyzer again and restart the car. Apparently if you're an estate agent trying to sell houses it doesn't look that good.
is that car cutting out thing genuine? every car should be fitted with one, and every time you try to start the car with too much booze on your breath it shortens the cut out interval. ergo if you never try to start the car whilst over the limit your car will never cut out. just what the world needs, a bunch of tea-totalling estate agents.
spotted the misspell by reading the clip.
you spoken to paddy? he seems happy enough in the desert.
Yes the breathalyzer activated ignition is genuine. The reason that it cuts out after 10 minutes and does that each 10 minutes for the first hour is so that a sober person can't breath in for you before you leave and not ride with you. If that's the case then the sober person needs to be in the car and stay with you for the journey. Kind of makes sense that the sober person then drives.
One of the problems with this device is that it is super sensitive. I was told about one which deactivated the car when a teenager with plenty of alcohol based deodorant got into the back of the car. Just breathing in the deodorant fumes were enough to lock out the ignition.
The same person (ex-employee of the department of transport) told me about the realtor (estate agent) who had to do this. Apparently he had to change professions because he wasn't making any sales.
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