Drug driving

[IanF]

Interesting report. I wonder if a lot of the non-alcohol drinking younger generation are finding other ways to relax without realising the fact they are reducing their ability to drive…

https://news.sky.com/video/share-13548622

It’s ridiculous they get to continue driving until the blood report is completed 4 months later!

[Beany]

I mean, if they think having a big bifta, or a couple of lines of columbian marching powder isn't going to impact their driving capability, then they probably shouldn't be driving, or allowed near sharp objects, or be leaving their home without their full time carer.

Surely people can't be that fucking stupid.

[dinny_g]

There was a string of cases in Ireland recently of people being stopped on Sunday and Monday mornings (fairly common trying to catch the "morning after - over the limit" drivers), refusing the breathalyser of having inconclusive breathalyser and being subjected to a blood test.

the blood test proved they under the drink drive limit but cannabis showed up - from days previously. They hadn't smoked at all the days before they were stopped - but still in their system at measurable quantities and they got done for drug driving...

[Gavster]

The big one round here is bloons, there’s so many kids sitting around in their friend’s car smashing through canisters of fast gas, then driving off and smashing into something. A friend who’s a brain surgeon is seeing more and more kids walking like they’re paralytic drunks because N2O is destroying their motor skills.

[Mito Man]

Drug use is absolutely rife now. 7am in Covent Garden there’s always the same chaps standing in the same places. You eventually notice them in the mornings because it’s relatively quiet and everyone is commuting, there’s no loitering tourists so they stick out. Stop somewhere to grab breakfast and you’ll notice all sorts of people approach them. Smartly dressed men in suits, women, young and older.
5 years ago it was more of a thing in the alleys but it seems to be openly accepted now. At least the people here won’t be driving a car but damn there’s a lot of people struggling out there.

[Barry]

Those of you that ride motorcycles (and probably the cyclists here) know just how prevalent it is, I get whiffs of weed constantly when I'm amongst traffic. Folk seem to think its victimless or something..

That said, standards are so fvcking poor these days they don't even stand out.

[Jimexpl]

The big one round here is bloons, there’s so many kids sitting around in their friend’s car smashing through canisters of fast gas, then driving off and smashing into something. A friend who’s a brain surgeon is seeing more and more kids walking like they’re paralytic drunks because N2O is destroying their motor skills.

When my Defender got hit in SE1 outside my father-in-law’s the driver was on bloons - at least they were on the floor of the car when I found it after an hour of driving around council estates in the morning!

[Nefarious]

It's not just the kids. I was mildly shocked to find out that the mum of one of my daughter's mates (who is a GP) just goes about her regular day, including driving and diagnosing patients while on 5mg of valium. She saw absolutely no problem with it.

[ZedLeg]

It’s probably one of those things that had previously been masked by drink driving rates but is becoming more noticeable as they’ve dropped.

I’d get in cars with people who were high in the 90s so it’s not new.

[Ascender]

Coke is absolutely rife up here and like Nef says, it's not just the kids at it. Nobody seems too bothered about hiding it either...

[jamcg]

The cocaine is the reason I’m all for legalising cannabis. I don’t smoke it, and the fact it’s illegal is no deterrent these days, the country may as well be bringing in some tax from it, plus all the people who suddenly go from unemployment to being weed farmers, stop stealing electricity in the most dangerous ways you can imagine, and people who don’t pay a license to grow or sell illegally become an issue for hm revenue and customs, rather than the police, so they can focus on the coke, crack, heroin, meth, spice, all the drugs that genuinely ruin people’s lives. All I think when I smell someone smoking it is how much tax revenue the country has just lost.

Obviously it’s not as simple an issue as that, but when people bring up the cost to the NHS it’s a cost we’re already bearing. Might as well get that cost covered

As for the driving there’s a mental process of “I’m smoking something illegal, I may as well drive even though that’s illegal” so it doesn’t necessarily develop the same stigma as drink driving. That mentality is also what has got some people I know into cocaine and one into heroin. I’m already doing x, might as well do z, especially when dealers have those people “free samples”

[ZedLeg]

We should legalise more because prohibition has never in the entire history of people worked tbh.

[Jobbo]

We should legalise more because prohibition has never in the entire history of people worked tbh.

Yes, just tax drugs instead like alcolohol and tobacco.

[duncs500]

so they can focus on the coke, crack, heroin, meth, spice, all the drugs that genuinely ruin people’s lives.

Having seen weed ruin people's lives, I wouldn't say it doesn't have its issues. You could say the same about alcohol as well though!

[Rich B]

yeah, i’ve tried plenty of drugs over the years, but i don’t think i’d want any of them easier to get hold of or more acceptable.

[ZedLeg]

They’re not hard to get hold of now though.

Like, a whatsapp message and someone will deliver within the hour. No harder than ordering a takeaway.

There’s just no regulation or quality control because the entire industry is illegal.

[Rich B]

They’re not hard to get hold of now though.

Like, a whatsapp message and someone will deliver within the hour. No harder than ordering a takeaway.

There’s just no regulation or quality control because the entire industry is illegal.

You’re already in that world though, you have dealers numbers in your phone. Sure, it’s dead easy once you’ve got yourself into that scene.

For lots of kids though, the fact they don’t have the route to getting it easily is a deterrent along with it being risky because it’s illegal.

Legalise it and it’ll just be like alcohol - they’re all going to give it a go as a matter of course, which will lead to a lot more people using drugs.

all imo of course.

[Mito Man]

Sounds like the future to me. AI and robots doing all the work out there, rest of us fleshy mortals on universal income hooked to government provided drugs
We will have nothing but we will have a good time.

[Nefarious]

Not sure what has legally changed, but I believe one of the previous issues with drug driving convictions was the definition of "unfit". With alcohol, there was an agreed limit of alcohol in your blood, but with other things it was a case of if it were detectable you could be deemed under the influence. Given that weed, for example, remains detectable for 30 days that leaves a pretty big gap between being "unfit" and there being evidence of previous consumption. I think they used to need a police doctor at the time to give his expert opinion on your fitness to drive. Not sure what the current situation is.